Rapid automatized naming
Encyclopedia
Rapid automatized naming (RAN) is a task that measures how quickly individuals can name aloud objects, pictures, colors, or
symbol
s (letters or digits). Variations in rapid automatized naming time in children provide a strong predictor of their later ability to read
, and is independent from other predictors such as phonological awareness
, verbal IQ, and existing reading skills (Powell, Stainthorp, Stuart, Garwood & Quinlan, 2007).
Importantly, it can predict later reading abilities for pre-literate children from their rapid automatized naming of pictures and letters (Lervag & Hulme, 2009).
were later unable to name colors despite being able to color match and having no evidence of Color blindness
(Denckla & Cutting, 1999). These individuals however were able to spell and write, indicating that their brain structures were intact and that they could generate the pathway from spoken words to visual and kinaesthetic representations (Denckla & Cutting, 1999). This visual-verbal disconnection led to a search for individuals who could not read and may be unable to name colors, primarily grade one students (Denckla & Cutting, 1999). It was found that in grade one students who could not read, color naming was possible but took much longer than color naming in children who could read (Denckla & Cutting, 1999).
The first color naming task was located in Ruesch and Wells Mental Examiner’s Handbook (1972) (Denckla & Cutting, 1999). It consisted of a 50 squares of 5 primary colors
repeated in random order 10 times. The test was originally administered as a timed continuous test at the bedside of individuals recovering from head injury (Denckla & Cutting, 1999).
Rapid automatized naming was first identified in 1974 as predicting reading abilities in young English readers between 5–11 years of age by Martha Denckla and Rita Rudel of Columbia University
(Denckla & Rudel, 1974).
Faster times in RAN trials have been found to be a good indicator of reading competence, not only in alphabetic writing system
s, but in writing systems such as Chinese logographs and Japanese kanji
and hiragana
(Ho, CS-H.& Lai, DN-Ch, 1999); (Koybayashi, Haynes, Macaruso, Hook & Kato, 2005). RAN testing has been shown to be effective in testing reader’s fluency in languages with orthographically
transparent alphabetic scripts
such as German and Dutch (Wimmer, Mayringer & Landerl, 2000). Timed reading tests of poor readers of transparent orthographies show very few reading errors; their main reading problem is slow, laborious decoding for words that are automatically read by their peers. This was also found for other readers in languages with consistent orthographies such as Spanish, Italian and Dutch (Wimmer, Mayringer & Landerl, 2000).
Another finding is that English based dyslexia overlooks naming-speed deficit because in most studies only poor word recognition is used to diagnose reading disability (Wimmer, Mayringer & Landerl, 2000). English is an inconsistent orthography because it has poor letter sound correspondences
. English and French orthography are also inconsistent because of their use of silent letters (Wimmer, Mayringer & Landerl, 2000).
It has been found that continuous rapid naming of list items, compared to naming of single, items is easier for nondyslexic readers than it is for dyslexic
ones (Jones, Branigan & Kelly, 2009).
Two formats of RAN testing are used, discrete and serial testing.
s and must name the symbols sequentially as fast as possible (de Jong, 2011). An assumption made of serial RAN testing is that it consists of two components: articulation
time (the mean time it takes to articulate the symbol), and pause time (the mean length of time between naming two adjacent symbols)(de Jong, 2011). When referring to pause time, this can include saccadic eye movements
, disengagement from previously named symbols and focusing on upcoming symbols (de Jong, 2011).
from memory
which can also be referred to as lexical access speed (de Jong, 2011).
Some researchers argue that discrete testing is a better method because of individual differences in the reading speed of a list of sight words; the relationship of RAN and reading will be stronger if sight word reading speed is measured by discrete presentation (de Jong, 2011).
in children. It is often used to predict category membership in reading group sub-types (Arnell, Klein, Joanisse & Busseri, 2009).
Today researchers use RAN to test orthographic interpretation and phonological awareness. Two tests used to test RAN are the CTOPP and TOWRE (Furnes & Samuelsson, 2011).
Some concerns with testing rapid automatized naming include the fact that it assesses a wide range of cognitive skills
. This includes the fact that speed and accuracy can be influenced by many different processing mechanisms (Arnell, Klein, Joanisse & Busseri, 2009). Another concern is identifying which cognitive mechanisms are shared with reading (Arnell, Klein, Joanisse & Busseri, 2009). This includes whether RAN is testing orthographic knowledge or whether it is testing phonological processing. Today, it remains unclear what processes RAN is actually testing (Arnell, Klein, Joanisse & Busseri, 2009).
It has been suggested that RAN may link to reading because reading depends on object-naming circuits in the left cerebral hemisphere
that are recruited in reading to underpin word-recognition abilities (Lervag & Hulme, 2009).
Researchers argue that RAN tests "the ability to retrieve phonological representations rapidly from long-term memory" (de Jong, 2011). Part of this view consists of RAN as tapping into the phonological system by measuring the rate of retrieval of phonological information in long term memory. "The theoretical underpinnings being that, beyond the preciseness or accuracy of the grapheme–phoneme representations itself, rapid access to phonological representations is the main prerequisite to develop automaticity in reading a transparent writing system" (Furnes & Samuelsson, 2011).
Others however dispute the support for RAN testing phonological processing. They argue that phonological awareness is more strongly related to pure decoding ability, whereas naming speed appears to be more strongly related to reading fluency (Shatschneider, Carlson, Francis, Foorman & Fletcher, 2002). Similarly, other researchers view RAN as a sub-process of phonological awareness. In this view RAN is seen as a task that draws on accessing phonological codes for effective execution (Swanson, 2003).
Studies have been conducted where RAN has been seen to measure reading of different kinds of words. These researchers argue that "the relationship of RAN with reading should be higher if the reading task requires more orthographic knowledge." The results of some studies tend to support this prediction as stronger relationships were found with exception word reading (de Jong, 2011).
"The fact that RAN as a predictor of reading and spelling was not affected by orthographic regularity seems to suggest that RAN is a compound skill that consists of several sub-processes that are related to early literacy development. These processes might very well imply both orthographical and phonological skills" (Furnes & Samuelsson, 2011).
. Another related theory is that both depend on variations in the rate of development of a general cognitive speed of information processing (Kail & Hall, 1994); (Kail, Hall & Caskey, 1999).
The validity of RAN in measuring reading ability is based on three assumptions. First, that RAN deficits and phonological deficits are independent of one another (Swanson, 2003). Secondly, the relationship between RAN and phonological awareness varies according to reading maturity (Swanson, 2003). Finally, naming speed is a complex process involving processes beyond the phonological system (Swanson, 2003).
One of the issues of labelling RAN as a measure of reading ability is that it ignores many complexities. Some argue "that rapid naming tasks are composed of attentional, visual, lexical, temporal, and recognition sub-processes that all contribute to naming speed performance. Lumping all these sub-processes under the category of phonological processes obscures the complexity of rapid naming tasks. Such a hypothesis is consistent with the finding that naming speed tasks consistently account for variance in early reading skills beyond that accounted for by measures of phonemic awareness" (Schatschneider et al., 2002).
Another viewpoint is that rapid automatized naming directly relates to differences in reading competence. Supporting this is the fact that the ability to rapidly name digits and letters predicts reading better than rapidly naming colors and objects. This suggests a difference due to differences in experience with letters. However, rapid automatized naming of colors, objects, numbers and letters measured in children before they learn to read predicts later differences in reading skill, while early differences in reading ability do not predict later differences in rapid automatized naming (Lervag & Hulme, 2009).
” in which phonological deficits and naming-speed deficits are two separate causes of reading problems, such that when they are combined, they produce a greater dyslexic defect than would be produced by either deficit individually (Wolf & Bowers, 1999).
The double-deficit hypothesis suggests that RAN and phonological awareness operate as independent systems that are equally important in word identification (Swanson, 431). This model is based on literature showing that phonological disabilities and naming speed-deficits underlie some forms of reading disabilities (Swanson, 2003).
In the case of modest or severe reading disability, the concurrence of both a phonological deficit and rapid naming deficit characterizes the most difficult forms of reading disabilities. These individuals score lowest on reading measures (Swanson, 2003).
In contrast, others argue that although the relationship between RAN and phonological awareness is monotonic, these measures do not produce uniform changes. Instead, as reading skills increase or decrease, RAN and phonological awareness skills do not change uniformly (Swanson, 2003).
Evidence exists that RAN’s contribution to reading ability decreases as we age. Longitudinal studies report that the contribution of naming speed to reading skills after grade 3 diminishes, whereas the contribution of phonological awareness remains constant (Swanson, 2003).
symbol
Symbol
A symbol is something which represents an idea, a physical entity or a process but is distinct from it. The purpose of a symbol is to communicate meaning. For example, a red octagon may be a symbol for "STOP". On a map, a picture of a tent might represent a campsite. Numerals are symbols for...
s (letters or digits). Variations in rapid automatized naming time in children provide a strong predictor of their later ability to read
Reading (process)
Reading is a complex cognitive process of decoding symbols for the intention of constructing or deriving meaning . It is a means of language acquisition, of communication, and of sharing information and ideas...
, and is independent from other predictors such as phonological awareness
Phonological awareness
Phonological awareness refers to an individual's awareness of the phonological structure, or sound structure, of spoken words. Phonological awareness is an important and reliable predictor of later reading ability and has, therefore, been the focus of much research.- Overview :Phonological...
, verbal IQ, and existing reading skills (Powell, Stainthorp, Stuart, Garwood & Quinlan, 2007).
Importantly, it can predict later reading abilities for pre-literate children from their rapid automatized naming of pictures and letters (Lervag & Hulme, 2009).
History
The concept of rapid automatized naming began with a study by Geshwind and Fusillo in 1966. They found some adults who suffered from a strokeStroke
A stroke, previously known medically as a cerebrovascular accident , is the rapidly developing loss of brain function due to disturbance in the blood supply to the brain. This can be due to ischemia caused by blockage , or a hemorrhage...
were later unable to name colors despite being able to color match and having no evidence of Color blindness
Color blindness
Color blindness or color vision deficiency is the inability or decreased ability to see color, or perceive color differences, under lighting conditions when color vision is not normally impaired...
(Denckla & Cutting, 1999). These individuals however were able to spell and write, indicating that their brain structures were intact and that they could generate the pathway from spoken words to visual and kinaesthetic representations (Denckla & Cutting, 1999). This visual-verbal disconnection led to a search for individuals who could not read and may be unable to name colors, primarily grade one students (Denckla & Cutting, 1999). It was found that in grade one students who could not read, color naming was possible but took much longer than color naming in children who could read (Denckla & Cutting, 1999).
The first color naming task was located in Ruesch and Wells Mental Examiner’s Handbook (1972) (Denckla & Cutting, 1999). It consisted of a 50 squares of 5 primary colors
Primary Colors
Primary Colors: A Novel of Politics is a roman à clef, a work of fiction that purports to describe real life characters and events — namely, Bill Clinton's first presidential campaign in 1992...
repeated in random order 10 times. The test was originally administered as a timed continuous test at the bedside of individuals recovering from head injury (Denckla & Cutting, 1999).
Rapid automatized naming was first identified in 1974 as predicting reading abilities in young English readers between 5–11 years of age by Martha Denckla and Rita Rudel of Columbia University
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
(Denckla & Rudel, 1974).
Faster times in RAN trials have been found to be a good indicator of reading competence, not only in alphabetic writing system
Writing system
A writing system is a symbolic system used to represent elements or statements expressible in language.-General properties:Writing systems are distinguished from other possible symbolic communication systems in that the reader must usually understand something of the associated spoken language to...
s, but in writing systems such as Chinese logographs and Japanese kanji
Kanji
Kanji are the adopted logographic Chinese characters hanzi that are used in the modern Japanese writing system along with hiragana , katakana , Indo Arabic numerals, and the occasional use of the Latin alphabet...
and hiragana
Hiragana
is a Japanese syllabary, one basic component of the Japanese writing system, along with katakana, kanji, and the Latin alphabet . Hiragana and katakana are both kana systems, in which each character represents one mora...
(Ho, CS-H.& Lai, DN-Ch, 1999); (Koybayashi, Haynes, Macaruso, Hook & Kato, 2005). RAN testing has been shown to be effective in testing reader’s fluency in languages with orthographically
Orthography
The orthography of a language specifies a standardized way of using a specific writing system to write the language. Where more than one writing system is used for a language, for example Kurdish, Uyghur, Serbian or Inuktitut, there can be more than one orthography...
transparent alphabetic scripts
Alphabet
An alphabet is a standard set of letters—basic written symbols or graphemes—each of which represents a phoneme in a spoken language, either as it exists now or as it was in the past. There are other systems, such as logographies, in which each character represents a word, morpheme, or semantic...
such as German and Dutch (Wimmer, Mayringer & Landerl, 2000). Timed reading tests of poor readers of transparent orthographies show very few reading errors; their main reading problem is slow, laborious decoding for words that are automatically read by their peers. This was also found for other readers in languages with consistent orthographies such as Spanish, Italian and Dutch (Wimmer, Mayringer & Landerl, 2000).
Another finding is that English based dyslexia overlooks naming-speed deficit because in most studies only poor word recognition is used to diagnose reading disability (Wimmer, Mayringer & Landerl, 2000). English is an inconsistent orthography because it has poor letter sound correspondences
Phonemic orthography
A phonemic orthography is a writing system where the written graphemes correspond to phonemes, the spoken sounds of the language. In terms of orthographic depth, these are termed shallow orthographies, contrasting with deep orthographies...
. English and French orthography are also inconsistent because of their use of silent letters (Wimmer, Mayringer & Landerl, 2000).
It has been found that continuous rapid naming of list items, compared to naming of single, items is easier for nondyslexic readers than it is for dyslexic
Dyslexia
Dyslexia is a very broad term defining a learning disability that impairs a person's fluency or comprehension accuracy in being able to read, and which can manifest itself as a difficulty with phonological awareness, phonological decoding, orthographic coding, auditory short-term memory, or rapid...
ones (Jones, Branigan & Kelly, 2009).
Types of RAN Testing
Rapid automatized naming can be used in many different ways. One of its strengths is flexibility in what types of stimuli categories it uses. Different categories consist of colors, digits, objects and letters (Arnell, Klein, Joanisse & Busseri, 2009).Two formats of RAN testing are used, discrete and serial testing.
Serial Testing
Using a serial testing method, participants are shown a row or column of symbolSymbol
A symbol is something which represents an idea, a physical entity or a process but is distinct from it. The purpose of a symbol is to communicate meaning. For example, a red octagon may be a symbol for "STOP". On a map, a picture of a tent might represent a campsite. Numerals are symbols for...
s and must name the symbols sequentially as fast as possible (de Jong, 2011). An assumption made of serial RAN testing is that it consists of two components: articulation
Articulate sound
Articulate sounds are vocalizations that express the letters, syllables, etc, of any alphabet, or language. Non-humans cannot form articulate sounds, cannot articulate the sounds of their voice, excepting some few birds, as the parrot, magpie, Parakeet, etc....
time (the mean time it takes to articulate the symbol), and pause time (the mean length of time between naming two adjacent symbols)(de Jong, 2011). When referring to pause time, this can include saccadic eye movements
Saccade
A saccade is a fast movement of an eye, head or other part of an animal's body or device. It can also be a fast shift in frequency of an emitted signal or other quick change. Saccades are quick, simultaneous movements of both eyes in the same direction...
, disengagement from previously named symbols and focusing on upcoming symbols (de Jong, 2011).
Discrete Testing
Using the discrete testing method, participants are shown symbols individually usually on a computer screen (de Jong, 2011). In discrete RAN testing each individual symbols' naming latency is measured. The naming latency consists of the mean time from presentation to articulation of symbol (de Jong, 2011). It is scored using the mean naming latency of all symbols (de Jong, 2011). Some theorists believe that discrete RAN testing reflects the retrieval of phonological codePhonology
Phonology is, broadly speaking, the subdiscipline of linguistics concerned with the sounds of language. That is, it is the systematic use of sound to encode meaning in any spoken human language, or the field of linguistics studying this use...
from memory
Memory
In psychology, memory is an organism's ability to store, retain, and recall information and experiences. Traditional studies of memory began in the fields of philosophy, including techniques of artificially enhancing memory....
which can also be referred to as lexical access speed (de Jong, 2011).
Some researchers argue that discrete testing is a better method because of individual differences in the reading speed of a list of sight words; the relationship of RAN and reading will be stronger if sight word reading speed is measured by discrete presentation (de Jong, 2011).
Criticism
Today RAN is frequently used as a clinical instrument for diagnosing reading disabilitiesReading disability
A reading disability is a condition in which a sufferer displays difficulty reading resulting primarily from neurological factors. Developmental Dyslexia, Alexia , and Hyperlexia.-Definition:...
in children. It is often used to predict category membership in reading group sub-types (Arnell, Klein, Joanisse & Busseri, 2009).
Today researchers use RAN to test orthographic interpretation and phonological awareness. Two tests used to test RAN are the CTOPP and TOWRE (Furnes & Samuelsson, 2011).
Some concerns with testing rapid automatized naming include the fact that it assesses a wide range of cognitive skills
Cognition
In science, cognition refers to mental processes. These processes include attention, remembering, producing and understanding language, solving problems, and making decisions. Cognition is studied in various disciplines such as psychology, philosophy, linguistics, and computer science...
. This includes the fact that speed and accuracy can be influenced by many different processing mechanisms (Arnell, Klein, Joanisse & Busseri, 2009). Another concern is identifying which cognitive mechanisms are shared with reading (Arnell, Klein, Joanisse & Busseri, 2009). This includes whether RAN is testing orthographic knowledge or whether it is testing phonological processing. Today, it remains unclear what processes RAN is actually testing (Arnell, Klein, Joanisse & Busseri, 2009).
Theories
The role RAN plays in testing reading ability is contentious. Research supports the use of RAN as a measure of phonological processing, as a measure of orthographic processing and integration, and as a measure of reading ability.It has been suggested that RAN may link to reading because reading depends on object-naming circuits in the left cerebral hemisphere
Cerebral hemisphere
A cerebral hemisphere is one of the two regions of the eutherian brain that are delineated by the median plane, . The brain can thus be described as being divided into left and right cerebral hemispheres. Each of these hemispheres has an outer layer of grey matter called the cerebral cortex that is...
that are recruited in reading to underpin word-recognition abilities (Lervag & Hulme, 2009).
Phonological Processing
Little is known about the mediator variable between phonological awareness and RAN and the relationship between phonological awareness and RAN (Swanson, 2003).Researchers argue that RAN tests "the ability to retrieve phonological representations rapidly from long-term memory" (de Jong, 2011). Part of this view consists of RAN as tapping into the phonological system by measuring the rate of retrieval of phonological information in long term memory. "The theoretical underpinnings being that, beyond the preciseness or accuracy of the grapheme–phoneme representations itself, rapid access to phonological representations is the main prerequisite to develop automaticity in reading a transparent writing system" (Furnes & Samuelsson, 2011).
Others however dispute the support for RAN testing phonological processing. They argue that phonological awareness is more strongly related to pure decoding ability, whereas naming speed appears to be more strongly related to reading fluency (Shatschneider, Carlson, Francis, Foorman & Fletcher, 2002). Similarly, other researchers view RAN as a sub-process of phonological awareness. In this view RAN is seen as a task that draws on accessing phonological codes for effective execution (Swanson, 2003).
Orthographic Processing
Others, however, argue that RAN plays a larger role in measuring orthographic processing. Here RAN is believed to measure processes that are important in gaining orthographic representations (de Jong, 2011).Studies have been conducted where RAN has been seen to measure reading of different kinds of words. These researchers argue that "the relationship of RAN with reading should be higher if the reading task requires more orthographic knowledge." The results of some studies tend to support this prediction as stronger relationships were found with exception word reading (de Jong, 2011).
Orthographic and Phonological Processing
Still other studies focus on the relationship between phonological processing and orthographic processing."The fact that RAN as a predictor of reading and spelling was not affected by orthographic regularity seems to suggest that RAN is a compound skill that consists of several sub-processes that are related to early literacy development. These processes might very well imply both orthographical and phonological skills" (Furnes & Samuelsson, 2011).
Learning to Read
There are several theories why rapid automatized naming is associated with reading abilities. One suggestion is that they both exploit the speed with which phonological representations are retrieved from long-term memoryLong-term memory
Long-term memory is memory in which associations among items are stored, as part of the theory of a dual-store memory model. According to the theory, long term memory differs structurally and functionally from working memory or short-term memory, which ostensibly stores items for only around 20–30...
. Another related theory is that both depend on variations in the rate of development of a general cognitive speed of information processing (Kail & Hall, 1994); (Kail, Hall & Caskey, 1999).
The validity of RAN in measuring reading ability is based on three assumptions. First, that RAN deficits and phonological deficits are independent of one another (Swanson, 2003). Secondly, the relationship between RAN and phonological awareness varies according to reading maturity (Swanson, 2003). Finally, naming speed is a complex process involving processes beyond the phonological system (Swanson, 2003).
One of the issues of labelling RAN as a measure of reading ability is that it ignores many complexities. Some argue "that rapid naming tasks are composed of attentional, visual, lexical, temporal, and recognition sub-processes that all contribute to naming speed performance. Lumping all these sub-processes under the category of phonological processes obscures the complexity of rapid naming tasks. Such a hypothesis is consistent with the finding that naming speed tasks consistently account for variance in early reading skills beyond that accounted for by measures of phonemic awareness" (Schatschneider et al., 2002).
Another viewpoint is that rapid automatized naming directly relates to differences in reading competence. Supporting this is the fact that the ability to rapidly name digits and letters predicts reading better than rapidly naming colors and objects. This suggests a difference due to differences in experience with letters. However, rapid automatized naming of colors, objects, numbers and letters measured in children before they learn to read predicts later differences in reading skill, while early differences in reading ability do not predict later differences in rapid automatized naming (Lervag & Hulme, 2009).
Double Deficit Hypothesis
It has been proposed that dyslexia is due to a “double-deficit hypothesisDouble deficit (education)
The double-deficit theory of dyslexia proposes that a deficit in two essential skills gives rise to the lowest level of reading performances, constituting the most severe form of dyslexia.-Reading ability:The ability to read is believed to depend on two skills:...
” in which phonological deficits and naming-speed deficits are two separate causes of reading problems, such that when they are combined, they produce a greater dyslexic defect than would be produced by either deficit individually (Wolf & Bowers, 1999).
The double-deficit hypothesis suggests that RAN and phonological awareness operate as independent systems that are equally important in word identification (Swanson, 431). This model is based on literature showing that phonological disabilities and naming speed-deficits underlie some forms of reading disabilities (Swanson, 2003).
In the case of modest or severe reading disability, the concurrence of both a phonological deficit and rapid naming deficit characterizes the most difficult forms of reading disabilities. These individuals score lowest on reading measures (Swanson, 2003).
In contrast, others argue that although the relationship between RAN and phonological awareness is monotonic, these measures do not produce uniform changes. Instead, as reading skills increase or decrease, RAN and phonological awareness skills do not change uniformly (Swanson, 2003).
Evidence exists that RAN’s contribution to reading ability decreases as we age. Longitudinal studies report that the contribution of naming speed to reading skills after grade 3 diminishes, whereas the contribution of phonological awareness remains constant (Swanson, 2003).