Adaptivity in reading literary texts;

Flexibility in reading literary texts -1-
FLEXIBILITY IN READING LITERARY TEXTS;
DIFFERENCES BETWEEN WEAK AND STRONG ADOLESCENT READERS
Tanja Janssen 1
, Martine Braaksma 1
, Gert Rijlaarsdam, 1
and Huub van den Bergh 2
1 Graduate School of Teaching and Learning, University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands
2 Institute of Linguistics, Utrecht University, the Netherlands
Paper for the EARLI conference, Nicosia, Cyprus, August 23-26, 2005
Contact: T.M.Janssen@uva.nl
Keywords: flexibility, adaptivity, literary understanding, reader response, reading activities
Abstract
In this paper we examine whether weak and strong adolescent readers can be identified by differences in
flexibility of their reading processes. Flexible readers, in our view, are readers who are able to adaptively change
the configuration of text processing activities (e.g., inferencing, analyzing, evaluating), both within a single text
and between different texts. We hypothesized that successful literature readers would be more flexible in their
processing of short literary stories than less-successful readers.
19 Dutch tenth-grade students from eight classes participated in a ‘known group validity’ study. Ten
participants were known to be strong readers and nine participants were known to be weak readers of literature.
Each student read five different short stories under think aloud conditions. 92 Think aloud sessions were
transcribed, segmented and coded. Multilevel analyses were applied to examine the distribution of reading
activities over the reading process, and to compare weak and strong readers’ patterns of response.
Results confirmed the flexibility hypothesis: strong readers more often changed their reading activities
over the course of the reading process. For instance, strong readers’ emotional responses fluctuated significantly
during reading, whereas weak readers’ emotional responses remained unchanged. Moreover, strong readers
adapted their processing activities to different stories, whereas weak readers tended to use monotonous patterns
of response.
Introduction
In literature instruction, response-based approaches receive much support from teachers and
researchers. There is a broad consensus that students should be encouraged to bring forward
their own personal responses to a literary text, instead of searching for predetermined
meanings or memorizing facts about the author, the literary genre or the historical period
(Applebee & Purves, 1992; Janssen, 1998; Poyas, 2004; Van Schooten, 2005). However,
some questions remain: How should students develop their own personal responses to
literature? And how can we encourage students to use more sophisticated strategies for
literary understanding?
To begin to answer such questions, it is helpful to know more about the literary
reading process itself and about differences between individual students in literary processing.
According to Schunn and Reder (1998), there are three general approaches to the study of
individual differences in cognitive skill. One approach assumes that individuals vary in the
strategies or processes they use. For example, expert readers may use other processes than
novice readers. A second approach assumes that people use the same processes but differ in
one or more performance parameters that affect how processes are executed (e.g., speed). For
instance, skilled readers are faster in decoding than less-skilled readers. The third approach
assumes that people differ in adaptivity. That is, although individuals may use the same

Flexibility in reading literary texts -2-
processes, they may differ in how well they adapt their processes to a given situation. In the
present study, we adopted the last approach.
Adaptivity or ‘flexibility’ (a more common term in literary studies) is theoretically
considered to be important in the domain of literature reading. Rosenblatt (1999), for instance,
argued that ‘flexibility of mind’ is part of the essence of literature reading, and a fundamental
goal of literature teaching: “A poem or a novel should provide fresh insight. Readers,
therefore, must be helped to develop flexibility of mind, a freedom from rigid emotional
habits, if they are to enter into the aesthetic experiences the artist has made possible.” (ibid.,
1999: 98).
Groeben (2001) related creativity and ‘flexibility’ to the literary convention of
polyvalence; that is, the possibility or necessity of (actively) assigning different meanings to a
literary text. Flexible readers, then, would be readers who are able to generate multiple
meanings in response to a single literary text. This ability is strongly associated with literary
competence; in think aloud studies, expert readers of literature were found to be more
‘flexible’ in their processing of literary texts than novice readers, in that they searched for
alternative interpretations and were able to perceive a literary text from multiple perspectives
(Andringa, 1995a; Earthman, 1992). Other empirical research on ‘flexibility’ in literary
reading is scarce.
In the present study, we mean by ‘flexibility’: the ability to spontaneously change ones
reading activities in adaptive response to different parts of a literary text and/or to different
literary texts, with the purpose of making meaning. Thus, we assume that readers, in their
attempt to understand a literary text, may adapt or shift their reading activities at two levels;
within (the reading of) a single text and between different texts. For example, when reading
and interpreting a story, a reader may use a pattern of ‘delayed evaluation’; deferring
evaluative responses until the end of the reading process (Vipond & Hunt, 1984). The same
reader may use a different pattern when reading another story, for instance, evaluating the
story immediately at the beginning of the reading process, instead of at the end. In other
words, readers may vary the ‘orchestration’ of their mental activities over the course of the
reading process, and they may orchestrate their activities differently in response to different
stories.
Previous think aloud studies of literary reading (e.g., Andringa, 1995a; Earthman,
1992) have provided indications that some readers are more capable of flexibly changing their
patterns of response during reading than other readers of literature. In all likelihood, some
readers are also more capable of changing their patterns of response when reading different
texts. These differences are probably related to students’ capability in the domain of literature.
Successful readers of literature may be more sensitive to differences between literary texts
and text parts (and adjust their processing accordingly) than less-successful or ‘weak’ readers.
In this study, we examine whether adolescent readers differ in flexibility when reading
short stories, and whether strong readers are more flexible in their processing than weak
readers. Before describing our study, we first present an overview of empirical research,
relevant to individual differences in literary processing.
Background
In reading research, attempts have been made to uncover the fundamental processes that are
involved in the understanding of text (e.g., Britton & Graesser, 1996; Pressley & Afflerbach,
1995; Van Dijk & Kintsch, 1983). One shared assumption is that text comprehension involves
a constructive process, in which readers are actively attempting to make sense of a text. A
second assumption is that readers are attempting to build mental representations of the states,
events, actions, and characters that are dealt with in the text (Van Dijk & Kintsch, 1983). It is

Flexibility in reading literary texts -3-
assumed that these representations evolve during reading; readers continuously extend and
update their representations of a text. In this process, they draw not only on their linguistic
knowledge and world knowledge, but also on their personal knowledge and experiences.
Most models of text comprehension focus on cognitive aspects of the reading process.
However, in literary reading, feelings, sensations, emotional and aesthetic reactions play an
important role; they are part of the process of understanding, as shown by empirical research
(e.g., Eva-Wood, 2004; Kneepkens & Zwaan, 1994). In addition, literary texts are often
ambiguous, indefinite, and open. Because literary texts raise questions about meanings (e.g.,
by open endings, allusions, metaphorical language), readers are stimulated to deal with gaps,
to search for connections, and to develop their own interpretations (Andringa, 1995b).
Andringa (1995b) presents a systematic overview of literary reading processes, in
which components of cognitive models (e.g., Van Dijk & Kintsch, 1983) and insights of
empirical literary studies are interwoven. She distinguishes several types of processes:
identification (e.g., determining the literary genre), selection (e.g., focusing on information),
(re)construction (e.g., filling in gaps), elaboration (e.g., making personal associations),
evaluation (judging, criticizing), emotional processes (e.g., experiencing suspense, pity), and
metacognition (e.g., reflecting on one’s own reading activities).
Readers may vary in the extent to which they display certain processes when they
attempt to make sense of a literary text. A body of research provides evidence of differences
between expert and novice readers of literature (e.g., Andringa, 1995a; Dorfman, 1996;
Earthman, 1992; Peskin, 1998; Thury & Friedlander, 1995; Zeitz, 1994). Some of these
studies rely on questionnaires or other types of post-reading responses, whereas others use a
think aloud methodology to reconstruct readers’ online processes.
Earthman (1992), for example, conducted a think aloud study involving eight college
freshmen and eight graduate students who thought aloud while reading two short stories and
two poems. She found that the freshmen produced less elaborated responses than the graduate
students. Freshmen tended to retain their initial view of the text, while graduate students read
in a more open manner, searching for alternative interpretations, and assuming varying
perspectives.
Andringa (1995a) compared the think aloud responses of three groups; adolescent
readers, less experienced adult readers, and experts of literature. The 22 participants each read
a Faulkner story under think aloud conditions. Andringa found that the less experienced
readers focused primarily on the story events, and tended to view the story from one
perspective only, whereas the expert readers were able to perceive multiple perspectives. The
adolescent readers displayed a limited repertoire of text processing activities compared to the
adult readers.
Similar findings were reported by Peskin (1998), who analyzed the think aloud
responses of eight expert readers (English PhD candidates) and eight novices (undergraduates
and advanced high school students) during their reading of two poems. She found that experts
produced more elaborate responses, and used more productive interpretive strategies during
reading than did the novices. According to Peskin, the expert readers possessed a rich
knowledge base, enabling them to recognize large and meaningful patterns. The novices, who
had only general expectations for poetry (for example, that metaphor is important in poems),
had difficulty in making the poems coherent.
Clearly, as in other domains, there is a considerable gap between experts and novices.
However, expert-novice studies typically do not examine the variability that exists within
each group. Moreover, it is important to note that most novices will not attain the expert level.
In fact, the literature curriculum in secondary education is not aimed at students becoming
experts of literature. Rather, the aim is to acquaint students with literature, and to stimulate
them to become engaged and independent readers. So, in addition to expert-novice studies, we

Flexibility in reading literary texts -4-
need ‘novice-novice’ research; studies that may give us insight into the literary processing of
novice adolescent readers, and into the variability within this group.
A number of think aloud studies focused on adolescent readers’ processing of literary
texts. Smith (1991), for instance, analyzed the think-aloud protocols of five successful and
five less-successful ninth-grade students, each reading two short stories. He found that
successful readers used more processes (on average 9.4 instead of 7.4) and made more
personal responses than did the less-successful readers. However, most noteworthy were the
large differences between individual readers. Each reader seemed to have his or her own
characteristic style of response; the particular story had little effect on how a student
responded.
Harker (1994) examined how 15 tenth-graders responded to two poems, using a thinkaloud
method. He found that most of the students did not go beyond determining the “plain
sense” of the poems, translating poetry into prose. No effect of reading phase was found on
students’ responses; that is, students did not change their initial interpretations in the postreading
phase, when they had had time to reflect on the poem.
These studies suggest that even successful readers in grades 9-10 lack flexibility in
reading; they do not adjust their reading activities to the particular literary text, nor do they
develop their interpretive responses after reading. However, the limited number of
participants and the limited number of literary texts that were read by each participant (just
two stories or poems), do not permit generalizations. More and more different literary texts
should be used to be able to determine the effects of text; and more participants are needed to
be able to examine the within-subject variances.
Previous studies have, in fact, focused on a ‘strategy approach’ to individual
differences, the first approach described by Schunn and Reder (1998). The main assumption is
that readers differ in the processes they use; successful readers are more personal, productive,
elaborate and/or interpretive in their processing than less-successful readers. Changes in the
configuration of processes over the course of reading and over different texts, have not been
taken into account. One inherent feature of processes has been neglected: the factor of ‘time’.
A process consists of two elements: (1) constituting cognitive and affective activities, and (2)
a certain development of time.
Several studies of writing processes have examined the factor ‘time’ (Braaksma,
Rijlaarsdam, Van den Bergh & Van Hout- Wolters, 2004; Breetvelt, Van den Bergh &
Rijlaarsdam, 1994). These studies have shown that able and less able student-writers may rely
on the same cognitive writing activities, but differ from each other in the moment or phase of
the writing process in which they perform these activities. It seems worthwhile to use such an
‘adaptivity approach’ in our study of adolescents’ literary reading processes. It would enable
us to examine how student-readers distribute their reading processes over moments in the
reading process, when reading different literary texts.
Present Study
The aim of the present study is to get more insight into the (presumed lack of) flexibility of
weak and strong adolescent readers of literature. The variability of reading activities over the
course of the reading process (both within and between stories) is taken as an indication of
‘flexibility’ in reading. Three questions will be addressed in this study;
(1) Do adolescent readers change their configuration of reading activities over the course
of their reading process, when reading and responding to short literary stories? And if so;
(2a) Do strong readers more often change their reading activities in response to a literary
story than their weaker peers?

Flexibility in reading literary texts -5-
(2b) Do strong readers more often change their reading activities in response to different
literary stories than their weaker peers?
Method
Participants
We invited tenth-grade students, enrolled in eight classes of three Dutch secondary
schools, to participate in a study on response to short stories. About 60 students volunteered.
We then interviewed their literature teachers, asking them to identify, among the volunteers,
students that were particularly well motivated and competent in reading literature and students
that were unmotivated and below average in reading literature. During our conversations, all
eight teachers were able to identify some excellent and some very weak students. The
teachers’ assessments were validated by other data (students’ self assessments and their
grades for related school subjects).
From these two extreme groups we recruited 20 participants, of whom 10 were
identified as ‘strong’ and 10 as ‘weak’ readers of literature. In age and ethnic representation,
the two groups were similar; students were on average 16 years old, and two students in each
group were from non-Dutch (mostly Turkish or Moroccan) origin. Because boys and girls
may respond differently to literary texts (e.g., Van Schooten, 2005), we strove for an equal
number of boys and girls in both groups. Eventually, one boy withdrew from the study
because of personal reasons, so that 19 students participated: 10 strong (5 female) and 9 weak
readers (5 female). The students participated in the study after school time, and were
compensated by a small reward.
The stories
We used literary stories that could invite multiple interpretations. The stories were
short (500-1000 words), so that thinking aloud would not take more than 20 minutes per
story. We first pre-tested ten stories, by having each story read under think-aloud conditions
by two to three volunteers (other tenth-graders). Out of these ten stories, we chose five stories
that proved to be unfamiliar to the students, elicited a variety of responses, and were
challenging without being too difficult. The birthday calendar by Marianne de Nooyer is a
story about a boy who, out of boredom, gives marks to his family members, and writes them
down on the birthday calendar. The three friends by Jeanette Winterson is a post-modern fairy
tale about three friends searching for “that which cannot be found”. In Hullay by Cees
Nooteboom a boy sees his little nephew drowning and does nothing to help him. And then it
was our turn by Kader Abdolah, is about a family suffering under the dictatorship of the Shah
of Persia. Finally, Primo Levi’s The interview is a socio-critical story about a man who is
being interviewed by an alien about life on earth.
The stories differ in literary genre; they encompass a fairy tale, a science fiction story,
as well as realistic or psychological stories. Some are witty and imaginative (e.g., The three
friends), while others are serious or tragic (e.g., And then it was our turn). Three of the stories
were originally written in Dutch; for The three friends and The interview we used authorised
Dutch translations. For the benefit of thinking aloud, we divided each story into story
fragments (10 to 15), each consisting of one or two paragraphs. We copied each fragment on a
separate PowerPoint slide.
Procedure
Two individual sessions were held with each student at the research institute, led by
one of the researchers or an assistant. During the first session, participants watched a video of
a student thinking aloud while trying to solve math problems. The video was intended to
acquaint students with the method of thinking aloud, without cueing particular types of

Flexibility in reading literary texts -6-
response (Ericsson & Simon, 1993). Then, the participants received the following
instructions:
“You are about to read a few short stories. We would like you to think aloud as you try to make sense of
them. Try to put into words everything that is going on in your mind while you are reading. Imagine, for
instance, a radio reporter who is giving an account of a football match. A reporter can see what happens
in the field, but the listeners can’t. So, like a reporter, you have to tell us what’s going on in your mind
during reading. Don’t worry about how you say it; just share everything you are thinking the moment it
comes to your mind.”
We emphasized that it was crucial to talk as much as possible, and that there were no right or
wrong responses.
Participants read the stories fragment by fragment from a computer screen, two stories
during the first session and three stories during the next session, about one week later. The
stories were presented in the same order, beginning with the least difficult one (The birthday
calendar). For each story, we provided some contextual information, by showing the actual
published version on paper, a picture of the author, and some biographical details (year of
birth, genres, titles of previous works).
The reading of the stories on the computer was self-paced; by pressing a key the
student could advance to the next fragment, or return to a previous one. A bar indicated the
number of story fragments already processed and still to follow. When a student fell silent for
more than five seconds, we used general prompts in order to stimulate a response (‘What are
you doing?’ ‘What is going on in your mind?’). More specific directions were avoided, in
order not to cue particular responses.
Students were given as much time as they wanted. The think aloud sessions were
audio recorded on the computer, and transcripts were made of the recordings.
Protocol analysis
We collected 92 think aloud transcripts, from the 19 students, each reading four or five
stories (three recordings failed due to technical problems). The transcripts were segmented
into meaningful units or statements, most often sentences. To analyze the statements, we
developed a coding scheme of reading activities, based on the model of Andringa (1995b).
Two of the researchers tested the scheme on 30 transcripts collected in our pilot study, and
changed some of the categories to fit our material.
The process of testing and revising categories resulted in a coding scheme of eight
categories, covering most of the student statements in the pilot transcripts (see Table 1). Some
statements did not fit into any of the categories; for these, we added the category Other
activity.
To illustrate how the student responses were transcribed and coded, we present a coded
transcript fragment (see Table 2). The student in this fragment responded to the first two
fragments of The three friends. In Table 2, all comments of the transcriber are placed between
square brackets. Codings are placed between angle brackets. The abbreviations ,
and so on, refer to our processing categories.
Most students first read the story fragment through (either silently or aloud), and then started
to reread and think aloud in response to that particular fragment. Rereading and thinking
aloud often happened simultaneously. Sometimes students did not read the passage through,
but responded immediately in-between the lines.

Flexibility in reading literary texts -7-
Student statements were treated as individual cases; each statement or sentence was
numbered and coded. Actual (silent) reading by students was noted in the transcripts, as were
pauses in their response, but these silences were treated as ‘default’, and hence not coded.
Nonverbal responses were coded as much as possible (e.g., [Sighs], [Laughs]). Because we
transcribed from audio recordings, facial expressions and gestures could not be recorded and
thus were left out.
All statements in the transcripts (n = 4347) were coded by one of the researchers. In
order to test the inter-rater reliability, 10% of the student statements (n = 413) from nine
different transcripts were coded by two coders independently. The inter-rater agreement was
85% (Cohen’s Kappa .81).
Analysis
We wanted to examine differences between strong and weak readers in their distribution of
several reading activities over the reading process. Therefore, we needed to model the
occurrence of each reading activity as a function of time (elapsed since the start of the reading
process), and examine this function across strong and weak readers.
To model these occurrences of reading activities, multilevel models appear to be
appropriate. Multilevel models take the hierarchy of the data into account; the observations of
the occurrence of activities are considered as nested within story fragments, which in turn are
nested within stories and readers. Each observation ‘belongs’ to a particular reader. This
quality of multilevel models makes it possible to analyze the occurrence of reading activities
for individual readers. There is no need to aggregate over all activities of each reader
(resulting in frequencies per reader).
Let Yijk be an indicator variable, which indicates whether fragment i of story j of
individual k in the process is analyzed (Yijk equals 1) or not (Yijk equals 0). Now we want to
show that the occurrence of a reading activity varies during reading, and that the occurrence
of a reading activity varies between stories as well as between readers. In order to model the
relation between the dichotomous dependent variable and the moment (fragment) of
occurrence, a polynomial function is used.
p
Logit(
) = β (1)
Y
ijk
∑ = p P
p=
0
* fr
(i = 1, 2, …Ijk; j = 1, 2, …,Jk; k = 1, 2, …K).
p
ijk
In the equation above, the fragment number is indicated with frijk. So, powers of fragment
number are used to describe the occurrence of (the logit 1 ) of Yijk. That is: the occurrence of a
reading activity at a certain moment during reading is written as a function of fr 1 + fr 2 + fr 3 …
Such polynomials are extremely flexible; they can take almost any shape depending on the
number of parameters (P) and the numerical value of the regression weights. This, however,
can be considered as an empirical matter; the shape of the polynomial (i.e. the number of
polynomials needed) can be estimated from the data. The model chosen has to fulfil the
following requirement: higher order elements are only taken into account if all lower order
elements have reached significance. That is, a second order element (fr 2 ) is only taken into
account if the first order element (fr 1 ) has reached significance.
However, the model according to equation (1) does not allow for differences between
either stories or individuals. We can consider the proportion at fragment i of individual k as
deviance from the mean occurrence of this reading activity for all individuals. That is, a
variance between individuals for each regression weight has to be estimated. This is merely

Flexibility in reading literary texts -8-
another way of saying that for each individual the difference with the mean regression weight
is estimated. The occurrences of this reading activity might vary between stories as well; the
regression weight for story j of individual k (at fragment i) is considered as a deviance from
the mean regression weight for this individual. Hence, equation (1) has to be elaborated with
residuals for individuals as well as with residuals for the story read.
p=
P
∑
p=
0
p=
P
p
∑(γ
p
β = + + )
(2)
p=
0
u
pjk
v
p0k
In equation (2) residuals for stories (upjk) as well as for individuals (vp0k) are allowed. These
residuals are assumed to be normally distributed with an expected value of zero and a
variance of S 2 upjk and S 2 vp0k respectively. It is however an empirical matter which variance
components are needed to describe the differences between stories (S 2 u1jk, S 2 u2jk, … ) and
which are needed to describe the differences between individuals (S 2 v10k, S 2 v20k, …).
Substitution of equation (2) in (1) shows the model to be estimated:
Y
∑ = p P
p=
0
p
p
Logit(
) = [( γ + + ) * ]
(3)
ijk
u
pjk
v
p0
k
fr
ijk
As the dependent variable is dichotomous, a logit transformation is used (remember, Logit
(Yijk) = Ln (Yijk / [1 – Yijk)).
Results
Figure 1 summarizes the general course of students’ reading activities over the reading
process, constructed from the fixed part estimates of the model (see the Appendix for the
estimates). Each reading activity is presented in a separate panel.
The horizontal axis represents the factor ‘time’ in the form of story fragments. On the vertical
axis the estimated mean probability of occurrence of each reading activity is diagrammed for
the two ability groups; W (weak readers) and S (strong readers). Each line represents the
mean course of the reading activity displayed by weak or strong readers over four to five
stories.
It is important to note that the scale of the vertical axis differs for the various reading
activities, due to different levels of probability of occurrence. For instance, retelling is a rather
common activity, whereas metacognitive responding is relatively rare.
In our discussion of Figure 1, we will first focus on the general patterns in students’
activities. In the next section we will consider differences in patterns between weak and
strong readers.
Do readers change their configuration of activities over the course of the reading process?
As appears from Figure 1, there are four distinct patterns in the general course of students’
reading activities;
- no change over the course of the reading process;
- an increase of the reading activity over the course of the reading process;
- a decline of the reading activity over the course of the reading process;

Flexibility in reading literary texts -9-
- an increase at the beginning, followed by a decline towards the end of the reading
process.
Some reading activities (e.g., ‘analyzing’) are represented by straight horizontal lines. In these
cases, the mean probability of occurrence of the activity remains constant over the reading
process as a whole. No change over the reading process was observed.
Other reading activities show a pattern of gradual increase (e.g., ‘problem detecting’).
At the beginning of the reading process, the probability of occurrence of problem detecting is
less than 10%. Student-readers tend to detect relatively few problems when reading the first
few story fragments. As the story reading progresses, the probability of occurrence increases.
At the end of the reading process, problem detecting reaches a peak (about 20 %). Apparently,
students experience relatively many interpretation problems towards the end of the story.
The third pattern can be illustrated by ‘associating’. This activity significantly declines
over the course of the reading process. At the start of the reading process, when students are
reading the story’s title and the first few fragments, they provide relatively many personal
associations in response to the story. As the reading progresses, fewer associations are given.
The probability of occurrence drops from 10 – 20% at the start to less than 5% at the end of
the reading process.
The final pattern is illustrated by strong readers’ emotional responses. At the
beginning of the reading process, there is a probability of about 5% that strong readers
provide emotional responses to the story. This probability increases significantly during
reading. For story fragment 9 the probability of occurrence has been doubled (13%). From
this point on, the chance of emotional responses to occur diminishes again, dropping to about
8%. Apparently, strong readers tend to provide the most emotional responses when they are
reading the middle part of stories, the part where ‘the true action’ takes place.
In sum, readers tend to change the configuration of their reading activities over time.
The mean probability of occurrence fluctuates over moments in the reading process for six out
of eight reading activities; retelling, inferencing, problem detecting, associating, evaluating
and emotional responding. For two activities (analyzing and metacognitive responding) no
changes over the course of the reading process were observed.
Do strong readers more often change their activities during reading than their weaker peers?
Our second research question (2a) involves a comparison between weak (W) and strong (S)
readers, regarding changes in their reading activities during reading. The comparison can be
made from two different perspectives; in terms of differences in occurrence, and in terms of
the pattern of development of the activity over time.
Figure 1 shows that for analyzing, the lines for weak and strong readers coincide,
forming one straight horizontal line. This indicates that weak readers engage in analyzing as
often as strong readers, and that in both groups the occurrence of analyzing remains constant
over the reading process.
For problem detecting, associating and metacognitive responding, the lines of weak
and strong readers are (almost) parallel. This indicates a similar pattern of development for
both groups; an increase of problem detecting, a decline of associating, and a stable pattern of
metacognitive responses throughout their reading of a story. However, the extent to which
weak and strong readers engage in these activities differs. In general, strong readers engage in
these activities more often than weak readers, throughout the reading process.
The panels of the remaining reading activities (retelling, inferencing, evaluating, and
emotional responding) show differences in occurrence and different patterns of development
for weak and strong readers. For example, compared to strong readers, weak readers provide
many retellings of the story content during reading. Their mean pattern of response does not

Flexibility in reading literary texts -10-
change over the reading process; the pattern is stable or monotonous. For strong readers, on
the other hand, the occurrence of retelling fluctuates, following a curve linear pattern.
In Table 3, we present a summary of the differences in mean patterns of reading
activities between weak and strong readers.
For five out of eight activities, weak readers display a monotonous pattern of reading
activities in the course of their reading process. When their reading activities change during
reading (as in problem detecting, associating and evaluating), the changes are linear.
Furthermore, two of these three activities (problem detecting and associating) change for
strong readers as well, and in the same manner. This indicates that the fluctuations in these
activities during the reading process are unrelated to readers’ ability level.
In general, the strong readers are more versatile during reading, adapting their reading
activities to the story fragment they are reading. Their activities reflect different types of
patterns in the course of reading; an increase, a decline, or a curve linear pattern.
Individual differences among strong and weak readers
Up to this point, we have focused on the mean differences between weak and strong readers,
and the mean patterns of change as they emerge from the fixed part of the model. However,
there may be large differences between individual readers within the same ability group. The
parameter estimates of the random part of the model (see the Appendix) give an indication of
the variability within the group of weak and strong readers. The estimates represent the
deviations of individual readers from the general mean reading process in each group.
From an inspection of the estimates we learn that all between-subject variances are
statistically significant (p

Flexibility in reading literary texts -11-
one weak reader who provides relatively many associations over the course of his or her
reading process.
For metacognitive responding, most of the lines of individual readers are very close
together, with strong readers producing more metacognitive responses than weak readers. One
weak reader produces an exceptionally large number of metacognitive responses, surpassing
all other readers.
To conclude, the individual differences are generally larger for the weak readers than
for the strong readers. The number of readers responsible for the large variability between
weak readers differs from activity to activity. Sometimes just one individual reader is
responsible (e.g., associating, metacognitive responding), sometimes more readers (e.g.,
retelling). However, individual readers tend to deviate only in the extent to which they use an
activity, not in the pattern of the activity. Individual weak readers have a stable or
monotonous pattern of response in common.
Do strong readers more often change their activities in response to different stories than their
weaker peers?
Our third research question (2b) again involves a comparison between strong and weak
readers, but now we focus on differences in response to different stories. The random
parameter estimates provide information about the between-story variability within the group
of weak and strong readers (see the Appendix). For almost all weak and strong readers’
activities the estimates are significant (p < .10). This indicates that there is an effect of ‘story’
on the probability of occurrence of reading activities. In other words, students’ patterns of
reading activities vary, depending on the story they are reading.
For five of the eight reading activities, the parameter estimates for the strong students
are larger than the parameter estimates for the weak students. For instance, the between-story
variance of retelling for strong readers is 0.34, whereas the estimate for weak readers is small:
0.08. A similar difference is found for inferencing, problem detecting, associating and
metacognitive responding. This indicates that strong readers’ activities are more influenced by
the particular story than the weak readers’ activities during reading.
In most cases, the between-story variances for strong readers are larger than the
between-subject variances for the same readers. In other words, strong readers do not differ so
much from each other in the reading activities they use, but they tend to respond differently to
different stories. For weak readers it is the other way around; weak readers show large
individual differences (see previous section), but they do not change their reading activities
much in response to different stories. Rather, weak readers tend to maintain their own,
personal pattern of response across different stories.
To illustrate the between-story differences we present Figure 3. In this Figure the
estimated probability of occurrence of retelling is depicted. Each line represents one
individual reader (W = weak, S = Strong) reading one story. In total, the figure contains 92
lines: for 19 participants, each reading four to five stories.
Figure 3 shows that the lines of the strong readers are relatively far apart, indicating
differences between stories. For the strong readers, the probability of occurrence of retelling
fluctuates between 0% and 40%, depending on the particular story, and on the particular
fragment within the story. The lines of the weak readers are closer together. For the weak
readers, the estimated probability of occurrence of retelling varies between 13% and 26%.
There are no effects of story or story fragments on the occurrence of the weak readers’
retelling activities.

Discussion
Flexibility in reading literary texts -12-
Our first question was whether adolescent readers changed the configuration of their reading
activities over the course of their reading process, when reading and responding to short
literary stories. We found that they did. In fact, most of their cognitive and affective reading
activities fluctuated over the course of reading a short story. For example, the occurrence of
problem detecting gradually increased during reading, whereas the occurrence of personal
associations decreased. Such fluctuations were observed for six out of eight reading activities.
Our second question was whether strong adolescent readers more often changed the
configuration of their reading activities than weak readers, over the course of the reading
process and in response to different stories. This appeared to be the case. For example, strong
readers varied their retellings over the course of reading a story, and their pattern of retelling
varied depending on the story. This suggests that strong readers were ‘context-sensitive’ in
their use of the retelling strategy. Weak readers, on the other hand, did not change their
pattern of retelling during reading, nor did they change their pattern of retelling in response to
different stories. Instead, they showed a monotonous pattern of response. Thus, we
demonstrated that, although weak and strong adolescent readers use the same activities, they
may differ in their orchestration of activities over the reading process and over stories. We
conclude that strong readers tend to show a more flexible reading process than weak readers.
However, we must point out some limitations of this study. Note, for instance, that we
dealt with the various cognitive and affective activities in an univariate way. However,
reading activities probably interact with each other. For example, the increase of problem
detecting may be directly related to the decrease in making personal associations. A possible
explanation of this pattern lies in the stories we used. Perhaps they were too difficult; during
reading students increasingly experienced problems in making sense of the text, and
consequently they were no longer able to make any personal associations (or vice versa).
However, the small sample size of 19 participants did not allow a simultaneous analysis of the
occurrence of several reading activities. Therefore, interactions could not be analyzed.
A further concern is whether thinking aloud had a different effect on the reading
activities of weak readers than on the activities of strong readers. One might argue that our
findings are due to an interaction between the type of participant and the demands of the
thinking aloud method. Weak readers might be less confident and consequently less able to
verbalize their thoughts during reading (let alone vary their response patterns) than strong
readers. Yet, the weak readers in our study were not less elaborate in their responses than their
strong peers. On the contrary, their think aloud transcripts were longer than those of strong
readers. Besides, most students talked freely during the think aloud sessions. It seems
unlikely, then, that the differences we observed are attributable to differences in selfassurance
or verbal ability.
We recruited the participants in our study from two ‘known’ groups; weak and strong
readers of literature. In doing so, we maximized the likelihood of finding differences in
reading activities and in ‘flexibility’ in use of activities. However, the ability to read literature
should rather be viewed on a continuum (varying from very weak to very strong) than in
terms of a dichotomy. A more precise indication of students’ literary reading skill could be
derived from students’ (verbal or written) post-reading responses to the same stories used for
the think alouds. Post-reading responses could be used to examine the relationship between
the immediate outcome of a reading process and the preceding reading activities. Such a study
would enable us to determine which patterns of reading activities are predictive of the quality
of students’ post-reading response.
Despite these limitations, this study has yielded meaningful information about
individual differences in literary reading processes, in particular, about differences in the

Flexibility in reading literary texts -13-
orchestration of reading processes. The ‘strategy approach’, as described by Schunn and
Reder (1998), cannot fully account for such differences, for it assumes that different groups of
readers use different strategies or processes. We found that different groups of readers may
use the same processes, but in a different configuration, depending on the moment in the
reading process and on the particular text. In other words, there are two missing links in
previous research: the factor ‘time’ or moment in the reading process, and the factor ‘text’ or
the necessity of using many literary texts (instead of just one or two, as done in most previous
studies). The importance of the present study is that it has made these missing links visible by
empirical means.
The findings of our study may also be of practical importance for the teaching and
learning of literature. To bring weak student-readers to a higher level of expertise in literature
reading, it is clearly not enough to encourage them to bring forward their personal responses
to a literary text or to use more sophisticated reading strategies during reading. Weak readers
especially have to learn to differentiate their responses and strategies, depending on the phase
in the reading process, and on the particular literary text they are reading.
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Appendix
Flexibility in reading literary texts -15-
Parameter estimates by Reading Activity (in logit scores), indicating change in occurrence of
activities during the reading process.
Random model Fixed model
R1 R2 R3 R4 F1 F2 F3
Weak readers
Retelling 1.10 0.08 - - -1.02 - -
Inferencing 0.16 0.21 - - -1.09 - -
Problem detecting 0.19 0.27 0.30 ns 4.57 -2.17 0.55 -
Associating 1.92 0.06 ns 0.74 7.17 -2.62 -0.66 -
Analyzing 0.46 0.81 - - -3.19 - -
Evaluating 0.53 0.80 -0.03 ns 9.67 -3.08 0.31 ns -
Emotional responding 0.13 0.03 ns - - -2.86 - -
Metacognit. responding 1.33 0.78 - - -3.98 - -
Other activity 1.22 - - - -1.79 - -
Good readers
Retelling 0.27 0.34 - - -2.03 0.57 -1.12
Inferencing 0.25 0.39 - - -1.53 0.41 -
Problem detecting 0.15 ns 0.57 -0.29 ns 2.24 -1.83 0.37 -
Associating 0.24 0.36 0.58 ns 5.85 -2.42 -1.38 -
Analyzing 0.36 0.76 - - -3.18 - -
Evaluating 0.32 0.23 ns - - -2.06 -0.03 ns -
Emotional responding 0.38 - - - -2.00 0.59 -1.49
Metacognit.responding 0.48 0.80 - - -3.14 - -
Other activity 0.12 0.12 ns - - -1.69 -0.61 ns 1.36
Parameters that are not statistically significant are indicated with ns; all other parameters are significant at .10
level.
Random model
R1 = between student variance in activity in the intercept;
R2 = between story variance in activity in the intercept;
R3 = covariance between intercept and linear change at student level;
R4 = covariance between intercept and quadratic change at student level.
Fixed model
F1 = intercept;
F2 = mean linear change in activity frequency;
F3 = mean quadratic change in activity frequency

Table 1
Coding scheme of students’ statements in the think aloud transcripts
Reading activity Description
RET
Retelling
INFER
Making
inferences
PROB
Detecting
problems
ASSO
Making
associations
ANA
Analyzing
EVA
Evaluating
EMO
Responding
emotionally
META
Responding
metacognitively
OTH
Other activity
Retelling, paraphrasing or (almost
literally) repeating the content of a
story passage.
Stating information not explicitly
given by the text, filling in gaps,
drawing conclusions, making
predictive or explanatory inferences.
Detecting a problem to integrate
information; pointing out a knowledge
gap or miscomprehension.
Relating the story to personal
experiences or knowledge of the
world; giving associations or personal
opinions; making intertextual links.
Noticing aspects of form, structure,
style or genre; connecting text parts.
Providing positive or negative
evaluative comments on (parts of) the
story.
Verbal and nonverbal emotional
responses to (parts of) the story;
exclamations.
Monitoring ones own reading (e.g., by
giving self-instructions) or reflecting
on ones own reading habits or
preferences.
Responses that cannot be placed into
any of the previous categories.
Flexibility in reading literary texts -16-
Sample responses to The three friends
“So, there were three friends and they
found another one.”
“A palace. So they must be rich.”
“I think something strange is going
to happen.”
“I don’t understand what this means.”
“What is ‘the wainscotting’?”
“I have two friends myself. Together
we went on a holiday.”
“The three friends remind me of the
three musketeers.”
“It starts like a fairy tale.”
“The author uses short sentences.”
“I like how this is written (…).”
“A bizarre story. I don’t like it at all.”
Laughing, sighing, moaning
“How sad!”
“Yuk!”
“I’ll just have to reread this part.”
“I am pretty used to reading this kind
of stories.”
E.g., reading aloud, commenting
upon the think aloud task,
incomprehensible statements.

Table 2. Example of a coded transcript fragment
Story fragment Student’s response
1. The three friends
2. Once upon a time there were two
friends who found a third. Liking no
one better in the whole world, they
vowed to live in one palace, sail in
one ship, and fight one fight with
equal arms.
3. After three months they decided to
go on a quest. ‘What shall we seek?’
they asked each other. The first said,
‘Gold.’ The second said, ‘Wives.’
The third said, ‘That which cannot
be found.’ They all agreed that this
last was best and so they set off in
fine array.
Flexibility in reading literary texts -17-
[Reads aloud] The three friends.
[Laughs]
The three little pigs.
Like those comic characters; Huey, Dewey
and Louie.
[Goes to the second segment]
[Reads silently]
[Laughs].
It is really not a nice beginning.
[Rereads aloud]. Two friends who found a
third.
They are rich; a palace.
I was thinking [inaudible words].
[Goes to the third segment].
[Reads silently]
[Et cetera].
Coding
Table 3. Summary: mean patterns of reading activities of weak (W) and strong (S) readers
No change Increase Decline Increase
& decline
Retelling W S
Inferencing W S
Problem detecting W / S
Associating W / S
Analyzing W / S
Evaluating S W
Emotional responding W S
Metacognitive responding W / S

(Estimated) Probability
(Estimated) Probability
(Estimated) Probability
(Estimated) Probability
0.30
0.25
0.20
0.15
0.10
0.05
0.17
0.13
0.09
0.05
0.05
0.04
0.03
0.02
0.01
0.20
0.15
0.10
0.05
0.00
Retelling
W W W W W W W W W W W W W W W
S
S
S
S
S
S
S S S S S S S
1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15
Fragment
Problem Detecting
S
W
S
S
W W
S
W
S
W
S
S
(Estimated) Probability
0.40
0.33
0.26
0.19
0.12
0.05
Flexibility in reading literary texts -18-
Inferencing
W W W W W W W W W W W W W W W
S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S
1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15
Fragment
1. Retelling 2. Inferencing
S
W
S
W
S
W
1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15
Fragment
Analysing
S
W
S
W
S
W
S
W
S
W
S
W
S
W
(Estimated) Probability
0.15
0.10
0.05
0.00
S
S
S
S
S
S
W
W
W S
W
W
W
S
W
W S
W
WS W
S W
W
W
S
W
S
S
S
1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15
Fragment
3. Problem Detecting 4. Associating
W
S
W
S
W
S
W
S
W
S
W
S
W
S
W
S
W
S
W
S
W
S
W
S
W
S
W
S
W
S
1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15
Fragment
Emotional Responding
S
S
S
S
(Estimated) Probability
0.13
0.11
0.09
0.07
0.05
0.03
Evaluating
S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S
W
W W W W W W W W W W W W W W
1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15
Fragment
5. Analysing 6. Evaluating
S
S
S S S
WS W W W W W W W W W W W W W W
1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15
Fragment
S
S
S
S
S
(Estimated) Probability
0.10
0.08
0.06
0.04
0.02
0.00
Metacognitive Responding
S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S
W W W W W W W W W W W W W W W
1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15
Fragment
7. Emotional Responding 8. Metacognitive Responding
Figure 1. Mean probability of occurrence of reading activities, for each ability group
(W = weak readers, S = strong readers)

W
(Estimated) Probability
(Estimated) Probability
(Estimated) Probability
(Estimated) Probability
0.30
0.25
0.20
0.15
0.10
0.05
0.25
0.20
0.15
0.10
0.05
0.00
0.15
0.12
0.09
0.06
0.03
0.00
0.5
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0.0
Retelling
W W W W W W W WS S S S
W W W W W W WS W W W W W
S W W W
S W W
S S S S S S
W W W W WS W WS S
W W W W WS S
W WS
S
S
S
S
W W W WS W W W W W W W W W W W W
W W W W
S
W W W W W W W W W W W
W WS WS W W W W W W W W W W W W
S S
S
S S S S
S
S S
S
S S S S S
S
S
S
S S S S S
S S
S
S
S
S S S S S
S S
S S
S S S S S
S S
S
S
S S S S S S S S
S S S
S S S S S S S
S S
S S S
S S S
S S S S S S
S
S
S S S
S
S S
S
S S
S
S
S
S
S S S
S
S S S
S S S
S S
S
1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15
Fragment
W
(Estimated) Probability
0.40
0.33
0.26
0.19
0.12
0.05
Flexibility in reading literary texts -19-
Inferencing
S
S
S
S
S
S
W W W W W W W W W W W W W W W
W W W W W W W W W W W W W W
W W W WW W W W W W W WW W W W WW
WS S S
S
S
S
S
S
S
S
W W W W W W W W W W W W W W
WS WS S S S
S
S
S
S
S
S
S
S
S
W W W W W W W W W W W W W
S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S
S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S
S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S
S
S
S S S S S S S S S S S S S
S S S S S S S S S S
S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S
S
S
S S S S S S S S S S
S S S S S S S S S S S S S
1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15
Fragment
1. Retelling 2. Inferencing
Problem Detecting
W
S
W S
W
W W
S
S
W
S
W
W W
S
S
W
S
W
W W
S
S
W
S
W
W W S
S
WS S
W
WW W
W S
S
W
S
S
W
S
W
W W W
S
S
S
S
W
S
W
W W WS
S
S
S
W WS W
W
W WS
S
S
S
W S
W WS W
W
W W
S
S
S
WS
W
S
WS W
W
W W
S
S
S
W
S
S
W
W
W
W
W
S
S
W
WS
S SS
W WS
W
W
W
W
S
S
S
W
W
S
W WS
W
W
W
W
S
S
W
W
S
W WS
W
S
W
W
S
S
W
S
W
W WS
S
S
WS
W
W
1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15
Fragment
Analysing
(Estimated) Probability
0.8
0.6
0.4
0.2
0.0
W W W W W W W W W W W W W W W
S S
S
S
S
S S
S S S S
S S S S S
S S S S S
S S S S S
S S S
S
S S S S S
S S S S
S S S S
S S S S
S S
S S S
S S S
S S S
S
S S
W
S
W
S S
S
W
S S S S
S S
W W W S S
W S S
S S
S
S
S S
W
W
W W S S SS S S S
S
W
W
W
W
W W W W W W W S
S
W W W W W W W S
W
W
W
W
W
W
W
W
W W W W S
W W
W
W W WS W S W S
W
W
W W W W W W S
S
W
W
W W
W W W
W W W
1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15
Fragment
3. Problem Detecting 4. Associating
S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S
S S S S S S S S S S S S
W W W W W W W W W W W W W W W
W W W W W W W W W W W W W W W
W
W
S
W S W
S
W
S
W
W
S
W S W
S
W
S
W
W
S
W S W
S
W
S
W
W
S
W S W
S
WW S
W
W
S
W S W
S
W
S
W
W
S
W S W
S
WW S
W
W
S
W S W
S
W
S
W
W
S
W S W
S
W
S
W
W
S
W S W
S
W
S
W
W
S
W S W
S
W
S
W
W
S
W S W
S
W WS W
S
W S W
S
W WS S
W
W
S
W S W
S
W WS W
W
S
W S
W
S
W
W
W
S
W S
W
S
W
S
1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15
Fragment
Emotional Responding
(Estimated) Probability
0.25
0.20
0.15
0.10
0.05
0.00
Evaluating
S S S S S S S S S S S S S S
S S S S S S S S S S S S S S
S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S
S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S
WS WS S WS S WS S WS S WS S WS S WS S WS S WS S WS S WS WS S WS WS
S
S
WS W
W
S
WS W
W
S
WS W
W
S
WS W
W
S
WS W
W
S
WS W
W
S
WS W
W
S
WS W
W
S
WS W
W
S
WS W
W
S
WS W
W
S
WS W
W
S
WS W
W
S
WS W
W
S
WS
W
W
W W W W W W W W W W W W W W
W W W W W W W W W W W W W W W
W W W W W W W W W W W W W W W
1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15
Fragment
5. Analysing 6. Evaluating
S
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(Estimated) Probability
0.3
0.2
0.1
0.0
Metacognitive Responding
W W W W W W W W W W W W W W W
S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S
S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S
S S S S S S S S S S S S S S
S S S S S S S SS S S S S SS S S
W W W W W W W W W W W W W W W
S
S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S SS S
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7. Emotional Responding 8. Metacognitive Responding
Figure 2. Mean probability of occurrence of reading activities for individual readers
(W = weak readers, S = strong readers)

W
Flexibility in reading literary texts -20-
Figure 3. Mean probability of occurrence of retelling for individual readers, each reading
four to five stories (W = weak reader, S = strong reader).
(Estimated) Probability
0.40
0.33
0.26
0.19
0.12
0.05
Retelling
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