n a recent article, Inglis and Alcock (2012) contended that their data challenge the claim that when mathematicians validate proofs, they initially skim a proof to grasp its main idea before reading individual parts of the proof more carefully. This result is based on the fact that when mathematicians read proofs in their study, on average their…

This case study, conducted in the context of an interactive classroom-based action research, has examined the process by which Language 1 (L1-native speakers of English) and Language 2 (L2-non-native speakers of English) students develop the ability to acquire the standard written form of the English language. The dissertation was designed to…

When readers search for misspellings in a proofreading task or for a letter in a letter detection task, they are more likely to omit function words than content words. However, with misspelled words, previous findings for the letter detection task were mixed. In two experiments, the authors tested the functional equivalence of both tasks. Results…

This study examined the efficacy of the EDIT Strategy on proofreading skills of postsecondary individuals who attended a campus-based college program for students with developmental disabilities. A random assignment to treatment or control groups and a pre- and posttest with maintenance follow-up design were employed. The EDIT Strategy was taught…

Nowadays, scientific writers are required not only a thorough knowledge of their subject field, but also a sound command of English as a lingua franca. In this paper, the lexical errors produced in scientific texts written in English by non-native researchers are identified to propose a classification of the categories they contain. This study…

We report a small-scale study investigating the perceptions of postgraduate students who are non-native speakers of English and those of academic staff with regard to those students. Previous research has focused only on the former and identified a number of linguistic and cultural challenges these students face in adapting to Anglophone…

This article highlights the potential of academic literacies as a theoretical framework for EAP, encompassing not only work on texts, but the wider, socio-political, geopolitical, and institutional contexts and practices in and with which EAP operates. An academic literacies approach foregrounds social practices, and one particular practice, that…

In a test, the testing score would be closer to examinee's actual ability when careless mistakes were corrected. In CAT, however, changing the answer of one item in CAT might cause the following items no longer appropriate for estimating the examinee's ability. These inappropriate items in a reviewable CAT might in turn introduce bias in ability…

Proofreading one's own writing is difficult due to the overfamiliarity of one's writing, which has been claimed to conceal errors, even extraneous errors inserted by someone else (as in collaborative writing). In the present research, we examined whether increasing one's familiarity with text can indeed have a negative influence on error…

As part of a larger interview-based study of the beliefs, practices and experiences of 16 proofreaders of student writing in a university setting, this article reports informants' conceptualisations of their role. "Proofreading" is defined for the purposes of this research as "third-party interventions (that entail some level of written…

This three-year study of research training policy and practice involved government and university executives, and university academics from the Philippines. A total of 53 participants were involved: two officials from the Commission on Higher Education, six directors of research centres, 28 university executives and 17 academic staff. Seven public…

This article reports on a research project on proofreading, prompted by its proliferation in contemporary higher education. The article is framed by an academic literacies perspective and develops the concept of "writtenness", which draws attention to both the underlying culturally and socially constructed values relating to the production and…

The purpose of this interpretivist qualitative study is to discover what factors influence first-year college students as they construct their text messages. Using grounded theory methodology, 11 first-year college students at a university in the Southeast were interviewed one-on-one and through text messaging in order to gain insight into…

Drawing on an interview-based study of the beliefs, practices, and experiences of 16 proofreaders of student writing at undergraduate and/or graduate level in a university setting, this paper focuses on the ethical concerns informants associate with the proofreading act. "Proofreading" is defined for the purposes of this research as "third-party…

The present study examined how proofreading and reading-for-comprehension instructions influence eye movements during reading. Thirty-seven participants silently read sentences containing compound words as target words while their eye movements were being recorded. We manipulated word length and frequency to examine how task instructions influence…