The Effect of Various Presentation Patterns on the Comprehension of Speeded Speech
R. Emile Jester, R. M. W. Travers · American Educational Research Journal · 1967
During the past ten years, a body of research has been accumulated related to the comprehension of speeded speech. The results generally indicate that it is possible for listeners to comprehend effectively continuous meaningful discourse at rates far above those normally encountered in everyday listening. Fairbanks, Guttman, and Miron (1957a) found that auditory presentations made at the rate of 282 words per minute (wpm) produced the optimum efficiency of comprehension where efficiency was determined by dividing the comprehension test score by the time required for presentation. The latter research workers then went on to investigate the effects of making two consecutive redundant presentations with the hypothesis that this should produce higher mean comprehension test scores than a single presentation at half the speed (Fairbanks, Guttman, and Miron 1957b). The results supported this hypothesis. Various combinations of redundant speeded presentations were first used in an investigation by Reynolds (1966). Reynolds used six combinations of repeated auditory presentations. An interesting result of the experiment was that when four progressively slower presentations were made (350 to 200 wpm), the mean comprehension test scores were reliably higher than when the same number of presentations, occupying the same total presentation time, were made in either an ascending (200 to 350 wpm) order or when the material was presented at 263 wpm on each of four trials (which also occupied the same amount of time).