Transfer of Phonological and Morphological Awareness to Reading in English and Logographic Hanja among Korean Children

Abstract

This study examined differential contributions of Korean phonological and morphological processing skills to reading and spelling across Korean Hangul, logographic Hanja, and English among 107 sixth graders in Korea. In regression equations, after controlling for vocabulary and phonological awareness, both number naming speed and morpheme judgment accounted for unique variance in Hangul word reading and spelling. Korean phoneme awareness explained unique variance in reading and spelling skills in English, but not in Hanja. In addition, Korean morphological awareness was found to predict reading in both Hanja and English. It is thus suggested that phonological and morphological awareness, which are both language-general abilities, transfer to reading skills across languages and writing systems.