Print Awareness: a Comparison Between Print and Electronic Assessments in Typically Developing Preschool Children

Abstract

This study compared print and electronic formats of the Concepts About Print (CAP) assessment in typically developing preschool children. The researchers were interested in comparing print awareness skills using two different reading modalities. Independent variables were mode of presentation and age, dependent variables were the CAP scores. To account for a learning curve, two different versions of the CAP assessment were used and counterbalanced. Modes of presentation was also counterbalanced. Examiners achieved a 98.24% agreement (K = 0.964) across 40% of all assessments. A significant correlation (r =.919) was found between the scores on the CAP and scores on the eCAP. A paired samples t-test showed no significant difference in scores based on mode of presentation (t (14) = .29, p = 0.779, 95% CIs [-.86757, 1.13423]). Further research is needed to increase the sample size, the diversity of the sample population, and examine interaction effects between age and mode of presentation. Additional research is also needed to investigate effect of gender, socioeconomic status, multiple languages, and amount of exposure to electronic text on eCAP performance.