I am interested in the use of multilevel multivariate models for understanding educational and psychological phenomena in their social contexts. Because education occurs within classrooms and schools, important aspects of education can be examined when these groupings are included in empirical investigations. My interest in multilevel modeling extends from my interest in construct validation and psychometrics—understanding relations among items, tests, or other performance measures. This appreciation for multiple phenomena, combined with my experience with learning languages has also interested me in bilingual education: the relations between languages within various domains of learning. Address: PO Box 5010 Atlanta, GA 30302-5010
Cognitive Research: Principles and Implications, 2021
Faces judged as stereotypically Black are perceived negatively relative to less stereotypical fac... more Faces judged as stereotypically Black are perceived negatively relative to less stereotypical faces. In this experiment, artificial faces were constructed to examine the effects of nose width, lip fullness, and skin reflectance, as well as to study the relations among perceived dominance, threat, and Black stereotypicality. Using a multilevel structural equation model to isolate contributions of the facial features and the participant demographics, results showed that stereotypicality was related to wide nose, darker reflectance, and to a lesser extent full lips; threat was associated with wide nose, thin lips, and low reflectance; dominance was mainly related to nose width. Facial features explained variance among faces, suggesting that face-type bias in this sample was related to specific face features rather than particular characteristics of the participant. People’s perceptions of relations across these traits may underpin some of the sociocultural disparities in treatment of c...
Longitudinal methods are gaining wider use in educational research, but they have yet to see much... more Longitudinal methods are gaining wider use in educational research, but they have yet to see much application in research among students who are deaf or hard of hearing. The present chapter has three aims. First, an overview is given of some of the benefits and important concepts in longitudinal methods that may be informative for teachers and researchers. Second, a two-cohort data set of reading comprehension scores at up to four time points is analyzed in a didactic manner, in order to illustrate concepts and models for literacy growth. Sample computer code (SAS and R) is provided. Third, recommendations for teachers and researchers are provided.
Better understanding of the mechanisms underlying early reading skills can lead to improved inter... more Better understanding of the mechanisms underlying early reading skills can lead to improved interventions. Hence, the purpose of this study was to examine multivariate associations among reading, language, spoken phonological awareness, and fingerspelling abilities for three groups of deaf and hard-of-hearing (DHH) beginning readers: those who were acquiring only spoken English (n = 101), those who were visual learners and acquiring sign (n = 131), and those who were acquiring both (n = 104). Children were enrolled in kindergarten, first, or second grade. Within-group and between-group confirmatory factor analysis showed that there were both similarities and differences in the abilities that underlie reading in these three groups. For all groups, reading abilities related to both language and the ability to manipulate the sublexical features of words. However, the groups differed on whether these constructs were based on visual or spoken language. Our results suggest that there are ...
Language, speech, and hearing services in schools, Jan 5, 2018
The goal of the current study was to examine the impact of dialect density on the growth of oral ... more The goal of the current study was to examine the impact of dialect density on the growth of oral language and reading skills in a sample of African American English (AAE)-speaking children reared in urban communities. Eight hundred thirty-five African American children in first through fifth grades participated. Using an accelerated cohort design, univariate and bivariate growth models were employed to examine dialect density, oral language and reading, and the relationships between these variables. For the univariate models, results indicated that (a) dialect density decreased over time by approximately 5% per year beyond first grade, (b) language skills improved approximately 0.5 SD per year, and (c) reading comprehension increased significantly from first to second grade and slowed 23% per year in second through fifth grades. Results from the bivariate models revealed that (a) dialect density and language ability are negatively associated, although dialect density did not affect ...
Using multitrait, multimethod data, and confirmatory factor analysis, the current study examined ... more Using multitrait, multimethod data, and confirmatory factor analysis, the current study examined the effects of arithmetic item formatting and the possibility that across formats, abilities other than arithmetic may contribute to children's answers. Measurement hypotheses were guided by several leading theories of arithmetic cognition. With a sample of 1314 3rd grade students (age M=103.24 months, SD=5.41 months), Abstract Code Theory, Encoding Complex Theory, Triple Code Theory, and the Exact versus Approximate Calculations Hypothesis were evaluated, using 11 measures of arithmetic with symbolic problem formats (e.g., Arabic numeral and language-based formats) and various problem demands (e.g., requiring both exact and approximate calculations). In general, results provided support for both Triple Code Theory and Encoding Complex Theory. As predicted by Triple Code Theory, arithmetic outcomes with language formatting, Arabic numeral formatting, and estimation demands (across formats) were related but distinct from one another. As predicted by Encoding Complex Theory, executive attention was a direct predictor of all arithmetic outcomes. Language was no longer a direct predictor of arithmetic outcomes when executive attention was accounted for in the model; however, a strong and enduring relationship between language and executive attention suggested that language may play a facilitative role in reasoning during numeric processing. These findings have important implications for assessing arithmetic in educational settings and suggest that in addition to arithmetic-focused interventions, interventions targeting executive attention, language, and/or the interplay between them (i.e., internal speech during problem-solving) may be a promising avenues of mathematical problem-solving intervention.
Statistical learning (SL) is believed to enable language acquisition by allowing individuals to l... more Statistical learning (SL) is believed to enable language acquisition by allowing individuals to learn regularities within linguistic input. However, neural evidence supporting a direct relationship between SL and language ability is scarce. We investigated whether there are associations between event-related potential (ERP) correlates of SL and language abilities while controlling for the general level of selective attention. Seventeen adults completed tests of visual SL, receptive vocabulary, grammatical ability, and sentence completion. Response times and ERPs showed that SL is related to receptive vocabulary and grammatical ability. ERPs indicated that the relationship between SL and grammatical ability was independent of attention while the association between SL and receptive vocabulary depended on attention. The implications of these dissociative relationships in terms of underlying mechanisms of SL and language are discussed. These results further elucidate the cognitive natu...
Cognitive Research: Principles and Implications, 2021
Faces judged as stereotypically Black are perceived negatively relative to less stereotypical fac... more Faces judged as stereotypically Black are perceived negatively relative to less stereotypical faces. In this experiment, artificial faces were constructed to examine the effects of nose width, lip fullness, and skin reflectance, as well as to study the relations among perceived dominance, threat, and Black stereotypicality. Using a multilevel structural equation model to isolate contributions of the facial features and the participant demographics, results showed that stereotypicality was related to wide nose, darker reflectance, and to a lesser extent full lips; threat was associated with wide nose, thin lips, and low reflectance; dominance was mainly related to nose width. Facial features explained variance among faces, suggesting that face-type bias in this sample was related to specific face features rather than particular characteristics of the participant. People’s perceptions of relations across these traits may underpin some of the sociocultural disparities in treatment of c...
Longitudinal methods are gaining wider use in educational research, but they have yet to see much... more Longitudinal methods are gaining wider use in educational research, but they have yet to see much application in research among students who are deaf or hard of hearing. The present chapter has three aims. First, an overview is given of some of the benefits and important concepts in longitudinal methods that may be informative for teachers and researchers. Second, a two-cohort data set of reading comprehension scores at up to four time points is analyzed in a didactic manner, in order to illustrate concepts and models for literacy growth. Sample computer code (SAS and R) is provided. Third, recommendations for teachers and researchers are provided.
Better understanding of the mechanisms underlying early reading skills can lead to improved inter... more Better understanding of the mechanisms underlying early reading skills can lead to improved interventions. Hence, the purpose of this study was to examine multivariate associations among reading, language, spoken phonological awareness, and fingerspelling abilities for three groups of deaf and hard-of-hearing (DHH) beginning readers: those who were acquiring only spoken English (n = 101), those who were visual learners and acquiring sign (n = 131), and those who were acquiring both (n = 104). Children were enrolled in kindergarten, first, or second grade. Within-group and between-group confirmatory factor analysis showed that there were both similarities and differences in the abilities that underlie reading in these three groups. For all groups, reading abilities related to both language and the ability to manipulate the sublexical features of words. However, the groups differed on whether these constructs were based on visual or spoken language. Our results suggest that there are ...
Language, speech, and hearing services in schools, Jan 5, 2018
The goal of the current study was to examine the impact of dialect density on the growth of oral ... more The goal of the current study was to examine the impact of dialect density on the growth of oral language and reading skills in a sample of African American English (AAE)-speaking children reared in urban communities. Eight hundred thirty-five African American children in first through fifth grades participated. Using an accelerated cohort design, univariate and bivariate growth models were employed to examine dialect density, oral language and reading, and the relationships between these variables. For the univariate models, results indicated that (a) dialect density decreased over time by approximately 5% per year beyond first grade, (b) language skills improved approximately 0.5 SD per year, and (c) reading comprehension increased significantly from first to second grade and slowed 23% per year in second through fifth grades. Results from the bivariate models revealed that (a) dialect density and language ability are negatively associated, although dialect density did not affect ...
Using multitrait, multimethod data, and confirmatory factor analysis, the current study examined ... more Using multitrait, multimethod data, and confirmatory factor analysis, the current study examined the effects of arithmetic item formatting and the possibility that across formats, abilities other than arithmetic may contribute to children's answers. Measurement hypotheses were guided by several leading theories of arithmetic cognition. With a sample of 1314 3rd grade students (age M=103.24 months, SD=5.41 months), Abstract Code Theory, Encoding Complex Theory, Triple Code Theory, and the Exact versus Approximate Calculations Hypothesis were evaluated, using 11 measures of arithmetic with symbolic problem formats (e.g., Arabic numeral and language-based formats) and various problem demands (e.g., requiring both exact and approximate calculations). In general, results provided support for both Triple Code Theory and Encoding Complex Theory. As predicted by Triple Code Theory, arithmetic outcomes with language formatting, Arabic numeral formatting, and estimation demands (across formats) were related but distinct from one another. As predicted by Encoding Complex Theory, executive attention was a direct predictor of all arithmetic outcomes. Language was no longer a direct predictor of arithmetic outcomes when executive attention was accounted for in the model; however, a strong and enduring relationship between language and executive attention suggested that language may play a facilitative role in reasoning during numeric processing. These findings have important implications for assessing arithmetic in educational settings and suggest that in addition to arithmetic-focused interventions, interventions targeting executive attention, language, and/or the interplay between them (i.e., internal speech during problem-solving) may be a promising avenues of mathematical problem-solving intervention.
Statistical learning (SL) is believed to enable language acquisition by allowing individuals to l... more Statistical learning (SL) is believed to enable language acquisition by allowing individuals to learn regularities within linguistic input. However, neural evidence supporting a direct relationship between SL and language ability is scarce. We investigated whether there are associations between event-related potential (ERP) correlates of SL and language abilities while controlling for the general level of selective attention. Seventeen adults completed tests of visual SL, receptive vocabulary, grammatical ability, and sentence completion. Response times and ERPs showed that SL is related to receptive vocabulary and grammatical ability. ERPs indicated that the relationship between SL and grammatical ability was independent of attention while the association between SL and receptive vocabulary depended on attention. The implications of these dissociative relationships in terms of underlying mechanisms of SL and language are discussed. These results further elucidate the cognitive natu...
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