Inferences of textual comprehension and genres: A comparative study between Costa Rica and Spain

The various theoretical models of reading comprehension have revealed the complexity of the cognitive processes involved. Readers need to construct the meaning of what they are reading, to check what they are reading against their recall of related information, and to build a coherent frame of reference or reference model. This reference model develops from the text-base, as well as from the integration of this text-base with the reader's previous knowledge, derived from those readers' experience, their worldview and their understanding the text's genre in the text-base. Our research analyses the construction of inferences throughout different genres within a sample composed of 3,199 Secondary Education students in Costa Rica and Spain. To this end, TECOLEIN, a test aiming to measure students' level of inferential reading comprehension, was designed and validated. TECOLEIN was composed of four types of inferences in three different genres. The data obtained were analysed using Paired-Samples T-Test and ANOVA and, at the same time, a two-stage cluster analysis was performed. The results obtained in TECOLEIN have allowed, firstly, to observe a gradual progress of the inferential reading comprehension among students aged 12, 14 and 16. Throughout secondary education, the students develop strategies that integrate into the reading comprehension both the knowledge built from the text, and that based on long-term memory. Secondly, the joint analysis of the answers offered by the students to questions of inferential comprehension related to different genres reflects the existence of different degrees of difficulty in the comprehension of a text. Finally, difficulties of reading comprehension in Costa Rica and Spain present scaled results, since both countries present a similar difficulty associated with a type of inferential comprehension.