Prior reviews report positive word-reading intervention effects for adolescents but with a wide range (0-1.31) due to broad outcome conceptualization¶

Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study · quant-synthesis r? · q2
Currency · newest study 2026 · not yet checked against its sources · not reviewed by a person

Subclaims¶

q2 i? Previous meta-analyses and systematic reviews (2003-2023) generally reported significant positive mean effects of reading interventions on adolescent word reading, ranging from 0 to 1.31, but did not distinguish specific word-reading approaches. → Julia J. Yi 2026

Evidence¶

Julia J. Yi 2026¶

Julia J. Yi, A. Angelique Aitken, Emily Sharp, Adiba Nusrat, Micheal Sandbank. (2026). What Works for Teaching Word Reading to Adolescents? A Meta-Analytic Investigation. Educational Psychology Review. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10648-026-10124-9

q2 · i? · quant-synthesis · r?

The review's own synthesis of ten prior reviews (Table 1, 2003-2023), which it reports showed positive effects "stretching from 0 – 1.31" but conceptualized literacy outcomes too broadly to isolate word-reading approach effects.

"Previous meta-analyses and systematic reviews examining adolescents and reading interventions have generally reported statistically significant, positive mean effects of the interventions on word reading, though with a wide range of observed effects stretching from 0 – 1.31"

Discussion¶

Learner Variables¶

• Decoding — outcome: instruction changes it

Related Claims¶

• Phonics instruction has a small but statistically confirmed effect for children with reading disabilities, while Orton-Gillingham structured-literacy programs show positive but non-significant effects — related
• Systematic phonics outperforms unsystematic or no-phonics instruction on children's reading overall, but its advantage over whole-word teaching on novel words is untested in children and contested — related
• Interventions targeting different reading and skill content domains show mostly small differences, with average effect sizes of 0.14–0.22 all statistically significant — related
• No significant differences emerged between word-reading intervention approaches, though whole word recognition showed trends toward null effects — related
• Word-reading interventions yield significant positive effects on adolescent literacy outcomes overall (g = 0.30) — related