Rapid Automatized Naming (RAN) as a Kindergarten Predictor of Future Reading in English: A Systematic Review and Meta‐analysis

Abstract

Rapid automatized naming (RAN) has been shown to be a strong correlate of reading abilities. RAN also predicts future reading across different ages, ability levels, and languages, and is often used in literacy screening. Thus, understanding the specific relations between early RAN and later reading difficulties is important, particularly for screening. This systematic review and meta‐analysis (with N = 60 samples; k = 373 effect sizes; n = 10,513 participants), was the first to test the extent to which measures of RAN assessed before grade school predict future reading performance in English‐speaking children. We also tested whether characteristics of the RAN tasks, reading measures, or sample demographics moderate this relationship. We found that overall, kindergarten/preschool RAN is correlated with grade‐school reading at r = −.38, similar in magnitude to previous concurrent meta‐analyses that included various ages and languages. We found that alphanumeric RAN tasks were more strongly related to future reading than were non‐alphanumeric tasks, as well as that RAN significantly predicts all types of reading measures tested, but more strongly predicts real word than nonword reading. To assess the role of RAN’s unique predictive power, we also meta‐analyzed the semipartial correlations of early RAN with later reading when controlling for phonological awareness (PA); the result of rsp = −.25 demonstrates RAN’s significant, unique contribution beyond PA. These results support shared cognitive resource models in which the similarity between RAN and reading tasks accounts for their correlation. We provide practical guidelines for based on these data for early screening for reading difficulties and dyslexia.

Entropy of eye movement during rapid automatized naming

“…As verified in previous studies ( Wiig et al, 2000 ), the mean percentage of naming accuracy remained stable and did not differ significantly for healthy children across the age stages. Hence, to evaluate individuals’ RAN abilities, the majority of studies and all published tests ( Wolf et al, 2000 ; Georgiou et al, 2008 ; Norton and Wolf, 2012 ; Snowling and Melby-Lervag, 2016 ; Araújo and Faísca, 2019 ; McWeeny et al, 2022 ) considered only the TTN, which was widely used to measure the reading fluency and speed. Consequently, the current study considered the TTN, only, to evaluate eye movements during RAN.…”

“…Rapid automatized naming (RAN) tasks ( Wolf et al, 2000 ; Georgiou et al, 2008 ; Norton and Wolf, 2012 ; Snowling and Melby-Lervag, 2016 ; Araújo and Faísca, 2019 ; McWeeny et al, 2022 ) have been proposed for measuring individuals’ ability to retrieve and name a series of letters, numbers, objects, or colors sequentially as quickly as possible. RAN looks simple but is actually associated with a broad range of cognitive processes, including attention, executive functions (e.g., working memory, inhibitory control), and linguistic processes (e.g., phonological retrieval, visual-verbal connections) ( Wolf et al, 2000 ; Georgiou et al, 2008 ; Norton and Wolf, 2012 ; Snowling and Melby-Lervag, 2016 ; Araújo and Faísca, 2019 ; McWeeny et al, 2022 ).…”

“…Rapid automatized naming (RAN) tasks ( Wolf et al, 2000 ; Georgiou et al, 2008 ; Norton and Wolf, 2012 ; Snowling and Melby-Lervag, 2016 ; Araújo and Faísca, 2019 ; McWeeny et al, 2022 ) have been proposed for measuring individuals’ ability to retrieve and name a series of letters, numbers, objects, or colors sequentially as quickly as possible. RAN looks simple but is actually associated with a broad range of cognitive processes, including attention, executive functions (e.g., working memory, inhibitory control), and linguistic processes (e.g., phonological retrieval, visual-verbal connections) ( Wolf et al, 2000 ; Georgiou et al, 2008 ; Norton and Wolf, 2012 ; Snowling and Melby-Lervag, 2016 ; Araújo and Faísca, 2019 ; McWeeny et al, 2022 ). Its clinical utility has been reported in the evaluation of several cognitive and neurobiological disorders, including developmental dyslexia ( Goswami, 2015 ), specific language impairment ( Snowling and Melby-Lervag, 2016 ), attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) ( Tannock et al, 2000 ), and autism spectrum disorder (ASD) ( Hogan-Brown et al, 2014 ; Zhao J. et al, 2019 ).…”

“…Its clinical utility has been reported in the evaluation of several cognitive and neurobiological disorders, including developmental dyslexia ( Goswami, 2015 ), specific language impairment ( Snowling and Melby-Lervag, 2016 ), attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) ( Tannock et al, 2000 ), and autism spectrum disorder (ASD) ( Hogan-Brown et al, 2014 ; Zhao J. et al, 2019 ). Remarkably, more and more findings ( Wolf et al, 2000 ; Georgiou et al, 2008 ; Norton and Wolf, 2012 ; Snowling and Melby-Lervag, 2016 ; Araújo and Faísca, 2019 ; McWeeny et al, 2022 ) have shown that the RAN deficits might become even more prominent in interpreting and characterizing the features of developmental dyslexia than other deficits in cognitive skills, such as phonological awareness, short-term memory, letter knowledge, and vocabulary. Furthermore, previous meta-analyses have documented the significant correlation between RAN and reading abilities across various reading constructs and languages ( Swanson et al, 2003 ; Araújo et al, 2015 ; Hjetland et al, 2017 ).…”

“…Theoretically, to better understand the visual and cognitive patterns or features during RAN, one should monitor the focus points in sequence and record the essential ocular activities during RAN, such as duration of time spent on some particular areas of interest, rapid movements between focuses, scanning path, temporal-spatial series of focuses, and so on. However, traditional behavioral observation method cannot be competent for recording such the detailed temporal-spatial dynamical information during RAN ( Wolf et al, 2000 ; Georgiou et al, 2008 ; Norton and Wolf, 2012 ; Snowling and Melby-Lervag, 2016 ; Araújo and Faísca, 2019 ; McWeeny et al, 2022 ). Fortunately, eye-tracking method ( Armstrong and Olatunji, 2012 ; Chawarska et al, 2013 ; Lai et al, 2013 ), among others, has been intensively used in psychology for decades to reveal the fundamental cognitive processes and mechanisms involved in reading and visual perception, and thus has the feasibility to characterize the essential features of RAN.…”