| Abstract: | This research investigated whether spelling ability, an index of precise lexical representations, predicts the balance between bottom-up and top-down processing in online sentence processing among skilled readers, over and above contributions of reading ability, vocabulary, and working memory. The results showed that the combination of superior reading and spelling was associated with more accurate report of rapidly presented sentences and that spelling uniquely predicted reduced reliance on context to identify words. These findings support the lexical quality hypothesis by demonstrating that individual differences in the reading strategies used by skilled readers reflect differences in the precision of their lexical representations. |
