Exploring the Interaction of Syntactic Complexity, Reading Skills, and Socioeconomic Status in School Textbook Comprehension

This study examines the effects of syntactic complexity, reading skills, and socioeconomic status (SES) on the comprehension of primary school textbooks among Chilean students. The research involved 237 students from 6th, 7th, and 8th grades attending public and private schools. Cloze tests, based on texts from school textbooks with varying levels of syntactic complexity, were administered to assess comprehension. The findings indicate that syntactic complexity alone does not significantly affect comprehension. However, interactions between syntactic complexity, SES, and reading skills reveal that the influence of syntactic complexity is moderated by individual and contextual factors. In particular, students with high SES and strong reading skills demonstrated the best performance in both levels of syntactic complexity, while those from low-SES backgrounds and with weak reading skills showed generally lower accuracy across conditions. Interestingly, within this latter group, performance was slightly higher in texts with greater syntactic complexity. These results highlight the complex interplay between linguistic, cognitive, and socioeconomic factors in shaping reading comprehension and underscore the need for educational interventions that account for both individual differences and contextual inequalities.