Phonemic Awareness Is a More Important Predictor of Orthographic Processing Than Rapid Serial Naming: Evidence From Russian

We studied the relationship between rapid serial naming (RSN) and orthographic processing in Russian, an asymmetrically transparent orthography. Ninety-six students (M age = 13.73) completed tests of word and pseudoword reading fluency, spelling, orthographic choice, phonological choice, phoneme awareness (PA), and RSN. PA was a better predictor of orthographic skills and pseudoword reading accuracy than RSN, which accounted for more variance in word and pseudoword reading fluency. Controlling for pseudoword reading fluency washed out RSN's contribution to word reading fluency. These results extend previous findings questioning the role of RSN as an index of orthographic processing skills and support the idea that RSN taps into automaticity/efficiency of processing print-sound mappings.