Further Discussion of the Evidence for an Intercohort Decline in Education-Adjusted Vocabulary
作者针对James A. Wilson和Walter R. Gove的文章提出质疑，认为他们没有充分考虑一个事实：在GSS数据覆盖期间，美国总成年人口中经教育调整的词汇得分出现了显著下降。作者指出，这种下降不太可能仅由时期效应导致，因为不同年龄段的得分随时间下降的模式与时期效应通常对年轻人影响更大的规律不符。此外，GSS数据显示，在中年阶段，同一出生队列的词汇得分并未增加，而如果数据中的队列间差异仅反映年龄效应，则应该出现这种增加。因此，作者认为，阅读时间在队列间的下降可能导致了经教育调整的词汇得分的队列间下降，这仍是一个合理的假设。
In their article, James A. Wilson and Walter R. Gove do not sufficiently consider the implications of the fact that education-adjusted GSS vocabulary scores in the total U.S. adult population declined to an important extent during the period covered by the GSS data. It is improbable that this decline resulted only from period influences: The declines in scores for different age levels over time are inconsistent with the usual tendency for period influences to affect the psychological characteristics of younger persons more than those of older persons. Furthermore, the GSS data show no increases in vocabulary scores within cohorts during middle age, as should have occurred if the intercohort differences shown by the data reflected only age effects. That an intercohort decline in time spent reading has contributed to an intercohort decline in education-adjusted vocabulary scores remains a reasonable hypothesis