Children’s Access to Print Material and Education-Related Outcomes: Findings from a Meta-Analytic Review

Those favoring continued funding for programs that increase children’s access to print material use findings from four disparate lines of research to support their argument, rather than direct evidence of program impacts. Our meta-analytic research review examined whether the efficacy of such programs is supported by direct evidence. The initial pool of 10,696 potential studies was winnowed down to 108 using explicit inclusion criteria. Outcomes found among these studies were clustered into eight categories. Meta-analytic findings show positive relationships between access to print and all eight categories. However, meta-analysis of findings from rigorous studies could only verify the causal relationships between access to print and children’s attitudes, reading behavior, emergent literacy, and reading achievement. Benchmarks for meta-analytic findings are provided.