The goal of the research proposed here is to examine the relationship between attention deficits and language processing deficits in 9- to 12-year-old children identified as having Attention Deficit Disorder. There is some evidence in the literature that these children "frequently" have language deficits, but there has been no systematic investigation of their language processing abilities. In the present proposal, and based primarily on current cognitive theory related to mental organization and on empirical evidence concerning differences between automatic and controlled attentional abilities, it is hypothesized that there should be some predictable, testable, language processing deficits secondary to a general deficit in attention. More specifically, it should be the case that a general deficit in attention would not effect automatic language processing routines, but would effect language processing routines that place demands on controlled attention mechanisms. This hypothesis is examined by taking advantage of recent evidence that there are two different types of context effect, one that is automatic (placing no demands on attention) and one that is controlled (requiring purposeful attention to be effective). By the model under investigation, 9- to 12-year-old children who have a deficit in controlled attention should show appropriate use of automatic contexts, but not of controlled contexts (that is, contexts that require controlled attention in order to be effective). Children of the same age but who do not have an attention disorder should show appropriate use of both types of context. This hypothesis is examined in a series of four experiments in which children are asked to read words presented visually either in pairs (Experiment 1a) or in sequential lists. Dependent measure is time to initiate reading the word out loud. "Context" is always a word prior to the target word (e.g., "spider" - "web"). Across experiments, the amount of time, number of words, and expectancy relationships between context and target words are varied. Children with attention deficits are expected to show reliable facilitation of the target word only in conditions where the context meets criteria for being "automatic" (principally, when the context is temporally near the target, with no intervening words). The present research is designed to provide a solid empirical and theoretical basis for formulating and testing hypotheses about the types of deficits that attention-disordered children should show during complex, e.g. sentence and discourse, processing.