Differentiation of the effects of cultural deprivation and achievement characteristics as they relate to auditory comprehension and by implication to potential reading ability was investigated. A total of 80 eighth-grade students were classified into four experimental groups: deprived-achievers, deprived-nonachievers, nondeprived-achievers, and nondeprived-nonachievers. They were individually exposed to a 500-word auditorally presented passage which was broken up into shorter passages of 40 to 60 words each. The passages were language samples given by representatives of each of the experimental groups and were obtained by having the subjects respond to six stimulus picture cards. Subsequent to the presentation of the auditory information, an auditory cloze test was administered. This test was composed of the same material presented in the initial exposure. The deletion schedule was an every fifth lexical word deletion. Analysis of the data revealed a significant difference on scores of auditory comprehension between groups of achievers and nonachievers and significant differences in scores of auditory comprehension as a function of the source of the auditory material. No significant difference between groups of deprived and nondeprived subjects on scores of auditory comprehension were found. Tables and references are included. (Author/DH)