This paper discusses a research project carried out to study and compare the reading processes of native and second language speakers of English. The procedure developed for the observation and description of the reading process and related language experience included initial diagnostic testing and taped inventories, a sequence of tutorial activities related to initial inventories, and final reading inventories. The results of inventories and coding sheets of first language speakers of various age levels were examined in terms of features like the following: word order, relativization, conjunction, disjunction, agreement, verb formation, progressive formation, pronominalization, seriation, and reported speech. The subject groups of native English speakers were ninth graders, tenth graders, high school seniors, and adults over the age of 25. Significant positive variations in performance were observed and these variations indicated better overall performance by those between the ages of fifteen and twenty-one than by younger or older participants. The factors under observation in the second language readers were the learner's age, prior cultural conditioning, and prior decoding skills in the first language. These three factors were found to be influential in the development of learning programs for reading proficiency and second language acquisition. (Author/CFM)