A series of six studies of the reading ability of Japanese high school and college students investigated the ability of students to process various literary forms and the types of questions students have difficulty with at different levels of reading proficiency. Over 25,000 students completed various versions of an English reading comprehension examination. Findings of the various studies suggest that: (1) students do not have enough experience dealing with a variety of literary forms; (2) it is better, particularly at the beginning, to teach students using short passages; (3) students at different levels of proficiency need different types of questions; (4) it is important to work on increasing students' reading speed; (5) tests should combine difficult and easy passages; (6) it is important to teach students how to guess the meanings of unknown words from context; and (7) various types of questions have different effects. (Two forms of the English Reading Comprehension Examination are attached.) (RS)