Middle School Students’ Audience Awareness in Persuasive Texts

Abstract

An important skill for writing is considering target audience, which requires writers to have audience awareness. Audience awareness is particularly crucial in persuasive writing because persuasive narratives require considering opposing ideas target audience have and refute them without dialogic feedback. Considering the importance of audience awareness in persuasive narratives, this study investigated audience awareness of 7 th grade students in two classrooms. A total of 30 students participated in the study and each student completed two narratives during the two-week period of the study. Students were assigned different audiences for each narrative topic. Results were compared for mean differences and Mann-Whitney U test was completed to examine the statistical significance of mean differences. Results indicated a statistically significant difference in audience awareness. Further analysis also indicated the importance of a meaningful match between the narrative topics and the assigned audience conditions. The study concludes with implications for teachers and suggestions for future studies.