Reading Strategies, Learning Styles and Reading Comprehension: A Correlation Study

Abstract

This study aimed to measure the correlations between reading strategies, learning styles and reading comprehension of the Saudi EFL college learners' English reading comprehension. This study used a survey and two IELTS reading passages that vary in difficulty levels. The purpose was to show how two different reading strategies affect EFL students' reading comprehension. The study further examines the correlations between learning styles and reading strategies, and whether this affects the students' comprehension in a sample of seventy-five EFL Saudi college students enrolled in the English Department. Participants were randomly assigned to two groups: an oral reading group  (n = 37) and a silent reading group (n = 38). The learning strategies were  'visual learner' and 'auditory learner', with three performance grades, 'low', 'average' and 'high'; while the reading methods were  'oral' and 'silent'. The findings showed that the variation of reading strategies, namely oral reading versus silent reading strategies, did not produce any statistically significant differences on EFL learners' reading comprehension. Findings also showed that high visual learners did not perform significantly differently from the silent reading group or the oral reading group.  There were no statistically significant differences between silent reading participants and oral reading participants in their performance on either text from the IELTS. More detailed findings were also presented and discussed against a background of prior research. Pedagogical implications were drawn, and recommendations for further research were proposed.