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The study examined how language ability and content familiarity affected reading comprehension performance of low- and high-ability Saudi students learning English. 132 students took reading comprehension tests on familiar and unfamiliar content. The results showed that language skills and familiarity significantly influenced performance, with low-ability students benefiting more from familiar content.

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ِAbeer Humud
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31 views3 pages

Article Title:: Reference

The study examined how language ability and content familiarity affected reading comprehension performance of low- and high-ability Saudi students learning English. 132 students took reading comprehension tests on familiar and unfamiliar content. The results showed that language skills and familiarity significantly influenced performance, with low-ability students benefiting more from familiar content.

Uploaded by

ِAbeer Humud
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Article Title:

The effects of content familiarity and language ability on reading comprehension


performance of low- and high-ability Saudi tertiary students studying English as a foreign
language

Authors: Dr. Yousif A. N. Al-Shumaimeri

Reference
AlShumaimeri, Y. A. (2006). The effects of content familiarity and language ability on reading
comprehension performance of low and high ability Saudi tertiary studying English as a foreign
language.
Link:

Overview
The experimental methodology used in this study was adequate for examining the relative
impacts of language proficiency and material familiarity on the comprehension performance
of a specific sample of Saudi students. In order to achieve this, a 2 x 2 between-subjects
design with 2 degrees of language proficiency (high and low) and 2 levels of topic familiarity
was set up (familiar and unfamiliar). The comprehension ratings from the multiple-choice
tests served as the dependent variable.
Research Questions:
Q#1:What are the relative effects of content familiarity on high- vs. low-ability readers'
comprehension performance?
Q#2:Do high- and low-ability readers perform differently given equal conditions?
Data Collection
During the reading module lectures for all students, the data collection was done in a university
setting on typical university days. In this study, 132 university students—132 men and women—took
two reading comprehension exams on two distinct kinds of content (familiar and unfamiliar).
Results
The study found that students' language skills and content familiarity had a big influence on how
well they understood what they were reading. The findings revealed that language competency had
a significant influence on how well children at different levels did with comprehending, and that
reading comprehension was enhanced by subject knowledge. The results show that reading
materials should be presented to kids that have appropriate linguistic challenges in order to improve
their reading and language abilities. The results also showed that while high-ability students did not
seem to be affected by a lack of prior knowledge, low-ability students did.
Recommendations
According to the literature, readers at some competence levels (in this case, the low-ability pupils)
benefit from previous information, whereas readers at other proficiency levels do not. These
findings imply that language training should concentrate on enhancing students' reading and
language skills by presenting reading materials with suitable linguistic difficulties.

Relevance
The results of the study show how reading comprehension performance of low- and high-
ability Saudi tertiary students studying English as a foreign language is affected by subject
familiarity and language ability. The performance of the participating readers'
comprehension appears to have been considerably impacted by both language proficiency
and content familiarity. While the low-ability students' reading comprehension appears to
have benefited from prior topic understanding, as seen by their performance, higher
language proficiency may have aided the high-ability students' performance on the
challenging passage.
Future research
Future research should use additional techniques of understanding measurement, such as
free recall, in light of the limitations of this study. Also, both male and female students at
the same academic levels participated in this study. Since that it is known that men and
women read differently, it would be fascinating to examine gender differences in future
research. Future studies could possibly study additional variables concurrently.

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