THE ROLE OF GENDER IN READING COMPREHENSION: AN ANALYSIS OF COLLEGE-LEVEL EFL STUDENTS’ COMPREHENSION OF DIFFERENT GENRES

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Published: Jul 1, 2016

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Didem Koban Koç
Hacettepe University

Abstract

The purpose of the present study is to examine the effects of gender on comprehending different types of genre. The study involved 60 first year college students (30 males and 30 females) who were taking an advanced reading course at a government university in Turkey. The students were given three reading passages of different genres such as historical fiction, essay and fantasy and were asked to answer comprehension questions related to the passages. Descriptives statistics, one-way ANOVA and repeated measures ANOVA were employed to analyse the relationship between gender and the test scores for each text type. The results showed that (1) the participants, in general, were significantly better at understanding the essay than historical fiction and fantasy (2) there was not a statistically significant difference between males and females regarding comprehending the different types of genres (3) both the male and female participants were significantly better at understanding the essay than historical fiction and fantasy. The study offers suggestions regarding incorporating different types of genre in the classroom.

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Vol. 3 No. 3 (2016)
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Articles

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