Effect Of Field Independent/Dependent Cognitive Styles On English Majors’ Reading Competence

Reading is one of the important ways for English learners to absorb languagematerials and get perceptual knowledge. However, reading comprehension process is acomplicated cognitive process and one of the individual factors of English learners isthe cognitive style, which embodies features of individual cognitive processingpreference. This study is based on the theory of field independence/dependence, whichis first put forward by the American psychologist, Witkin H A. It aims to analyzeEnglish majors’ cognitive features and the effect of cognitive styles on their readingcomprehension competence, and thus presents proper solutions to improve methods ofreading teaching.In order to explore the correlation between field independence/dependence andEnglish reading comprehension competence,97English major sophomores fromQingdao University of Science and Technology were asked to take a Group EmbeddedFigure Test and a reading test. The study focuses on three questions:①Comparedwith field dependent learners, do field independent learners perform better in readingcomprehension?②Are field independent learners better at reading comprehension ofscientific genre?③Are field dependent learners better at reading comprehension ofhumanistic genre?Based on the data analysis and discussion, three findings are concluded:①Compared with field dependent learners, field independent learners perform better;②Field independent learners are better at reading comprehension of scientific genre;③Field dependent learners are better at reading comprehension of humanistic genre.On the basis of these findings, the study presents some implications for Englishmajors’ reading teaching, for example: teachers should improve the awareness of fieldindependence/dependence; try to cultivate “field dependence” to be more “fieldindependence”; cultivate “field independence” to be more “field dependence” with more encouragement.