The Effects Of Text Difficulty, Text Type And Topic Familiarity On L2Reading Comprehension

L2reading comprehension, as one of the most important skills of secondlanguage acquisition, has attracted considerable attention of language researchers.Most previous studies have explored the effects of one or two factors, such as L2learners’ language proficiency, background knowledge, text type, test type, textdifficulty, etc. on L2reading comprehension; whereas little research has beenconducted on how various factors have interactively affected L2readingcomprehension. Thus, this study aims to comprehensively explore the effects ofdifferent factors on L2reading comprehension. Specifically, it addresses the followingresearch questions:1. Are there any significant main effects of text difficulty, text type andtopic familiarity on L2reading comprehension?2. Are there any significant interactions among text difficulty, text type andtopic familiarity on L2reading comprehension?The present study was a2(text difficulty)×2(text type)×2(topic familiarity)repeated measures design. Text difficulty was divided into easiness and difficulty.Text type fell into two categories, i.e. exposition and argumentation. Topic familiaritywas divided into familiarity and unfamiliarity. L2learners’ reading comprehensionwas measured by their scores of the English reading comprehension test. Thematerials of the reading comprehension test, selected from the previous CollegeEnglish Test-Band Four (CET-4) papers, consisted of eight passages, each of whichrepresents a combination of each level of text difficulty, text type and topicfamiliarity.The research involved three intact classes of93first-year non-English majorsfrom Huaiyin Institute of Technology. All the subjects were given a questionnaire oftopic familiarity and then took an L2reading comprehension test in the class session.The valid data from86subjects were used for further analysis.A repeated measures ANOVA was conducted, with results displayed as follows: 1. Text difficulty has a significant medium effect on L2reading comprehension(F=9.96, p <.05, η2=.11), but text type and topic familiarity have no main effects onL2reading comprehension (text type: F=.00, p>.05, η2=.00; topic familiarity: F=.16, p>.05, η2=.00).2. There is no three-way interaction among text difficulty, text type and topicfamiliarity (F=3.41, p>.05, η2=.04). However, there are three two-way interactionsbetween any two of them (p <.05).(1) There is a significant medium interaction between text difficulty and text typeon L2reading comprehension (F=8.50, p <.05, η2=.09). For easy texts, the meandifference between expositions and argumentations is statistically significant (p <.05),i.e. argumentations are easier to be comprehended. However, for difficult texts, thereis no significant difference between expositions and argumentations (p>.05).Similarly, for expositions, there is no significant difference between easy and difficulttexts (p>.05). But for argumentations, the advantage of easy texts over difficult onesis significant (p <.05).(2) There is a significant medium interaction between text difficulty and topicfamiliarity on L2reading comprehension (F=5.56, p <.05, η2=.06). For unfamiliartopics, there is a significant difference between easy and difficult texts (p <.05), i.e.easy texts are easier to be comprehended. But for familiar topics, there is nosignificant difference between easy and difficult texts (p>.05).(3) There is a significant large interaction between text type and topic familiarityon L2reading comprehension (F=18.09, p <.05, η2=.18). In spite of text type, themean difference between familiar and unfamiliar topics both reaches statisticalsignificance (p <.05). For expositions, familiar topics are easier for L2learners’reading comprehension than unfamiliar topics while the contrary is true ofargumentations. Similarly, in spite of topic familiarity, the mean difference betweenexpositions and argumentations is also statistically significant (p <.05). For familiartopics, expositions are easier to be read than argumentations while the contrary is trueof unfamiliar topics.The present study has important theoretical, methodological, and pedagogical implications. Theoretically, the results of the present study lend support to InteractiveTheory and Schema Theory. Methodologically, the present research adopts therepeated measures ANOVA. It not only explores the main effects of three variables,namely, text difficulty, text type and topic familiarity, on L2reading comprehension,but also investigates the interaction effects among the three variables. Pedagogically,on one hand, during the instruction of L2reading, L2teachers should choose theappropriate reading materials that meet the students’ reading level. On the other hand,L2learners are supposed to gain more knowledge of expositions and L2teachersshould give more instructions of the prior knowledge about expositive texts in thereading class.