A Study On The Correlations Between English Reading Habits,Reading Attitudes And Reading Performance

With the development of society,English has become the most widely spoken language and learning English definitely brings a lot of benefits.Such as we can communicate with foreigners in English and at the same time know about the latest news all over the world through English reading.Learners could not only improve their English knowledge and communicative competence but also experience the culture and customs of English-speaking countries by English reading.So,it is of importance for learners to have a good English reading habit and hold a positive English reading attitude.However,relevant researches show that: The current status of English reading is not optimistic.Most students do not have a positive attitude towards English reading,and they do not develop good English reading habits.This paper aims to focus on the correlations between English reading habits,reading attitudes and reading performance in order to give some practical significance.The research was based on the input hypothesis and affective filter hypothesis put forward by Krashen.Three research questions were presented in the thesis:(1)What are the status quo of English-majors’ English reading habits and reading attitudes? Are they related to each other?(2)To what extent are English reading habits and English readingperformance related?(3)To what extent are English reading attitudes and English reading performance related?The study did a questionnaire survey and made an analysis of 217 Chinese English major students’ English reading habits and attitudes from five universities in Hohhot.The five universities were Inner Mongolia University,Inner Mongolia Normal University,Inner Mongolia Agricultural University,Inner Mongolia University of Technology and Youth Political College of Inner Mongolia Normal University.The author released the questionnaire in late October and completed the questionnaire collection in early November.SPSS 17.0 has been used to conduct descriptive statistics and analysis of the data.Interviews were then conducted with the participants according to the survey results.The major findings of this study are: 1)English major students of the five universities had good English reading habits and attitudes and there was a positive correlation between English reading habits and English reading attitudes(r=0.543,P<0.05).2)There was a positive correlation between students’ English reading habits and their English reading performance(r=0.434,P<0.05)and the correlation was striking between English reading quantity and English reading habits(r=0.384,P<0.05).3)There was a positive correlation between students’ English reading attitudes and students’ reading performance(r=0.242,P<0.05),and the correlation is prominent between reading activity and enjoyment andEnglish reading performance(r=0.608,P<0.05);besides,there was a negative correlation between reading anxiety and difficulty and English reading performance(r=-0.379,P<0.05).The results of the study contribute to an understanding of variables which associated with English reading habits and English reading attitudes.Afterwards,this study put forward some suggestions on how to help students form good English reading habits and attitudes from several dimensions of English reading habits and reading attitudes and some practical suggestions for future research were also identified.Other dimensions of reading habits and reading attitudes are needed to be studied.