Effects of text types on advanced EFL learners’ reading comprehension

Abstract

This study aimed to investigate the effects of two text types on Chinese advanced EFL students’ reading comprehension: narrative and expository texts. It also examined the students’ perceptions of the text types. The participants in this study were 133 Chinese third-year English major students from five intact classes in a comprehensive university in southwest China. The data used for the study were drawn from a reading comprehension test, written questionnaires with 127 respondents, and semi-structured face-to-face interviews with 13 interviewees. The comparison of multivariate means between groups at each level showed that text types had significantly different effects on reading comprehension and that the students performed better on expository than narrative texts. It was also found that the students thought text types affected their reading comprehension. The findings have implications for the teaching and learning of English as a foreign language in the Chinese context.