The Correlation between Content Schemata, Linguistic Schemata and Reading Comprehension

Abstract

Reading is a complicated process that involves the reader's engagement with the text to develop meaning. The likelihood that someone will comprehend the content at hand depends on a variety of circumstances. The features of the content and the characteristics of the reader may be divided into two categories. Background knowledge and language proficiency are regarded to be more significant and to contribute more to reading comprehension in reading a second language or a foreign language than other aspects. This study is aimed to measure whether there is a relationship between content schemata and linguistic schemata as the predictor variables and reading comprehension proficiency as the criterion variable. The study was carried out in a sample of 35 English students of the first semester at Foreign Language Class in Al-Qolam Islamic Institute Gondanglegi Malang. The data collection involved a number of instruments, namely Linguistic test, Questionnaire and reading comprehension test. The linguistic test consisted of grammar test and vocabulary test. The questionnaire in the form of topic familiarity assessment was administered to collect data of the learners’ background knowledge scores. The data from the vocabulary and grammar tests and also the questionnaire were used to predict reading comprehension. To achieve the purpose of the present study, the data were analyzed by using multiple correlation with the help of SPSS 16 version. The result of the computation of multiple correlation showed the effect analysis of the combined predictors on reading comprehension yielded the computed value of F 16.756 indicating significance at .000. Multiple regression correlation calculations required a significance level of less than 0.05. In conclusion, both content schemata and linguistic schemata had correlated on reading comprehension.