Correlation Between Reading Interst And TOEFL Reading Comprehension Ability
Abstract
Reading is important skill in life, it allows the reader to gain information unbound by age of information and space. Through reading, an individual will be able to gain knowledge from many places in the world. Reading comprehension is process of comprehending what is being read. Reading interest is the basis aspect that drive and motivates an individual to read. Each person has different way and interest to read, the most notable aspects that determine interest in reading is gender
Quantitative approach was used as the research design of this study. The population was English third semester students at University of Islam Malang. The researcher chose 49 students who had already filled out the questionnaire. The instruments were reading questionnaire and TOEFL reading task, which used to know students reading interest, which used to know the correlation between reading interest and TOEFL reading comprehension. The techniques involved two steps; giving a questionnaire and collecting students’ score from lecturers’ document. To analyze the data, the researcher used Descriptive Statistics and Pearson Product Moment Correlation on SPSS version 24.
The results of the study showed Based on the study's findings, the researcher concludes that Significant correlation exists between English reading interest and TOEFL reading comprehension score with Sig = 0.004 and low level of correlation with the correlation r = 0.405. This indicated that better students’ English reading interest also better in their TOEFL reading comprehension score, which replied to the first question. Additionally, the study also revealed that there is no significant difference in students’ gender both in English reading interest with Sig = 0.144 and TOEFL reading comprehension score with Sig 0.809 which indicated that the difference in academic performance between male and female students in terms of English reading interest are not far different.
Based on the findings of the study, it is important for the lecturers to take action in class to get students interest in reading. Also, it is needed to the students to improve reading interest especially in English text to get better score at TOEFL reading comprehension section that might influence TOEFL score in general.
Key Words: Reading Interest, TOEFL Reading Comprehension, Students Gender