The effect of the EFL learners' background knowledge on their performance in reading comprehension tests

الملخص EN

This study aims at measuring the amount of the effect of the readers' background knowledge on their performance in reading comprehension tests through the assessment of information gain in reading comprehension (RC) tests.

This study involves the examinees in two types of tasks, i.e., prereading task and post-reading task.

The researcher hypothesizes that there are no statistically significant differences between the pre-reading and post-reading performances of examinees on RC tests.

The population of the study includes 467 students of English language and translation at Al-Isra University.

(154of them are majoring n English language and translation during in the summer semester of the academic year 2008- 2009 The sample of the study consists of 70 students who were registered for two reading courses.

To verify the validity of the research hypothesis, a number of statistical procedures were used such as arithmetical mean, t-test for tho control and experimental groups to analyze the performance of the examnees on two reading passages taken from TOFEL practice tests (2007).

The analysis of the data has shown the following results: 1.

The background knowledge has an effect on the performance on RC tests.

2.

There is a significant difference in students' performance on the prereading and post-reading tasks in favor of the latter.

3.

The effect of background knowledge is inevitable on RC tests, but it can be identified or neutralized.

Based on these conclusions, a number of recommendations were suesgesteel .