L2 Decoding and reading comprehension in Saudi foundation year ESL students: An investigation into readers' decoding abilities, outputs, experiences, and processes, and the contribution of their L2 decoding proficiency to their L2 reading comprehension

Phonological decoding proficiency has attracted ample attention in L1 reading research, and has been a key variable in prediction studies of L1 reading comprehension ability. Contrary to L1 research, L2 decoding skill has received less attention, with various linguistic contexts remaining unexplored (e.g., Arabic L1 learners of alphabetic languages). Furthermore, the unique contribution, or lack thereof, of this skill to L2 reading comprehension is unclear. Consequently, this study aimed to: (1) explore L2 decoding among Saudi (Arabic L1) university ESL students (CEFR: A1, A2, B1), particularly, the extent to which they are able to perform on measures of English decoding, and the nature of their decoding outputs, experiences, and processes; (2) investigate the contribution of L2 decoding proficiency to L2 reading comprehension, relative to the contributions of some other variables known to be important predictors of this skill: namely, L2 vocabulary knowledge, L2 grammar knowledge and L1 reading comprehension ability.
To achieve the first aim, 216 Saudi foundation year ESL students took part in a real and pseudoword reading-aloud task aimed at assessing their decoding proficiency. The decoding outputs of a subsample (N=60) were then phonemically transcribed and analysed. A qualitative investigation was also carried out in which further subsamples took part in: (a) an interview aimed at understanding their decoding experiences (N=12); and (b) a think-aloud task aimed at exploring their decoding processes (N=15).
To achieve the second aim, the following additional measures were administered to the same 216 participants: L2 vocabulary knowledge, L2 grammar knowledge, L1 reading comprehension ability, and L2 reading comprehension ability. A complementary qualitative investigation was also carried out in which 18 participants took part in interviews aimed at validating and providing greater depth to the quantitative results.
With respect to the first aim, descriptive analyses suggest that students encounter difficulties with English decoding, with a mean overall decoding percentage of success of 35%, 44%, and 52% for A1, A2, and B1 students, respectively. Error analyses of their decoding outputs and thematic analyses of their self-reported decoding experiences highlighted the following: difficulties with decoding vowel, consonant, and silent graphemes; a tendency to add to, omit, and mis-order existing graphemes; a tendency to make whole-word substitutions; difficulties with decoding unfamiliar and long words, and difficulties with the L2 script. Thematic analysis of the think-aloud data showed a range of decoding processes, including automatic processing, small-unit processing, large-unit processing, analogy-guided processing, intuition-guided processing and partial processing.
With respect to the second aim, a series of regression analyses showed that: (a) there was a significant relation between L2 decoding proficiency and L2 reading comprehension performance; (b) the contribution of L2 decoding proficiency to L2 reading comprehension was significant before and also after controlling for the effects of L2 vocabulary knowledge, L2 grammar knowledge and L1 reading comprehension; (c) L2 decoding proficiency was the third strongest predictor of L2 reading comprehension after L2 grammar knowledge and L2 vocabulary knowledge; (d) the two decoding measures (real word and pseudoword decoding) appeared to be more related than different in that neither made a significant contribution to L2 reading comprehension after controlling for the other and for other measured covariates; (d) the contribution of L2 decoding proficiency seemed to decrease as linguistic proficiency increased. Further, a thematic analysis of the interview data suggested that decoding difficulties could interfere with learners’ comprehension, with this being due to the role decoding plays in facilitating meaning access, modulating situational affect, and possibly freeing cognitive capacity. Together, these findings have various implications for reading theory, pedagogy, and assessment.

Advisor: Woore, R
Rose, HL