THE RELATIONSHIP OF READING STRATEGIES AND SELF-EFFICACY WITH THE READING COMPREHENSION OF HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS IN INDONESIA

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship of reading strategies and self-efficacy with the reading comprehension of high school students in Indonesia. A convenience sample of 138 high school students from a state high school participated in this study. To measure reading strategy use, the Survey of Reading Strategies (SORS) was applied. A self-efficacy questionnaire was developed to measure students' self-efficacy beliefs. To measure their reading comprehension ability, an English reading test taken from a practice book for National Examinations was adopted and administered to the participants. The regression analysis results demonstrated that the overall use of reading strategies had a significant relationship with reading comprehension and it made a small contribution to the prediction of reading comprehension ability. The categories of reading strategies were not significantly related to reading comprehension. The results also revealed that self-efficacy had a significant relationship with reading comprehension and contributed as much as 20% to the prediction of reading comprehension. When the two independent variables were investigated simultaneously, the use of reading strategies had a non-significant relationship with reading comprehension while self-efficacy was a significant predictor of reading comprehension.