English as a Second Language Reading Strategies

The study described in this text was undertaken to§test the hypothesis that reading comprehension items,§which elicit specific bottom-up and top-down§strategies, favour certain linguistic/cultural§groups. Although a variety of statistical methods§have been developed for flagging test items that§function differentially for equal ability examinees§from different ethnic, linguistic, or gender groups,§the standard differential item functioning (DIF)§detection procedures have not been very useful in§explaining why DIF occurs. To address this problem, a§confirmatory approach to DIF was used to determine§whether groups of reading test items, classified§according to a bottom-up, top-down reading strategy§framework, functioned differentially for equal§ability Arabic and Mandarin ESL learners. Analyses§revealed systematic group differences in two of the§bottom-up and three of the top-down reading strategy§categories. These results demonstrate the utility of§employing a theoretical framework for interpreting§group differences on a reading test that can be used§to assist ESL reading researchers, test developers,§and instructors in the development of technically§sound reading assessments.