Effects of Text Structure on the Iranian Students' Reading Comprehension Performance

It is a common practice in reading for academic purposes, to use expository text structure as reading materials. Scholars usually use different text structures such as; compare/contrast, cause/effect, problem/solution and a collection of descriptions to convey the message to their readers. Studies have found out that learners performed differently after they have read different text structures. The researcher investigated 2 groups of Iranian students' performance after reading two types of text structures which are compare/contrast and cause/effect. These groups of students were 33 intermediate and 33 advanced levels who participated in study. The results of the study via t-test analysis indicated that both groups performed differently after reading the different text structures. Findings of this study could provide significant insights for both teachers and students to understand how different reading texts can be organised in terms of difficulty. (C) 2012 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. Selection and/or peer-review under responsibility of the LSP 2012 Committee, Language Academy, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia.