A Survey on Non-English Majors' English Reading Strategies

The purpose of the study was to investigate college students' English reading strategies, reading difficulties and their strategies in answering reading comprehension questions. It conducted a minimal investigation of non-English majors' reading strategies utilizing think-aloud and simple interview. The results show that: 1) the testees have adopted thirteen reading strategies altogether; 2) reading difficulties are mainly caused by new words and complicated sentence structures; and 3) their strategies to answer questions are mainly as follows, using key words, scanning, selective attention; high-score students and low-score students take different strategies, high-score students being better at using the strategy of self-monitoring. Educators can utilize these findings to help students solve reading difficulties and teach them some useful some reading strategies.