The Impact of Self-Regulated Strategies on Promoting Iranian Intermediate EFL Learners’ Reading Comprehension Skill

Reading is an essential skill and probably the most important skill for second or foreign language learners (Grabe, 1991). It is an interactive and complex process influenced by linguistic and cognitive, social and cultural, and affective and motivational factors (Lu, 1989). To empower this skill, EFL learners can make use of self-regulated learning strategies which are good predictors of EFL learners’ attainment (e.g. Mahadi Subramaniam, 2013). The present study attempted to investigate the impact of self-regulated strategies on promoting Iranian intermediate EFL learners’ reading comprehension skill. To this aim, 72 Iranian EFL learners from four intact classes in an English language school in Ahvaz took part in the study. Two classes were randomly selected to form the experimental group and the other two classes were randomly chosen as the control group. To check their reading proficiency, all 72 EFL learners took a TOEFL reading test with a reliability coefficient of 0.86. Subsequent to that, the experimental group received instruction on SRL strategies to promote their reading comprehension skills and the control group just followed a non-SRL type of instruction on their reading comprehension skill. All of the participants were male EFL learners whose ages varied from 24 to 37. All participants came to their reading class twice a week for three months. The results of the posttest revealed that the participants of the experimental group outperformed their counterparts in the control group. Therefore, it should be pointed out that self-regulated strategies had a significant impact on Iranian intermediate EFL learners’ reading comprehension skill. This study recommends the use of self-regulated learning strategies in teaching English textbooks in Iran’s Educational system.