A Study of Korean EFL Students’ L2 Reading Attitude: Its Relationship with L1 Reading Attitude

Researchers have acknowledged the importance of the affective aspect of reading for reading development. However, the affective side has not received much attention compared to cognitive side in the field of second language research. Furthermore, the research focusing on the relationship between first language (L1) and second language (L2) is relatively scarce. Because of the paucity of such research, the current study was conducted to investigate these relatively unexplored areas. The aims of this study were two-fold. First, the study examined how an affective component, the L2 reading attitude of Korean EFL learners have was different from their L1 reading attitude. Second, it examined how their L2 reading attitude was related to their comparable L1 reading attitude. Participants in the study included 107 Korean college-level EFL students. Their L1 and L2 reading attitudes were measured using reading attitude questionnaires. The data were analyzed by employing descriptive statistics and a correlation coefficient. The results indicated that Korean students’ L1 reading attitude was different from their L2 reading attitude. Moreover, their attitude was more affirmative when they read in their native language than in English, which is a foreign language to them. Additionally, the study found evidence that L1 and L2 reading attitudes are correlated, suggesting that L1 reading attitude of L1 is transferable to L2 reading attitude.