An Investigation into Cognitive and Metacognitive Strategy Use and its Relationships to EFL Reading Test Performance: A Structural Equation Modelling Approach

Abstract

Cognitive and metacognitive strategies significantly enhance reading comprehension by promoting active engagement with texts and enabling learners to regulate their learning. Cognitive and metacognitive strategies also aid in understanding, interpreting, and responding strategically to reading tasks, particularly in testing environments, leading to improved reading skills and academic achievement. Therefore, this research aims to explore strategic competence by investigating how strategic knowledge (cognitive strategies) and strategic regulation (metacognitive strategies) influence reading comprehension test performance over a three-month period. It delves into the correlations between high school learners’ self-reported strategy use (trait) and their actual strategy application (state) with test performance. Additionally, the study investigates the roles of cognitive strategies (memory, comprehension, and retrieval) and metacognitive strategies (planning, monitoring, and evaluation) in reading comprehension tests using structural equation modelling (SEM). A total of 685 high school students from a Thai government school participated voluntarily. They completed a six-point Likert scale questionnaire about their strategy use before and immediately after each reading comprehension test. To ensure diverse perspectives, 12 participants were chosen through stratified sampling for interviews, representing low, moderate, and high proficiency levels based on their test scores. The results of the SEM analysis offer profound insights into the dynamics of cognitive and metacognitive strategy use in enhancing reading comprehension. Firstly, it was observed that the employment of both trait and state strategies is influenced by the linguistic mode and context, demonstrating that their effectiveness is context-dependent with a notable correlation in aspects of comprehending, memory and retrieval strategies. Importantly, these strategies exhibit temporal instability, indicating a variability in strategy use over time. This variability extends to their relationship with reading comprehension test performance, which was found to differ, suggesting that the impact of these strategies on test outcomes is not uniform. The analysis further revealed the intricate, nuanced, and multifaceted nature of cognitive and metacognitive strategies, highlighting the complex relationship between these strategies and their influence on reading comprehension tests. Notably, cognitive strategies were found to have greater stability over time than metacognitive strategies, suggesting a foundational role in reading comprehension. However, metacognitive strategies were identified as having a direct and variable influence on cognitive strategies, which, in turn, affected reading comprehension test performance in nuanced ways. This complex interrelationship underscores the critical importance of metacognitive strategies in orchestrating cognitive strategy use, pointing to significant pedagogical, methodological, and theoretical implications. These findings advocated for teaching approaches that are responsive to the dynamic and multifaceted nature of strategy use, emphasizing the need for educators to foster both cognitive and metacognitive strategy application to affectively enhance reading comprehension skills.

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