A Survey on the Relationship between Reading Understanding Skill with Multiple Intelligences of Iranian University Students of Arabic

Abstract

Reading-understanding skill is one of the most important linguistic skills necessary for students in order to learn and use Arabic. For the last decade, applying Gardner’s Multiple Intelligence (MI) theory, which focuses on individual differences and preferences, assures linguistic skills development; henceforth, current study investigated the relationship between MI and reading understanding skills of Iranian university students in Arabic Literature via descriptive-analytical method of correlation. To select a homogeneous sample of learners, according to Kerjesi-Morgan’s table, 400 testees out of 15557 students (years 1395-6 AP) were randomly selected as the participants by classified sampling method. Then, the language efficiency test and MI questionnaires were applied. The Pearson correlation coefficients results revealed that there was significant positive statistical relationship between reading understanding skill and Linguistic, Logical-Mathematical, Spatial, and Interpersonal intelligence. Henceforth, some MI-based pragmatic techniques were suggested to improve Arabic reading understanding skill.

Keywords

• applied linguistics
• foreign language teaching
• gardner’s
• multiple intelligences
• and arabic reading understanding skill