Young Minority Home-Language Students’ Biased Reading Self-Concept and Its Consequences for Reading Development

Segerer, Robin; Niklas, Frank ; Suggate, Sebastian and Schneider, Wolfgang (2021): Young Minority Home-Language Students’ Biased Reading Self-Concept and Its Consequences for Reading Development. In: Reading Research Quarterly, Vol. 56, No. 1: pp. 71-94

Abstract

Young students who speak a different language at home than that spoken in school (i.e., a minority home-language) appear to exhibit a biased reading self-concept. Importantly, this biased reading self-concept may correspond with altered causal pathways between reading self-concept and achievement in minority home-language students. To test this idea, the authors examined cross-lagged links between reading self-concept and reading achievement in a large multiple-group longitudinal study in Germany. Students with German (n = 885), Turkish (n = 193), or another (n = 550) home language were tested yearly in grades 1–4 on measures of reading and reading self-concept. Despite showing lower reading achievement, students speaking a minority home language exhibited a higher reading self-concept. Cross-lagged paths revealed reciprocal effects between reading achievement and reading self-concept from grade 1 to grade 2, particularly for students with German as a home language. Minority home-language students showed significantly lower effects of reading achievement on their subsequent reading self-concept from grade 1 to grade 2. From grade 2 onward, reading achievement predicted reading self-concept, but not vice versa.

• Item Type: Journal article
• Keywords: Language learners; Motivation/engagement; Comprehension; Fluency; Methodological perspectives; Cognitive; Bilingualism; Literacy Acquisition; Motivation / Engagement; Factor Analysis; LISREL/Causal Modeling; 2-Childhood
• Faculties: Psychology and Education Science > Department Psychology > Education and Educational Psychology
• Subjects: 100 Philosophy and Psychology > 150 Psychology
• Language: English