Comprehending a Non-text: A Study of Gender-based Differences in EFL Reading Comprehension

The present study investigated the gender-based differences in EFL reading comprehension in the Iranian EFL context. To illuminate the possible effect of background knowledge, the study focused on a non-text. The non-text was followed by 10 reading comprehension questions. Eight questions focused on the antecedent-reference relationship; one question asked for the topic of the text and one for the main idea. A total of 53 intermediate university students took part in the study. They were indicated to be at the intermediate level of reading proficiency after taking a reading comprehension test. The results indicated that males were more successful in constructing the meaning for the non-text in general and in performing on the three types of items in particular. In other words, they were more successful in dealing with a context of ambiguity. It was concluded that readers compensate for the lack of meaning in a text by making themselves activate a possibly related schemata and as such even meaningless texts will carry meaning.