Reading Achievement and Attitude Productivity among 17-Year Olds

To probe the association of reading achievement and attitude with productive factors in learning, the scores of 2,300 17-year-old stu- dents from a National Assessment of Educational Progress sample were regressed on 18 indices of seven factors. The achievement correlations with the factors are close to the averages revealed by recent quantitative syntheses of bivariate studies. A considerable amount of the reliable or adjusted variance in achievement, 51%, is accounted for by motivation, frequency of spare time reading, radio listening, socioeconomic status, home environment, the use of English at home, race, and public-school attendance. Enjoyment of reading and self-concept as a reader are simi- larly accountable, but attitudes about the importance of reading and free- dom to read are less predictable. Syntheses (or meta-analyses) of experimental and quasi-experimental studies and correlational surveys reveal a considerable number of consis- tent moderate to large psychologically-productive effects on cognitive, af- fective, and behavioral aspects of classroom-learning outcomes (Walberg & Haertel, 1980). The productivity factors most closely connected with learn- ing may be divided into nine categories: student age, ability (as measured by IQ or prior achievement), and motivation (as indexed by interest in the subject matter or self-concept as a learner); time devoted to study; amount and quality or effectiveness of instruction (including self-instruction); psychological environments of the home, school, and peer group outside