Critical Thinking Skills, Critical Reading and Foreign Language Reading AnxietyA Study on Iranian EFL Learners

Critical thinking is crucial to the learning process, cognitive development, and effective information seeking. Peoplecan use critical thinking skills to understand, interpret, and assess what they hear or read in order to formulateappropriate reactions or responses. The present study intends to investigate the effect of predictive power of criticalthinking skills on critical reading and foreign language reading anxiety of Iranian intermediate EFL learners. To thisend, 177 intermediate adult male Iranian EFL learners from Khatam ol-Anbia university took part in the study bycompleting Michigan test of English language proficiency, the California critical thinking skills test, Criticalreading scale and foreign language reading anxiety scale. Using KR-21 and Chronbach’s Alpha, the reliability ofquestionnaires was re-estimated. Data were analyzed through multiple regression analyses. The results of multipleregression indicated there was a statistically significant predictive of critical thinking skills. Additionally, Resultsindicated that a negative relationship between critical thinking skills and foreign language reading anxiety asmeasured by FLRAS; this seems reasonable. The quantitative findings gathered through CTS and FLRA scales suggestthat when there is an increase in CTS of the students, FLRA decreases and vice versa.

Keywords:

critical thinking skills , critical reading , foreign language reading anxiety