Gender Differences in Metacognitive Reading Strategies of Business and Engineering Students in Oman

Students often need help with reading comprehension, understanding, and retaining the meaning of the text. Overcoming reading difficulties involves teaching learners metacognitive strategies for effective reading. Metacognitive reading strategies enable readers to engage more actively with the material, improving comprehension, retention, and critical thinking skills while reading. This paper investigates the metacognitive strategy preferences of male and female Omani learners enrolled in Business and Engineering programs. Data was collected using the Survey of Reading Strategies (SORS). One hundred eighty-eight undergraduates, comprising 81 males and 107 females, responded to the survey. The data was analyzed using the SPSS statistical program. Descriptive statistics means and standard deviation were used to identify male and female learners' most preferred strategy scale (Global, Support, and Problem-solving strategies). Also, a t-test was used to determine individual strategy preferences between genders. The findings reveal no significant differences between male and female students for global and problem-solving strategies. However, results show a substantial difference between both genders for support strategies. Finally, the findings will inform curriculum developers and teachers in developing targeted metacognitive reading strategies to enhance students' competence in reading skills.