The role of reading and writing in summarization as an integrated task

Abstract

In order to complete summarization tasks L2 learners need to demonstrate both reading and writing abilities. Thus, understanding the role of these abilities is necessary for interpreting performance on such tasks. This study examined the role of reading and writing in summarization tasks completed by 64 Chinese college students. It was found word- and sentence-level strategies were most commonly used for reading the source texts. Writing strategies played a more important role than reading in such tasks. General English proficiency was found to have exerted no significant effect on the use of both reading and writing strategies, and participants’ reading and writing abilities only made moderate contribution to their summarization performance respectively. The theoretical, empirical, practical, and pedagogical implications of the study were then discussed.