2. Purpose of the study
Despite the attention levelled at the functionality of the reading skills in the Arab EFL
research, relatively little research has empirically examined how much time Arab EFL
university students spend on recreational reading in the English language. Thus, the
purpose of this study is address this gap in the literature and set out to be a point of
reference and comparison for future investigations about Arab EFL students’ English
reading habits at the tertiary level. In support of this claim, Al-Nafisah and
Al-Shorman (2011) attest that there is lack of research in this domain in the Middle
East. Only a few studies have investigated Arab EFL students’ English reading habits:
in Jordan (Al-Shorman and Bataineh, 2004) and in Saudi Arabia (Al-Nafisah and
Al-Shorman, 2011). In both studies, the authors elicited the reading interests of Arab