Reading habits of secondary school students in Serbia

Abstract

Reading habits are an essential aspect for creating a functionally literate society and for its positioning at the global level. In this regard, the aim of this paper is to examine quantities and contents that high school students read, including compulsory reading and other books that do not belong to this corpus. We also tried to examine students' opinions about ways that could contribute to their motivation to read books, to consider their reading habits keeping in mind the family context and the use of library services, as well as to determine whether reading books is related to gender, academic achievement, the type of school that the students attend, the class and the education of their parents. Students (N=1378) from high schools and secondary vocational schools from several cities in Serbia participated in the research. A questionnaire was used, constructed for the purposes of this study. The results show that adolescents are reluctant to read reading materials contained in the curriculum. The majority of students read books outside of this corpus, and they most often read comics, science fiction, crime and romance novels. More than one fifth of students do not recognise any way that would motivate them to read books. Since there has been no visible improvement in this area in teaching practice over the last decade, it would be desirable to introduce and affirm optional subjects that would contribute to improving the reading habits of high school students (especially in secondary vocational schools).