Robust evidence for the simple view of second language reading: Secondary meta-analysis of Jeon and Yamashita (2022)

This paper reports a complete secondary analysis of Jeon and Yamashita’s (2022) systematic review to build the second language (L2) model of the simple view of reading (SVR). The same meta-analytic methodologies were maintained, with the exception of applying meta-analytic structural equation modeling (MASEM). This study successfully replicated some of the aggregated correlations but not others, owing to (a) the recoding of the original raw data to recreate a dataset and (b) the motivated change in sample selection from a longitudinal study for MASEM. The MASEM results extended previous findings that L2 comprehension skills contribute more to L2 reading comprehension than L2 decoding skills, and together explain a large amount of variance in L2 reading comprehension. The SVR model with metalinguistic skills showed their contribution to L2 decoding and comprehension skills, but no direct impact on L2 reading comprehension, supporting the parsimonious structure of SVR in L2.