If you’ve been around for a while, you’ll know that I have talked a lot of about the importance of reading identities. I’ve presented on this concept at several conferences in the past 2 years, and am continued to speak on them at upcoming conferences – which is great because this is something that I am INCREDIBLY passionate about.

I thought it was timely to write a post on how I’ve been identifying reading identities in my research, so that others can too!

I have been using the Adolescent Motivation to Read Profile (AMRP), originally developed by Gambrell et al. in 1996. This tool has two parts to it, including a survey that can provide insight into a person’s reader self-concept and the value they place on reading. A full, open-access article on how to use this tool is available from Pitcher et al (2007). However, Malloy et al. (2013) provides a slightly updated version (mostly the language in the questions rather than the spirit of the questions themselves) that is available behind various paywalls.

So, once you get your hands on these documents, you’ll be able to create your own survey that uses these questions and distribute to your students! Here’s how it works and how I used it.

Part A: Multiple choice survey

The first part of this tool consists of 20 multiple choice questions that have four possible answers. At first glance, it might seem unusual for a survey to only have four choices in a multiple choice survey. According to typical likert-scale rules (you know, the 1-5, extremely unsatisfied – extremely satisfied surveys), respondents should have the option of choosing something ‘neutral’ (e.g. 3 or unsure) for their response. However, because the AMRP is specifically created for adolescents and is designed to clearly establish their reader self-concept and the value they place on reading, respondents to the AMRP are forced to choose between the more extreme responses, rather than allowing them to be neutral (Figure 1).

Responses to this part of the survey are then assigned a numerical value, or points. The more positive the response, the higher the number assigned, and the more negative the response, the lower the number assigned (Table 1).

Response	Score
A very good reader	4
A good reader	3
An ok reader	2
A poor reader	1

For example, if a student responded as “a very good reader” to question 1, then a score of 4 would be given. If the student responded as “an ok reader,” then a score of 2 would be given. This process is carried out across all 20 questions, meaning that a total of 80 points is available for each respondent. The higher the total number a respondent receives should correlate with how they see themselves as a reader (reader self-concept) and the value they place on reading.

To take your analysis even further, the questions have been designed to specifically identify how respondents feel in relation to their reader self-concept and value they place on reading:

• Odd numbered questions = reader self-concept
• Even numbered questions = value of reading

Of the total 80 points, 40 each are allocated to both self-concept and value (Figure 2).

The comparison between a respondents self-concept and value alone provide interesting insight into the way respondents view and engage with reading. Even if you didn’t take the process any further than this, you would still end up with potentially revealing insight into your students’ perception of and experience with reading.

How I used Part A:

From there, I made decisions about how to separate between the four different identities (avid, proficient, struggling, and reluctant). I used the following boundaries to assign identities:

Identity	Score boundaries
Avid reader	70 – 80
Proficient reader	60 – 69
Struggling reader	50 – 59
Reluctant reader	0 – 49

While I acknowledge that this is by no means a perfect way of identifying students’ reading identities, after randomly selecting interviewees across three different schools and across the four different identities, I can say that it felt like I had nailed this (good old gut reaction). Talking to the teacher librarians after interviewing the students also helped confirm my suspicions as they also felt I had managed to randomly select students from each reading identity.

Part B: Follow-up one-on-one interviews

The second part of the survey is a follow-up one-on-one interview you can conduct with your students to gain deeper understanding of their reader self-concept and the value they place on reading. I have not yet used this part of the tool. When I first used the AMRP (Gagen-Spriggs, 2020), I used the first part of the tool and then used the second part to add open-ended questions to the end of my survey as I did not have time to conduct one-on-one follow-up interviews (I so wish I could have though). This time around, I created my own questions based on what I was looking to delve deeper into in my one-on-one interviews with students (reading in their schools and teacher librarian influence).

General thoughts about reading identities

If you’ve heard me speak, it’s likely you’ll remember me talking about the importance of understanding a student’s reading identity, but also not pigeonholing them with it! Identity can change, particularly with the support of an enabling adult (La Marca, 2004), social agent (Merga, 2017), or influencer (Gagen-Spriggs, 2023) – all terms used to describe TEACHER LIBRARIANS!

What’s next with this?

Now that my data collection is officially done for my PhD (YAY!) I am deep in analysis mode. I probably won’t get to revisit this AMRP tool for a little while but I do want to hear how others are using it! So, if you do want a way to quickly identify the reading identities of your students, Part A of the AMRP tool is certainly one way you can do this. Let me know how it goes!

References

Gagen-Spriggs, K. (2020). An investigation into the reasons students read for pleasure. School Libraries Worldwide, 20(1), 15. https://doi.org/doi: 10.14265.26.1.009

Gagen-Spriggs, K. (2023). The influence of teacher librarians on reading cultures. Access, 37(3), 7–14.

Gambrell, L. B., Palmer, B. M., Codling, R. M., & Mazzoni, S. A. (1996). Assessing motivation to read. The Reading Teacher, 49(7), 518–533.

La Marca, S. (2004). An enabling adult: The role of the teacher-librarian in creating a reading environment. Scan, 23(4), 21–27.

Malloy, J. A., Marinak, B. A., Gambrell, L. B., & Mazzoni, S. A. (2013). Assessing motivation to read: The Motivation to Read Profile-Revised. The Reading Teacher, 67(4), 273–282. https://doi.org/10.1002/trtr.1215

Merga, M. K. (2017). Becoming a reader: Significant social influences on avid book readers. School Library Research, 20, 1–21.

Pitcher, S., Albright, L., Delaney, C., Walker, N., Seunarinesingh, K., Mogge, S., Headley, K., Ridgeway, V., Peck, S., Hunt, R., & Dunston, P. (2007). Assessing adolescents’ motivation to read. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 50(5), 378–396. https://doi.org/10.1598/JAAL.50.5.5