the relationship between iranian efl learners multiple intelligences and their reading comprehension ability

in the new age, in regard to human success in education in the globalizing world, one can consider english proficiency and individual differences as two important issues. in efl settings, reading skill plays an important role in education. it seems that using multiple intelligences theory in efl classes which values individual differences by tapping different intelligences, can be rewarding. as such, the present study aimed at investigating the strength of the relationship between iranian senior english majors’ multiple intelligences and their reading comprehension ability in english. therefore, at the end of the academic year, may 2011, after randomly selecting a sample of 159 iranian senior english majors, and by using two instruments including persian version of midas adults (shearer, 1996) and ielts academic reading section (2007), the researcher attempted the survey. on the basis of pearson correlation coefficients, the findings of the study revealed that four types of intelligences, namely intrapersonal, interpersonal, linguistic, and spatial had statistically significant correlation (p < .05) with subjects’ reading comprehension. also, on the basis of multiple regression through stepwise method, the results showed that intrapersonal intelligence (r = .21; p = .007 < .05) is the most significant predictor of the participants’ reading comprehension ability. the findings of the study are considered as context-based and not universal.