Despite a large amount of research on reading, little attention has been paid to experimental studies on the effects of purposeful reading. This study explored the effects of reading purpose on reading comprehension and perceived difficulty. 71 high school students participated in this study and were randomly assigned to three groups – graphic organizer (Purpose 1), key sentence (Purpose 2), and control. The learners’ reading comprehension was measured through pre-, post- and delayed tests. The participants’ perceived difficulty for the texts was also checked with a sevenpoint Likert scale. The result demonstrates no immediate effect of establishing reading purpose, though immediate reading purpose effects might be found if a longer treatment period is set. The results also reveal the sustained effect of reading purpose on reading comprehension. In perceived text difficulty, the Purpose 1 group found the reading passages the easiest among the three groups. This suggests that learners establishing a reading purpose can gain greater ease in reading than those without a reading purpose.