This document discusses several factors that affect language learning strategies:
Gender - Studies have found both minor and some significant differences in the strategies used by males and females. Females generally tend to use social interaction and metacognitive strategies more frequently.
Background - Learners from different cultural backgrounds often prefer different types of strategies, with Asian learners favoring rote learning strategies and Hispanic learners using dictionaries more.
Proficiency level - More proficient learners tend to use metacognitive and cognitive strategies more, while less proficient learners rely more on communication and compensation strategies.
Motivation - Motivation is a primary factor in language learning achievement, as more motivated learners put more effort
2. GENDER
POLITZER (1983)
Found a relatively minor difference between male and female
learners with females making greater use of social interaction
strategies.
EHRMAN & OXFORD (1988)
Females used more strategies than males on four SILL factors;
general strategies, authentic language use, searching for and
communicating meaning, and self-management strategies.
3. TRAN’S (1988)
Males made greater use of strategies to learn and to improve their
English language skills.
OXFORD & NYKOS (1989)
Females reported more frequent strategy use than males of formal
practice strategies, general study strategies and conversational
input elicitation strategies.
GREEN & OXFORD (1995)
Gender was one of the factors affecting the choices of language
learning strategies : females used memory and metacognitive
memories more frequently than males.
4. HONG-NAM & LEAVELL (2006)
Females used Social and Metacognitive strategies the most,
Memory the least;
Males used Metacognitive and Compensation most, Affective the
least.
5. BACKGROUND
POLITZER & McGROARTY (1985)
Asian students scored lower than the Hispanic learners on the scale
of good language behaviours. The researchers concluded that
such behaviours represent socal interactions in which Asian learners
are less likely to engage in Hispanics.
McGROARTY (1987)
Spanish learners use traditional strategies such as using dictionaries
to learn new words.
O’MALLEY & CHAMOT (1990)
Asian learners prefer their own established rote learning strategies.
6. BEDELL’S (1993)
Learners from various cultural backgrounds use certain types of
strategies at different levels of frequency.
OXFORD (1994)
Taiwanese students to be more structured, analytic, memory-based
and metacognitively oriented than other groups.
7. LEARNING STYLES
EHRMAN & OXFORD (1990)
Extroverts show a strong preference for social strategies while
introverts use metacognitive strategies more frequently.
ROSSI-LE (1995)
Learners who favour study group tend to use social and interactive
strategies.
OXFORD (2005)
Learning styles and strategies are the main factors helping
determine how language learners learn a second or foreign
language.
8. PROFICIENCY LEVEL
O’MALLEY ET AL (1985)
Differing levels of proficiency gave rise to differing frequencies of
strategy use.
CHEN (1990)
Low proficiency student used more communication strategies
compared to the high proficiency students.
CHEN (2002)
Low proficiency students outperformed high proficiency students in
compensation strategies.
9. LAN & OXFORD (2003)
Significant effects for language proficiency on Taiwanese
elementary school EFL learners’ use of metacognitive, cognitive,
compensatory and affective strategies.
PEACOCK & HO (2003)
Cognitive and metacognitive strategies show high correlations with
high language proficiency levels.
RAHIMI ET AL (2004)
The higher the proficiency level of the students, the more aware
they are of the rules and strategies of the language learning.
10. MOTIVATION
GARDNER (1985)
Motivation and attitudes are the primary sources contributing to
language learning.
Motivated learners achieved higher level of proficiency because
they put more of themselves into learning.
OXFORD & NYIKOS (1989)
The most important factor influencing strategy use.
11. YANG (1999)
Positive correlation between motivational level and use of
language learning strategies.
MACLEOD (2002)
Strategy use was affected by motivational level instead of a
particular motivational orientation.
