From Learning English to Learning in English: A Comparative Study of the Impact of Learning Contexts upon Chinese EFL Learners’ Strategy Use

Abstract

The past three decades have witnessed a proliferation of research on Chinese English as a foreign language (EFL) learners' use of learning strategies, but little has been examined about the potential influence of learning contexts upon their strategic engagement. This paper reports on the findings of an investigation of the impact of learning contexts upon the use of learning strategies of two cohorts of EFL learners in China. Both cohorts were non-English majors, one from a university where English is the medium of instruction (EMI) and the other from an EFL university. The data were collected using questionnaires and semi-structured interviews. Results reveal that learners from the EMI university demonstrated a higher level in their overall use of learning strategies over their counterparts from the EFL university. Independent T-test shows that the two cohorts were significantly different in their use of cognitive, meta-cognitive, affective and social strategies. These findings were discussed from a socio-cultural perspective. Implications are presented for the reform of English language education in China and beyond.

The Strategy Inventory for Second Language Learning: Tested, Adapted, and Validated in the Slovenian Higher Education Context

“…The study explored the structure of the SILL and its groups of items, which reflect the groups of strategies used by ESP learners in the researched context in Slovenia. With respect to the aggregated group results of the survey, compensation, metacognitive, and cognitive strategy groups had the three highest group means, followed by the social and memory groups, while the affective group of strategies had the lowest mean, which is comparable to the findings regarding Chinese students in the research of Li (2014). Although compensation strategies might be used to compensate for a lower level of language knowledge, the participants in Lai's (2009) research also reported using compensation strategies most frequently (and affective strategies least frequently).…”

“…We used the SILL questionnaire in English in spite of the fact that some researchers Vol. 7(2)(2019): have warned about wording problems (Li, 2014) and other limitations, such as students' inability to remember accurately how and when SLLS were usedand a lack of self-awareness when filling in a self-report questionnaire (Griffiths, 2003). On the other hand, translation might cause some other issues of understanding and interpretation.…”

Mobile-technology-induced learning strategies: Chinese university EFL students learning English in an emerging context

“…Research (Jiang & Smith, 2009;Li, 2014) on Chinese EFL learners' strategies showed that emotion and satiation strategies (affective and social strategies in Oxford's, 1990, terms) were least applied by Chinese learners in a traditional teacher-fronted classroom. Given that one of the aims of this research is to identify differences of Chinese EFL learners' strategy use between a teacher-fronted classroom and a mobile-technology-assisted learning setting, emotion and satiation control strategies in Dörnyei's (2005) framework were left out of the questionnaire item design.…”

“…Another strand of research on learning strategies in traditional language learning contexts is largely focused on learners' language output and vocabulary acquisition (Seker, 2016;Tseng & Schmitt, 2008;Zhang, Lin, Zhang & Choi, 2017). Cognitive and compensation (environmental control) strategies have been found to be the most frequently used strategies in an examination-oriented and teacher-led learning environment (Dmitrenko, 2017;Li, 2014). In research on learning strategies supported by technologies, the usefulness of different technologies has been consistently reported (e.g.…”

An Exploratory Study on the Relationship between Demotivation and Academic Fields among Chinese EFL Learners

“…Given the differences in demotivation among EFL learners of different academic fields, teachers and curriculum designers are suggested to take academic fields into account while designing and developing English class to students of different majors. As for the deficiency of effective learning strategies among the learners, a strategy-embedded instruction is thus necessary to be incorporated into English language curriculum (Li, 2014c).…”