5 factors Affecting Language Learning Strategies

GENDER

• Gender refers to man and woman.• A number of studies reported significantly

more use of learning strategies than their male counterparts. These studies postulated that female students used Compensation and Affective strategies more frequently than male ones.

• The students preferred to use Metacognitive strategies, whereas they depicted the least use of Affective and Memory strategies in overall strategy.

MOTIVATION AND ATTITUDES

• motivation and attitudes are the primary sources contributing to individual language learning.

• the concept of motivation can be classified into two orientations of reasons: instrumental and integrative

• occurs when students wish to truly become part of the culture of the language being learned.

LEARNING STYLE

• Learning style (general approach to language learning) often determined the choice of L2 learning strategies.

• For example, analytic-style students preferred strategies such as contrastive analysis, rule-learning, and dissecting words and phrases, while global students used strategies to find meaning (guessing, scanning, predicting) and to converse without knowing all the words (paraphrasing, gesturing).

APTITUDE

• Aptitude refers to potential for achievement. An aptitude test is designed to make a prediction about an individual’s future achievements.

• Aptitude for language learning is usually composed of four different types of abilities:

1)The ability to identify and memorize new sounds2)The ability to understand the function of particular

words in sentences3)The ability to figure out grammatical rules from

language samples4)The ability to memorize new words

PERSONALITY

• There are a number of personality

characteristics that are likely to affect L2 learning, such as– Extroversion vs. introversion– Inhibition vs. risk-taking– Self-esteem (self-confidence)– Anxiety– Empathy

• Some studies have found that learners’ success in language learning is associated with extroversion such as assertiveness and adventurousness, while others have found that many successful language learners do not get high scores on measures of extroversion.

• Personality may be a major factor only in the acquisition of conversational skills (examples: oral communicative ability), not in the acquisition of literacy skills (examples: reading and writing skills).