On Correlation Between Independent College Students' FD/FI And Their English Achievemetns

The cognitive style, field dependence (FD) and field independence (FI), denotes the extent to which the surrounding framework dominates the perception of items within it. FD/FI has been frequently theorized as being related to second language acquisition. However, different researchers have different findings in their own studies. Some researchers think that cognitive style is related to the English academic performance of students, while others think that cognitive style will result in the difference in several aspects, such as reading or writing, but cognitive style is not related to English academic performance as a whole.What's more, in recent years, with the popularization of higher education, Independent College appears as a new form and also an indispensable part of higher learning in China. With a review of the previous researches, the author also finds that there are no researchers investigating the FD/FI tendency and relationship between FD/FI and English achievement of Independent College students who make up the new population of English learners in China.The paper aims to explore the FD/FI degree of non-English majors in Independent College and the possible relationships between student's FD/FI and English achievement in Independent College.In this paper,213 freshmen of non-English majors from North Institute of Information Engineering of Xi'an Technological University are chosen as subjects. Students'FD/FI styles are measured by the Test Embedded Figures (TEF) which is complied by Psychology Department of Beijing Normal University. And their English achievements and the scores of English skills are surveyed by the English Achievement Test which designed by the author. The relationship between FD/FI and English achievements was examined through the Service Pack of Social Statistics software (SPSS 11.5). Descriptive statistics, independent sample T-test and correlation analysis were used to investigate the FD/FI tendency of the non-English majors in Independent College as a whole, the FD/FI tendency of different classes, different disciplines and the correlation between FD/FI and English achievements respectively and as a whole.Based on the analysis of the collected data in this experiment, the main findings of this study are as follows:1) Non-English major students in Independent College are mostly tending to FD as a whole, according to both the two-part division and three-part division of TEF.2) There is no significant difference between Class A and Class B student's FD/FI cognitive styles. Students, either in Class A or Class B, are mostly tending to be field independence as a whole.3) There is significant difference between Science students' and Art students' FD/FI cognitive styles. Science students are more FI than Arts students in Independent College.4) In Independent College there is no significant difference between non-English majors' TEF degree and their listening, vocabulary & grammar, and even writing achievement; however, there is significant difference between non-English majors' TEF degree and their cloze and reading achievements. FI students perform better in reading and cloze than FD students.5) There is no significant difference can be found between Independent College students' FD/FI and their English achievements as a whole.This research aims to apply the findings to English teaching so as to raise teachers' and students' awareness of FD/FI and encourage teachers and students to adjust their FD/FI properly, which could finally improve the English teaching and learning efficiency in Independent College.