The Influence Of Sociocultural Factors On Language Learning Strategies Preferred By Chinese EFL Learners

This study investigates the relationship between language learning strategy preferences and the sociocultural factors among Chinese College students who are learning English as a foreign language (EFL). The participants in this study are 126 undergraduate EFL students recruited from three intact classes at a university, in Nanjing, China, at which the majority of the students major in engineering and science. A Strategy Inventory for Language Learning (SILL) (revised version, 2003) is administered to identify what are the preferred language learning strategies used by Chinese EFL learners. Then an interview is conducted to specify what socioculural factors have influence on their selection and development of language learning strategies. Results of this study reveal that affective strategies and compensation strategies are frequently used by Chinese students while social strategies and cognitive Strategies are the least frequently used strategies. This study illustrates a result similar to Liu & Dai (2003)'s finding that Chinese learners prefer indirect strategies to direct strategies. Findings of interview are discussed within the explanatory framework: sociocultural theory, which stresses the influence of social environment and cultural institutions on children's mental development. The current study reveals that sociocultural factors do have significant impacts on students living in the same cultural background and social environment. The major findings of this study include: 1) sociocultural factors, such as the concept of hierarchy and face, do have impacts on the development and selection of students' language learning strategies; 2) the preferred strategies used by Chinese learners are test-oriented; 3) the preferred strategies used by students are not unchangeable. The change of learning environment, task and so on will make shift for students' use of language learning strategies. Those findings suggest that EFL instructors and researchers may reconstruct a more favorable classroom learning environment to develop students' English competence. The study also attempts to call for cultural awareness, especially the awareness of the home culture, from EFL instructors and researchers for the influence of home culture tends to be invisible for people living in it. The writer of this paper maintains that the awareness of home culture would be of help to EFL instructors and researchers to have deep understanding on symptoms of English learning and teaching in China and then work out a possible treatment for them; furthermore, where alien methodologies and teaching materials are concerned, we need to bear it in mind that suitable adjustment should be made to avoid cultural clash.