The Relationship Between Chinese College EFL Learners' Beliefs And English Achievements

The studies on language learners' beliefs have already burgeoned since the middle 1980s and have drawn great academic attention in western countries. Whereas, only a small number of scholars have made investigations into the learners' beliefs in China, and fewer empirical studies have been carried out to reveal the Chinese learners' beliefs about English learning.Under such circumstances, this study was carried out to identify Chinese college EFL learners' beliefs and to explore the relationship between their beliefs about English learning and their English achievements.A total number of 132 students in Southwest China University participated in the study. The Likert-scale questionnaire, Beliefs about English Learning Inventory for Chinese (BELIC), was based on the well-known BALLI (Beliefs About Language Learning Inventory) of Horwtiz (1988). This questionnaire was used to collect the subjects' English learning beliefs of 6 categories: language aptitude, English learning difficulty, nature of English learning, learning and communication strategies, motivation, roles of teacher and learner. In addition, a sample CET-4 test was employed to collect data of their English proficiency. Analyses were made on the significance of correlation between the subjects' data in learning beliefs and their data of English proficiency. The results of the study revealed the most common and uncommon beliefs of Chinese college EFL learners. And the results showed that the Chinese college EFL learners' beliefs towards English learning are correlated with their English achievements to different extents.