Poor and Good Learners’ Language Beliefs and Their Influence on Their Language Learning Strategy Use

This study focuses on exploring poor and good learners’ language beliefs and their language strategy use in an attempt to see whether there is any significant relationship between the poor and good learners. This paper particularly seeks to examine to what extent language beliefs as a construct are reflected in learners’ language behavior, which consequently may provide some pedagogical implications for teachers to benefit in classroom applications. A total of 146 undergraduate subjects were involved in this descriptive study, 86 of whom were classified as “poor” and 60 as “good” Turkish adult learners of English as a foreign language in an intensive language program at undergraduate level. The data were obtained through using two questionnaires, the results of which were analyzed through SPSS version 15. The results demonstrate that good language learners significantly differed from poor learners in certain beliefs including perceptions about pronunciation, possessing special abilities and the nature of language learning. The findings indicate a possible relationship and correlation between learner beliefs and strategy use.