scholarly journals Gender Differences in Complaint Strategies among Iranian Upper Intermediate EFL Students

2016 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 1 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leila Nasiri Kakolaki ◽  
Mohsen Shahrokhi

<p class="Default"><em>The goal of this research </em><em>was</em><em> to know the differences </em><em>between</em><em> the strategies used by </em><em>male and female upper</em><em> intermediate EFL learners in complaining. Various studies suggest that the way men and women speak is different. Women are considered to be more polite than men. The present study investigated the differences of complaining realizations between Iranian EFL men and women students. A number of 60 (30 males and 30 females) upper intermediate students were selected based on their performance on a general proficiency test administered by the institute’s authorities to participate in the study. Data were collected through an open-ended questionnaire in the form of a Discourse Completion Task (DCT). The responses were analyzed based on Rinnert and Nogami’s (2006) taxonomy. The study revealed that there was a difference between men and women in realizing the complaining speech act. Men used very direct complaint more frequently compared to women who used indirect complaints the most. The present study found gender has an influence on the choice of complaining strategies and politeness.</em><em></em></p>

2017 ◽  
Vol 7 (3) ◽  
pp. 85 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nima Pouladian ◽  
Mohammad Sadegh Bagheri ◽  
Firooz Sadighi

This study sought to examine the sort, frequency, and sources of writing wrongs committed by adult Iranian EFL students. To score the participants’ written essays and speaking interviews, the four criteria specified for the IELTS Speaking and Writing Band Scores (British Council, 2014) were taken into consideration. The study also tried to comparatively analyze the error categories made by men and women learners regarding the type and frequency of their linguistic errors. To gather the information, from the population of faculty members at Hormozgan University of Medical Sciences (HUMS) in Bandarabbas, Iran, 100 adults, both male and female, with their age ranging from 31 to 52, were selected using convenient sampling. Based on their previous IELTS band scores ranging from 4 to 6, the members are separated into three groups.The results of data analysis revealed that verb tense was the very common grammatical mistake done by members in all three groups. For the cohesion and coherence and lexical sub-categories, relative clauses and incorrect use of target lexical item were regarded as the most common categories of errors. Outcomes of Chi-Square analyses also showed substantial differences among errors committed by participants in different groups. Finally, the comparison between male and female participants’ errors revealed that male participants made both written and spoken errors more than females. According to the results, recommendations, and any suggestions that are of importance to teachers and policymakers as well as to EFL learners are presented in detail.


Author(s):  
Hamedreza Kohzadi ◽  
Fatemeh Aziz Mohammadi ◽  
Fatemeh Samadi

Examining the theme, plot, and characters of a literary work is a common practice for students of literature so that they can criticize literature. Unlike a non-critical reading which provides readers only with facts, a critical reading also entails depicting how a book or a source illustrates the subject matter. Through various reading procedures including interpretation, inference and examining ideologies embedded in texts, readers can develop critical thinking. This paper aims at examining whether or not there is a relationship between critical thinking and critical reading of literary texts in higher education. To meet the mentioned aim, 121 EFL learners from Arak University were invited to participate in this study. After administrating English proficiency test, total numbers of students were 98 male and female. Data analysis was done through employing ANOVA and T-test.


Author(s):  
Lien Cam

Many colleges and universities in Vietnam have employed e-learning platforms in teaching English with the hope to better students’ English proficiency. Recently, e-learning programs such as DNTU-LMS and Canvas have been implemented at Dong Nai Technology University. With their features of flexibility and efficiency, they have been being used as crucial tools for teaching and learning in various faculties in the university especially during the widespread of Covid-19 pandemic. The present study aimed at identifying the views of the EFL learners from Faculty of Foreign Languages on the application of e-learning platform. A group of 100 EFL students was chosen randomly to participate in this study. Data was collected using questionnaire. After analyzing student’s responses, the results proved that the introduction of e-learning was effective. E-learning also stimulates students to learn English and brings them comfort and joy.


2015 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 171
Author(s):  
Ali Soltani ◽  
Mohsen Ghafari

This study investigates the probable relationship between Iranian EFL learners' self-perception and assertiveness and their oral communication skills. A sample of 80 male and female Iranian EFL students participated in this study. The participants were initially required to complete Belbin's self-perception questionnaire, they were then asked to complete Oral Communication Strategies Inventory (OCSI). The results of the data analysis indicated that there was a strong positive correlation between the two variables and thus the higher the level of self-perception and assertiveness, the higher the level of communication will be. Keywords: Communication Strategies, Self-perception, Assertiveness.


2016 ◽  
Vol 8 (5) ◽  
pp. 126
Author(s):  
Atieh Farashaiyan ◽  
Paramasivam Muthusamy

<p>The purpose of this research was to describe the L2 pragmatic knowledge of Iranian EFL learners by producing the speech act of disagreement in English in different situations. One hundred and twenty Iranian EFL learners took part in this study. The required data were accumulated through a Written Discourse Completion Task (WDCT). The results showed that most participants tended to make use of more indirect strategies (44.85%) to disagree with another speaker’s statement either with higher or lower power or within different social distance.  The respondents’ most frequent strategy use refers to counterclaims with 44.8%. On the other hand, challenges with 8.8% and Irrelevancy of claims with 3.2% were respectively among the least frequent strategies used in all situations. The results showed that learners almost utilized the same strategies in different disagreement situations with the same frequency. Therefore, it indicates that they did not notice the situational variables of social power, distance and imposition to vary their choice of strategy. In other words, they did not have the contextual understanding of the mentioned factors. Therefore, the results can suggest that the learners lack sufficient pragmatic knowledge in performing the studied speech act. The implication of this study is for Iranian language instructors, materials writers and curriculum developers.  </p>


2021 ◽  
Vol 4 (4) ◽  
pp. 208-221
Author(s):  
Mohammad Mehdi Tahanzadeh ◽  
Mansoore Shekaramiz ◽  
Marjan Abyavi ◽  
Reihaneh Shamei

The present study investigated the gender differences in producing all English rounded vowels /u:/, /ɔ:/, /ʊ/ and /o/ in Iranian EFL learners' speech in comparison with native ones. Sixty Iranian EFL learners including 30 males and 30 females were selected as the participants of this study. Oxford proficiency test (OPT, 2001) was conducted in order to ensure the learners were truly homogenous with regard to their English proficiency level. All learners were right-handed, Persian monolingual native speakers with no brain injuries, hearing or visual problems that interfered with their performance in the test. Four words containing English round vowels with CVC syllable structure were selected and put inside the carrier sentence ''Say......please''. In fact, each learner uttered the carrier sentences separately. Via PRAAT software (win 64), the voices of the participants were recorded and analyzed for obtaining the first and the second formants (F1 and F2) of each vowel. The obtained data from male and female speeches were compared to each other to find their differences. The results showed in F2 values, there were gender differences considering the consonantal context. This study demonstrated that for males, the degree of backness of vowel /u:/ was less than that of vowel /ɔ:/, but for females it was vice versa. For both vowels, male's mean F1 was lower than female's mean F1 and male's mean F2 was higher than female's mean F2. The present study showed gender differences in producing English rounded vowels. So, the results can be used in classes which contain only one gender. The findings of this study can bring about some pedagogical implications for teaching English diphthongs, triphthongs and English rounded vowels.


2018 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 105-119
Author(s):  
Maryam Sharif ◽  
Lotfollah Yarmohammadi ◽  
Firooz Sadighi ◽  
Mortaza Yamini ◽  
Mohammad Sadegh Bagheri

This study was an attempt to compare and contrast the realization patterns of condolence speech act in English and Persian and to examine Iranian EFL learners’ realization of this speech act in English. The study was further interested in investigating whether Iranian EFL learners’ realization of condolence speech act is associated with their level of L2 proficiency. To this end, a Discourse Completion Test (DCT) was administered to 82 undergraduate Iranian EFL students in English. The participants were divided into three levels of language proficiency (elementary level, intermediate level, and advanced level) based on their scores on the Oxford Quick Placement Test (OQPT). For baseline comparisons, the EFL learners also received the translated version of the same DCT in Persian, and the English DCT was administered to 20 native speakers (NSs) of American English. The data were analyzed based on Elwood’s (2004) coding scheme. The results revealed that English and Persian NSs and Iranian EFL learners had access to the same condolence strategies, yet they differed in the semantic formulas, content, or forms they adopted to formulize their condolence expressions. In addition, level of L2 proficiency was found to be associated with Iranian EFL learners’ realization of condolence speech act. 


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (15) ◽  
pp. 8205
Author(s):  
Rastislav Metruk

In recent years, an accelerating trend in an undergoing shift from the use of traditional desktop computers towards the utilisation of smartphones for language learning purposes has been detected. In line with these trends, this study aims to investigate Slovak EFL learners’ attitudes and perceptions of English language learning apps (ELLA) regarding practicing and learning English. Furthermore, the differences in the perception of ELLA between the male and female research participants are also analysed. The target population totalled 158 Slovak university EFL learners, 48 males and 110 females, who were required to display their level of agreement to statements by responding to a 5-point Likert scale questionnaire. The instrument consisted of 30 statements altogether, involving items on apps’ usage and apps’ perception. The calculated means indicate that the participants’ attitudes and perceptions of ELLA range between being neutral and positive, and that EFL learners tend to practice language systems and skills to varying degrees. Moreover, 30 independent-sample t-tests, which were run in order to determine the differences between the male and female attitudes and perceptions, reveal that 50% of statements on apps’ usage and apps’ perception differ significantly, demonstrating considerable differences between the two sexes. The achieved results seem to contribute to the existing research on the use of smartphones and ELLA in the context of EFL learning by casting more light on mobile language learning, an area that merits further scientific exploration.


2017 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 97-106
Author(s):  
Khalil Motalebzadeh ◽  
Abdolghafour Bejarzehi ◽  
Hossein Sheikhzadeh

This study aims at investigating the effects of types of oral texts’ genres on listening comprehension of Iranian EFL learners. The participants of the study were 65 male and female EFL students which all of them from Issar institute in Nikshahr and Chabahar. In order to have homogeneous groups and real-intermediate level students, the first part of the Oxford Placement Test (OPT) containing 40 questions was performed. After the sampling procedure, the pretest was performed and then students were randomly assigned to two groups of control and experimental. The experimental group received a course encompassing the instruction of generic features including news with two genres, political and economic, for twenty sessions of instruction. The subjects in the control group listened to some pieces of news (without any specific generic features, mostly reports with ordinary people about routines). The results showed the experimental group had a better performance on the listening comprehension posttest.


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