Investigating the Relationship between Personality Type, Learning Styles and Strategies in Chinese learners of the Persian Language

Document Type : مقالات علمی پژوهشی

Authors
A. Vakilifard 1
P. Heydari Khosro 2
1 Associate professor, Department of Persian Language Didactics, Faculty of Humanities, Imam Khomeini International University, Qazvin, Iran
2 Master of Teaching Persian Language, Imam Khomeini International University, Qazvin, Iran.
10.29252/LRR.13.4.20
Abstract
In L2 learning, each language student learns from a specific perspective, and the individual variables such as personality characteristics could impact on students’ learning. This investigation examines the relationship between the Chinese personality types, learning styles, and strategies learning Persian as a second language. The study randomly recruited 44 students. The participants were distributed three data collection instruments including Myers–Briggs Type Indicator, Kolb’s (1984) learning style inventory, Oxford’s (1990) learning strategies questionnaire. Results showed that there was a statistically significant difference between the learners’ personality types and their learning styles. Students with sensing and perceiving personalities - in comparison to judging and intuition personality types – were characterized with converging learning style. Learners associated with feeling and perceiving personality types preferred diverging and assimilating learning styles comparing to those with thinking and judging personality types. Whereas learners with extraverted, sensing, feeling, and perceiving personality types dominantly tended to be assimilators, the introverted students were identified with intuitive, thinking, and judging learning styles. The results also showed that the Chinese Persian second language learners commonly used cognitive and metacognitive learning strategies. It was also found that they were considerably assimilators concerning learning style. It seems that perception of Chinese Persian second language learners’ personality types, styles, and learning strategies could largely have an influence on the improvement of instruction quality and the use of sound teaching methodologies.





1. Introduction

Studying on influence of individual features in learning second languages has made a lot of progress in recent decades also a lot of theories have been put forward in this field. Since its foundation, the field of psychology has been trying to achieve two different and somewhat contradictory areas: understanding the general principles of the human mind and investigating the uniqueness of the human mind. Individual differences, as the name suggests, are characteristics or traits that may make people different from each other (Dornyei, 2005). According to Norton (1997), when language learners speak, they are not only exchanging information with their audience or audiences, but also they are continuously organizing the concept of who they are and how they relate to the social world. In other words, they are creating and exchanging their identity. Another part of the research is related to the study of learning styles and strategies of learners. In recent years, studies which are related to the influence of personality characteristics on learning styles and strategies have increased dramatically. For example, the influence of learning styles and personality traits which is based on the Myers-Briggs model has been evaluated by Myers and colleagues (1998) and Ehrman (1996). According to Brown (2000), learning styles can be considered as cognitive, emotional, and biological characteristics which are relatively stable indicators of how one perceives, interacts, and responds to the learning environment. According to Oxford (1989:235), language learning strategies are behaviors or actions that language learners use for more successful, self-reliant and enjoyable learning. The main purpose of this research is to investigate the relationship between the personality types of Chinese speakers and the styles and approaches of Persian language as a second language. In foreign countries, a lot of researches have been conducted on the relationship between learning styles and strategies and the relationship between these two components with the personality characteristics of language learners. However, the results of these studies have not been proven on the success or failure of language learners in learning a foreign language. On the other hand, in Iran, there aren’t any studies to deal with the relationship between personality traits, styles and strategies for learning Persian language. Since Chinese speakers constitute a significant part of Persian learners in Persian language teaching centers, studying their learning style can play an important role in increasing the knowledge of Persian language teachers and their teaching methods.

Research Questions

According to this raised issue, the following research questions are raised too.

1. What is the relationship between personality type and learning styles of Chinese speakers?

2. What is the relationship between personality type and learning strategies of Chinese speakers?

3. Which learning styles do Chinese language learners use more?

4. Which learning strategies do Chinese language learners use more?



2. Methodology

The research devices in this study are Myers-Briggs personality questionnaire (AV form), Kolb learning styles questionnaire (1984) and Oxford learning strategies questionnaire (1990). Also, this research was conducted in the field and the data collection method is quantitative.

The statistical population in this research is all Chinese who were Farsi learners, 44 Chinese-speakers from the Persian language teaching center of Imam Khomeini International University were randomly selected as the research sample.





3. Results

This research showed that in the case of convergent learning style, people with sensory and perceptive personality type use convergent style more than intuitive and judgmental people.



4. Discussion

Regarding divergent and adaptive learning styles, similarly, people with emotional and perceptive personality type use divergent and adaptive learning styles more than thinking and judgmental people. Also, regarding the absorbing learning style, people with the four dimensions of extroverted, sensory, emotional, and perceptive personality tend to use the absorbing learning style more than introverted, intuitive, thinking, and judgmental people. On the other hand, no significant relationship was found between the personality type of Chinese speakers and their learning strategies. The dominant strategy of Chinese speakers was cognitive and metacognitive strategies. Also, the dominant style of Chinese speakers in this research was absorbing style. Learners with an absorbing learning style learn more through deep thinking. These people organize information well and use abstract concepts to understand the situation. The personality type of these people is introverted and intuitive.

Paying attention to this issue makes the Persian teachers as the second language teachers sensitive to language background and culture of learners in process of class activities. In addition, teachers can help the learners to be aware of their weakness, strength and preference of learning to investigate about challenges of learning.



6. Conclusion

The results of this study can be used to inform teachers and second language learners about the importance of language learning strategies and styles. It is believed that knowing the specific strategies and styles which are used by language learners is of particular importance due to the effectiveness of such strategies and styles in improving the efficiency of language learners.

It is suggested that more researches be conducted in the future to investigate the relationship between language learning strategies, learning styles and the personality type of Persian language teachers. The relationship between language learning strategies, learning styles and the personality type of Chinese speakers among boys and girls should be investigated in order to find out the effect of gender on these variables and their relationship.

More studies should be done on the relationship between learning styles and language learning strategies on other factors such as motivation, talent, performance and duration of language learning.

Keywords

Subjects

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Language Related Research
Volume 13, Issue 4 - Serial Number 70
September and October 2022
Pages 659-690