NON-ENGLISH MAJORS’ PERCEPTIONS AND USE OF METACOGNITIVE STRATEGIES AT A VIETNAMESE EFL CONTEXT

Abstract

The present study aimed to first investigate how non-English majored juniors at a Ho Chi Minh City-based college perceived the importance of metacognitive strategies and to what extent they used these strategies and then explore significant differences between their perceptions and use of metacognitive strategies. The mixed-methods study was conducted with the participation of 342 non-English majored juniors at the college. The quantitative data collected from the questionnaire were processed by SPSS (26.0), whereas content analysis was employed to analyze the qualitative data obtained from the semi-structured interview. The findings generally revealed that metacognitive strategies were believed to be significant by a large number of the students. In terms of their employment of metacognitive strategies, only some strategies relating to goal setting, needs-based adjustments, and reflections were employed frequently by most of the participants. Moreover, the study also indicated some significant differences between the learners’ perceptions and their actual use of metacognitive strategies. Based upon the aforementioned findings, some recommendations for further research on autonomous language learning strategies with a focus on metacognitive strategies are made.