EAP Students’ Patterns of Vocabulary Learning Strategy Use: The Case of Medical Students

This study aims to investigate firstly the vocabulary learning strategy use of Medical students and secondly, the effect of proficiency level on Students of Medicine patterns of vocabulary learning strategy use. To this end, 40 freshman students of medicine enrolled in an ESP course in Isfahan University of Medical sciences were randomly selected as the sample of this study. A 32- item Likert scale questionnaire was employed to elicit the data on vocabulary learning strategy use of students of Medicine. An OPT test was also administered to homogenize the students into two groups of more proficient and less proficient students. The findings of the study revealed that the most frequently used strategies among the medicine students were using bilingual dictionary” and repeating the new word orally several times”. Also, results indicated that that higher proficient medicine students used significantly more metacognitive strategies than the lower proficient students. Moreover, low level medicine students used monolingual English dictionaries significantly less than high level medicine students.

Keywords:

Vocabulary learning strategies , English for academic purposes , Proficiency level , Strategy use