English Departments Students’ Attitudes toward Learning English Language at Paktia University

Abstract

The aim of this study was to discover the attitudes of English language and literature departments’ EFL students toward learning English language at Paktia University. The study aimed to study the behavioral, cognitive, and emotional aspects of students’ attitudes and also to find out if there are any differences in students’ attitudes based on some of their demographic factors such as Kankoor (university entrance examination) selection, type of faculty, level of study, and level of pre-university preparatory education. A 24 item questionnaire survey was administered to 60 students selected conveniently from English language and literature departments of both education and language and literature faculties. The mean score and median were analyzed in order to determine the central tendency of the respondents’ attitudes. Moreover, the standard deviation was analyzed to count the dispersion of the responses. The results showed that students had generally positive attitudes toward learning English, but their attitudes in terms of behavioral, cognitive, and emotional aspects were slightly different. No significant differences were found in students’ attitudes based on their demographic information, but very slight differences were discovered based on their Kankoor selection, type of faculty, level of study, and pre-university preparatory knowledge.