THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN IRANIAN HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS' BELIEFS ABOUT VOCABULARY LEARNING AND THEIR SOURCES OF VOCABULARY LEARNING: THE ROLE OF LANGUAGE LEARNING EXPERIENCE

The present study was an attempt to gather information about vocabulary learning beliefs from 607 high school students by using a five-point Likert scale questionnaire with 34 items. After collecting the data, the students were categorized as inexperienced or experienced groups, on the basis of their language institute experience. The result of Pearson Correlation Coefficient revealed that there was a positive relationship, both in experienced and inexperienced students, between the students’ beliefs about vocabulary learning and their sources of vocabulary learning although it was not significant in inexperienced students. Inexperienced and experienced students differed far more than they resembled each other; they differed significantly in 5 out of 6 belief categories about vocabulary learning (p<.05).