The present research attempts to explore the overall pattern of English vocabulary learning strategies used by some Chinese college students. In addition to it, the employment of specific memorization strategies, and both similarities and differences in English vocabulary strategies use between students of the humanities and students of sciences are explored as well. A questionnaire, adapted from Gu and Johnson (1996), is administered to 325 college students from three universities. Students’ vocabulary learning strategies are investigated at metacognitive, cognitive and social/affective levels. By using SPSS, the analyses of the data reveal: (1) The investigated students tend to view vocabulary learning as a kind of monotonous, mechanical task from which they derive little pleasure or sense of success. Generally speaking, they employ a variety of vocabulary strategies at cognitive, metacognitive and social/affective levels; (2) Oral plus visual repetition and oral repetition predominate all memorization strategies. Other commonly used memorization strategies include semantic association, contextualization, word formation, and grouping; (3) Students of the humanities and students of sciences use some similar vocabulary learning strategies. However, there exist indeed some significant differences in using some cognitive vocabulary learning strategies in their vocabulary learning.Finally, the pedagogical implications of the research are suggested.
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