Learning strategies of Malaysian learners of Arabic as a foreign language: beliefs and frequency of use.

This study investigates the vocabulary learning strategies of undergraduate Malaysian learners of Arabic as a foreign language (AFL) in terms of beliefs and frequency of use. A total of 152 learners of Arabic in two Malaysian universities responded to a questionnaire composed of two main themes– beliefs (20 items) and strategies (45 items). The findings highlighted that Malaysian AFL learners generally agree on the importance of using different approaches –incidental and intentional– in manipulating and learning Arabic vocabulary. Furthermore, Malaysian AFL learners appeared to use vocabulary learning strategies at approximately the same level of frequency. However, it was found that dictionary related strategies were more frequently used in contrast to other strategies, namely, note taking, memorization, and guessing, which was the least usually used strategy.