PE‌ 94

The gender-based study of the effect of piagetʹs concrete and formaloperational stage of Iranian EFL learnerʹs vocabulary learning

كارشناسي ارشد

آموزش زبان انگليسي

رشت

۹۴/۱۱/۲۴

۹۲ص.

فريدون وحداني

ابراهيم عزتي

age , gender , concrete words , abstract words , concrete operational stage , formal operational stage , vocabulary learning

وحداني،فريدون،راهنما , عزتي،ابراهيم،مشاور

The effects of age and gender on second language acquisition constitute one of the most debated topics in the field of learning English as a second or foreign language. Thus, the present study intended to explore the effect of age and gender on Iranian EFL learners. To this end, a 20-item pre-test including concrete and abstract words was administered to 60 pre-intermediate male and female students of ages between 9 to 15. The students were assigned to two groups of 9-12 which were selected according to Piaget’s concrete operational stage and 13-15 which was Piaget’s formal operational stage (Piaget, 1954). After running the pre-test, the specific treatments were practiced for the two groups. Afterwards, both groups attended the post-test. The data from the study were summed up and the procedures of descriptive statistics (including means, standard deviations, etc.) were applied. According to the results, formal operational stage was the stage in which girls’ and boys’ performance in learning concrete and abstract words was different because the findings indicated that girls learned abstract words better than boys in formal operational stage. This study suggests that reaching the age of puberty in girls at the age of 13 or 14 implies that girls reach operational stage sooner and can handle abstract learning better than boys of the same age.

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