An Investigation of Writing Strategies Used by the Students on the Perspective Language Proficiency and Gender

Abstract

This study was aimed at describing the types of writing strategy used by students on the perspective language proficiency and gender, and the factors underlying the choice of writing strategies of the students at English department in one of university in Indonesia. This research was a qualitative study. The subject of the study was fourth students at English department on the undergraduate program which grouped into male, female, poor writing, and good writing. The methods of collecting data were observation, interview, and questionnaire. Based on the research finding, the type of writing strategies used by the students on the perspective language proficiency and gender covered the six strategies proposed by Oxford, namely: memory, cognitive, compensation, metacognitive, affective, and social strategy. The dominant writing strategy used by male students was memory strategy, whereas the female students was metacognitive strategy. And the dominant writing strategy used by the students having poor writing production was compensation strategy, whereas the students having good writing production was metacognitive strategy. Moreover, the factors underlying the choice of writing strategies used by male students were purpose of learning language, motivation, degree of awareness, learning style, and belief, whereas the factors underlying the choice of writing strategies used by female students were purpose of learning language, motivation, degree of awareness, learning style, belief, and learning environment. And the factors underlying the choice of writing strategies used by the students having poor writing were degree of awareness, belief, and proficiency, whereas the factors underlying the choice of writing strategies used by students having good writing were purpose of learning language, motivation, degree of awareness, and learning style.