Journal of Languages for Specific Purposes (Mar 2024)
STATISTICAL LITERACY AMONG EFL MASTER’S STUDENTS: ACTION RESEARCH
Abstract
The Social Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) is among the most common programs used by researchers in language studies to explore, examine, and analyze quantitative data for the sake of drawing valid conclusions. The current action research aims to offer insights into the utilization of SPSS by Master’s students in their empirical studies for statistical analysis. Specifically, it attempts to depict the way SPSS is employed in academic pursuits, and discern the inherent challenges faced by students, offering insights into the obstacles that may impede their effective use of SPSS as a tool for statistical exploration and interpretation in academic research. To reach these objectives, ten Master’s dissertations written by EFL students at the Department of English at Mouloud Mammeri University in language studies were scrutinized though a qualitative content analysis. Findings indicate that the students limit the scope of their use of SPSS to quantitative variables and descriptive statistics. In addition, it has been found that the most commonly used statistical technique is ‘the mean’ or ‘the average’ that could be easily measured without any sophisticated software. Furthermore, no reference to inferential statistics in order to compare among groups or to measure the impact of a variable on another is made. The overall conclusion drawn from the analysis of the corpus is that students exhibit reluctance to the use of inferential statistics in their empirical studies and unconsciously believe that SPSS, inferential statistics, or any other sophisticated software are tightly related to natural sciences and could not be easily applied in social sciences. On the basis of the findings, a number of recommendations are suggested like organizing workshops with computer scientists. In addition, students’ self-confidence should be increased in order to change their perception of their potential and abilities to feel more at ease with statistics and technologies while doing academic research in language studies.
