EFL Learner's Beliefs about Language Learning, Concern overMistakes, and Language Achievement: Investigating Possible Relationships in an Iranian Context

The present study was an attempt to explore any significant relationships among Iranian EFL learners’ beliefs about language learning aptitude and the difficulty of language learning, their concern over mistakes, and their language achievement. 116 Iranian junior and senior EFL students majoring in English Translation and English Literature at Shahid Bahonar university of Kerman were chosen through available sampling technique to take part in this study. To obtain the required data, the following questionnaires were utilized: Beliefs about Language Learning Inventory (BALLI) developed by Horwitz (1987), and Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale (MPS) designed by Frost et al. (1990). The participants'' GPAs of the basic courses were also used as a measure of their language achievement. Statistical test of Pearson Product- Moment Correlation and Independent T-Test were conducted to analyze the data. The findings of this study revealed that first, there were significant positive relationships between belief about language learning aptitude and language achievement, on one hand, and, belief about the difficulty of language learning and concern over mistakes, on the other hand; second, no significant relationship was found between these pairs: belief about language learning aptitude and concern over mistakes, belief about the difficulty of language learning and language achievement, and concern over mistakes andlanguage achievement; third, regarding gender, it was revealed that females, in comparison with males, had higher scores on belief about language learning aptitude. Moreover, there were no significant differences between males and females regarding other variables. Finally, compared with belief about the difficulty of language learning, belief about language learning aptitude was found to have the higher relationship with language achievement: the former did not predict language achievement.