افسانه غنی زاده

The present study aimed to analyze English as Foreign Language (EFL) teachers and students’ perceptions on learning effectiveness, negative factors, positive features, and future directions of virtual education. The data were collected through semi-structured interviews, open-ended questions, and journals. All the data were carefully studied and coded through MAXQDA (version 2020) software. The results indicated that poor internet connection along with low interaction between students and the teacher were the most frequently noted negative points of online classes. Accordingly, providing high-speed internet, supporting students, and having more interaction are the first essential elements in virtual education. Besides, flexibility, time-saving, and reduced cost considerations were considered the positive aspects of online classes. Regarding students’ learning performance, the results were of mixed nature. Providing training courses for teachers, using different materials during the class, and the most importantly having high-speed internet are some implications of this study.

The present study intended to design some materials based on the guidelines of González Davies (2004) for ‘legal texts and correspondence translation’ course of graduate students majoring in translation studies. To this end, first a checklist on the basis of Gentry and Gable's (2001) model was designed to find out the participants’ perceptions of the tasks. Next, the researchers designed related tasks based on Gonzales Davies’ (2004) guidelines inspired by Kiraly’s (2000) constructivist approach. In the third phase, the participants were given the designed tasks published in a book during10-12 sessions. Finally, the researchers held a semi-structured interview with the participants to find out their perceptions towards classroom activities as well as their translation ability. The results indicate that the participants had positive perceptions regarding the designed tasks. The findings have implications for translation classroom courses.

This study elucidated how humanistic teaching as manifested in teachers’ error correction influences EFL learners’ engagement, motivation, and language achievement. the present study was carried out in a language Institute in Mashhad, Iran. The population comprised 42 advanced female learners. To investigate how error treatment will affect EFL learners’ engagement, intrinsic motiv ation and language achievement, a mixed -methods design incorporating both quantitative (experimental design) and qualitative (interview & observation) methods (QUANqual) was employed. The participants were divided into control and experimental groups. Speaking errors of the participants of the experimental group were corrected by three methods of corrective feedback including peer-correction, elicitation, and repetition, whereas, speaking errors of the participants of control group were directly corrected by the teacher. To measure the intrinsic motivation, the MSLQ questionnaire (Pintrich, et al., 1991) was employed. Students’ engagement was determined through Tool-school engagement scale, which was assesses behavioral, emotional, and cognitive aspects of academic engagement (Fredericks, Blumenfeld, Friedel, & Paris, 2005). A Babel test was utilized to assess language proficiency. To examine the effect of corrective feedback on intrinsic interest, an independent samples t-test was run. The results substantiated the efficiency of corrective feedback in enhancing intrinsic motivation. A one-way between-groups multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was utilized to investigate the role of corrective feedback in Cognitive, Behavioral, and Emotional Engagement. It was revealed that all three types of engagement were influenced and the highest difference was observed in Emotional engagement and the lowest difference was obtained for Behavioral engagement. Regarding language achievement, the results implied that corrective feedback utilized in the experimental group resulted in higher language achievement. Twenty-five percent of the whole participants were interviewed after the term. The findings analyzed via MAXQDA software were in line with the results of the quantitative phase.

The purpose of this study was to examine the effect of teachers’ corrective feedbacks on L2 Farsi learners’ reading comprehension, language learning anxiety, and attitudes towards L2 learning. Thus, 44 Persian language learners who were homogeneous in terms of proficiency and studied Farsi at the International Center for Persian Instruction to Non-Persian Speakers at Ferdowsi University were randomly selected as participants. They were assigned to the control and the experiment groups. Prior to the treatment, both groups were assessed via Dörnyei’s (2005) Attitudes and Anxiety questionnaire and Ghonsooly’s (1389) Farsi Language Proficiency Test. The participants of the experimental group were then provided with different corrective feedbacks by the teacher in the course of 15 treatment sessions. After the treatment, the post-test was administered and the students’ attitudes towards the feedbacks were also obtained through a video-recorded interview. The results of the independent samples t-test demonstrated that on the reading comprehension posttest, the participants in experimental group outperformed their counterparts in the control group. Moreover, the results confirmed the effectiveness of corrective feedback in diminishing the learners' language learning anxiety. However, the teacher’s corrective feedbacks had no significant effect on the learners' attitudes towards L2 learning. The majority of the participants believed that appropriate to the occasions, a variety of corrective feedbacks should be used to enhance the effectiveness of corrective feedbacks.

Proverbs are literary pieces constituting the bulk of nation's language and culture. They reflect people's views toward different issues thereby playing decisive role in cultural identity of each nation. The present study aims at comparing women status in Iranian culture with the culture of a European country on the grounds of the intimate familiarity of one of the researchers with language and culture of Italy. To do so, the researchers contrastively analyzed the woman-associated proverbs of the two languages. The following steps determined the sequence of the study: collecting 1384 Italian and Iranian proverbs on women; translating the Italian proverbs; discussing cross-cultural issues; categorizing the subjects of the proverbs; determining the correspondences and the discrepancies among the samples. The results demonstrated that the two cultures exhibit cultural compatibility while diverge strikingly in some important respects. In particular, the Iranian culture was found to dominate the Italian culture with respect to two opposite issues, i.e., women humiliation and dignity.

1. Introduction Given the role of affective variables in relatively every facet of human life, the research into the function of self-efficacy systems on individuals’ behavior and performance has recently carried much weight for psychologists and educators. Translation as a higher–order cognitive task is also viewed both as a process of problem-solving strategies and decision making. More specifically, translation competence in PACTE’s TC model encompasses five sub-competences, among which strategic competence is of utmost importance, playing a pivotal role in solving problems and making interrelations between the other sub-competences. All these sub-competences are also connected to the psycho-physiological component, reflecting cognitive and behavioral, and psychomotor mechanisms. Consequently, self-efficacy and problem-solving strategies can make contributions to each other according to this model.
Although translation strategies are of essence to translation process, whereby relevant decisions are made, the available literature shows somehow the neglected field of problem-solving strategies in the field of translation. Therefore, this study tries to investigate this relationship and to determine the way and to what extent translators’ self-efficacy influences the complex process of problem-solving and decision making throughout the translation practice.
Self-efficacy, the principal notion of Bandura’s social cognitive theory (1997), is defined as the belief in one’s capabilities to organize and execute courses of action required to manage prospective situations. In fact, self-efficacy plays a significant role in achieving goals, performing tasks, and approaching challenges. What is more, people’s level of motivation, affective states, and actions are based more on what they believe than on what is objectively true. On the other hand, translation strategies are at the core of translation process; every translation entails a certain strategy and each translator possesses a specific one. Actually, translators face multiple constraints at various levels and stages, which require tapping into more effective decision making and problem-solving strategies; and translators’ self-efficacy perceptions may serve a function on the strategies they choose in their performance.
2. Methodology A total of 76 translation students of Imam Reza International University and Ferdowsi University of Mashhad participated voluntarily in this study. Their selection was based on convenience sampling. The sample was made up of 19 males (25%), 54 females (71%), and 3 non-mentioned (3.9%) whose first language was Persian. Their background education encompassed BA translation studies and literature in English. The primary purpose of the present inquiry was to develop an inventory scale to examine the probable impact of self-efficacy sense of student translators on their translation strategies. In so doing, two inventory scales of Translation Self-efficacy (TSE) and Translation Problem-solving Strategy (TPSS) in English were designed. The selection of scale items for the self-efficacy questionnaire was based on Bandura’s self-efficacy theory. The earlier version of the questionnaire was also consulted with two translation specialists for the better improvement and clarity of the scale. The construction of translation problem-solving strategy questionnaire was basically a case of the researchers’ personal experience based on their classroom observation of translation students. However, the main focus was on shared translation strategies which are commonly employed and verbally stated by translation students. Moreover, the earlier version of the scale was consulted with two translation teachers who commented on the items.
3. Discussion Statistical analysis indicated that both scales enjoyed validity and reliability. Upon running an exploratory factor analysis to identify interrelationships among items in the scales, a couple of factors were extracted from both questionnaires. As for TSE, 7 factors were loaded and labeled. They were willingness to translate, motivation enhancement for translating, the ineffectiveness of colleagues’ remedial points on reducing motivation, demotivation in facing problems, positive feeling and translation, and having no fear against translating problems. Along with that, 5 factors were extracted from TPSS and labeled as metacognitive strategy (evaluating and designing strategy), reviewing the text in order to simplify next translating, translating then evaluating, reviewing the text prior to translating, and utilizing dictionaries.
In order to examine the relationship between students’ self-efficacy and translation strategy scores, the Pearson-Product Moment formula was used between the loaded factors of both questionnaires. Statistical calculations accounted for a significant relation between the first factor of the TPSS questionnaire (i.e. metacognitive strategy) and the first and second factors of the TSE questionnaire (i.e. willingness to translate and also self-assuredness in ability to translate). What is more, using a dictionary made a modest contribution to the enhancement of motivation. An important implication of these findings is that the translation students who showed no concern or stress in facing translation problems were more qualified in designing and evaluating the relevant strategy in translating practice. It was also derived that the enthusiasm and confidence of students in translating were perceived to be inclining toward the application of metacognitive strategies. It can also be inferred that high-efficacious people compared to low-efficacious ones are cognitively and metacognitively aware of their behavior, trust themselves, and are able to control their demeanor and envisage success or failure.
4. Conclusion Summing up the results, self-efficacy’s potentiality in the translation domain is evident in this study, which helped to broaden the insight of such tenet in connection with the application of translation problem-solving strategies. More importantly, the extant literature substantiates the findings of the present study as regards the impact of self-efficacy beliefs on stress, self-confidence, willingness, and motivation; therefore, meticulous recognition of the source, nature, significance, and process of efficacy perceptions serves the merit of proposing and developing practical guidelines on improving training and performance of translation students as well as stimulating translation expertise.

Directed motivational current (DMC) as a novel strand in L2 motivational field is a robust motivational drive fueled by a highly valued goal and capable of stimulating and sustaining long-term behavior. The present study explored English as a foreign language students’ Directed Motivational Currents by validating the dynamic web-based Persian version of the scale, finding the most crucial motivational currents, and exploring its association with students’ proficiency and educational levels. This is accomplished by translating the DMC Disposition Scale (Muir, 2016) which measures two facets of easy flow and challenge through twelve items as the first step and utilizing the validated questionnaire to explore the most significant motivational currents of students by analyzing students’ responses on open-ended items of the questionnaire (qualitative phase) and finding the association between DMC and proficiency level as well as DMC and educational level (the quantitative phase) as the second step. The results of reliability estimates and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) demonstrated acceptable reliability and validity indices of the Persian version of DMC Disposition Scale. The results also indicated that most of the DMCs experienced by students were competitively self-referenced experiences rather than competitively other-referenced objectives. Moreover, a significant difference was observed between elementary and upper-intermediate proficiency levels of students regarding DMC with upper-intermediate learners experiencing more levels of motivational currents than the elementary counterparts. BA and MA students of English were found to experience more levels of DMCs than diploma learners. The most significant cases in the qualitative phase as well as the discussion on both parts are presented.

A key objective of education is to prepare individuals to be fully-functioning learners. This entails developing the cognitive, metacognitive, motivational, cultural, and emotional competencies. The present study aimed to examine the interrelationships among adaptability, tolerance of ambiguity, cultural intelligence, learning approach, and language achievement as manifestations of the above competencies within a single model. The participants comprised one hundred eighty BA and MA Iranian university students studying English language teaching and translation. The instruments used in this study consisted of the translated versions of four questionnaires: second language tolerance of ambiguity scale, adaptability taken from emotional intelligence inventory, cultural intelligence (CQ) inventory, and the revised study process questionnaire measuring surface and deep learning. The results estimated via structural equation modeling (SEM) revealed that the proposed model containing the variables under study had a good fit with the data. It was found that all the variables except adaptability directly influenced language achievement with deep approach having the highest impact and ambiguity tolerance having the lowest influence. In addition, ambiguity tolerance was a positive and significant predictor of deep approach. CQ was found to be under the influence of both ambiguity tolerance and adaptability. The findings were discussed in the light of the yielded results.

Motivation can be conceptualized as a dynamic process which is a key contributor to mastering a second language. This study used the L2-Motivational Self System as the basis for a conceptual framework for studying the effects of external factors on learners'' motivation. In particular, the role of teachers and parents was studied as the external facets of predicting learners'' motivation. One hundred and twenty EFL teachers along with 1,270 of their students participated in the study. To measure motivation, the Persian version of Dörnyei''s L2 Motivation Self-System Scale was utilized. Three key components of the scale, namely, criterion measure, attitudes to L2 learning, and instrumentality promotion were employed in measuring motivation. To assess the role of family in motivating learners, another subscale of Dörnyei''s questionnaire, i.e., family influence was used. To gauge teacher burnout, the educator version of the Maslach burnout inventory (MBI-ES) was used. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was run to analyze the causal relationships among the variables. The results revealed that teacher burnout negatively influenced learners'' criterion measure and their attitudes to learning English. However, the path leading from teacher burnout to instrumentality promotion was not significant. Furthermore, three direct, positive, and significant paths leading from family influence to learners'' criterion measure, instrumentality promotion, and attitudes to learning English were detected. Finally, findings are discussed with reference to the context of Iran.

The present study probed 250 English as foreign language (EFL) learner's de-motivation by investigating its role in student's burnout, i.e., a state of physical, emotional, and mental exhaustion caused by long-term involvement in situations that are emotionally demanding or stressful. It also sought to examine the indirect impact of de-motivation and direct impact of burnout on language achievement among Iranian English learners. To do so, a two-phase study was designed. The first phase comprised an array of different steps to validate the Persian version of the 'de-motivation scale' designed by Sakai and Kichuki (2009). It measures six constructs: teachers, characteristics of classes, experiences of failure, class environment, class materials, and lack of interest. In the second phase, the researchers utilized the validated questionnaire along with the student version of Maslach Burnout Inventory (Schaufeli et al., 2002) to explore the relationship among student's de-motivation, their burnout, and achievement. The latter scale measures three dimensions of burnout, namely, emotional exhaustion, cynicism, and academic inefficacy. The results of reliability estimates and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) demonstrated acceptable reliability and validity indices of the Persian version of 'demotivation scale'. The findings of the second phase yielded via structural equation modeling (SEM) revealed that student's de-motivation positively predicted student's burnout with 'class material's and 'lack of interest' having the highest influence. Burnout in turn was found to negatively influence language achievement.

The present article، first، examines the relationship between EFL university students'' critical thinking (CT) and emotional intelligence (EI). Second، the roles of gender and age as moderating factors in the relationship between students'' CT and EI are investigated. Third، the relationships between students'' age and gender with their EI are studied. To attain the goals of the research، 86 EFL students completed the «Watson-Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal» (Form A) and the «Bar-On''s EQ-i test». The findings of the study indicated that there was a significant relationship between EFL learners'' CT and their EI. Among the components of EI، flexibility and social responsibility were found to have the highest correlations with CT and were also shown to be positive predictors of CT. The results also revealed that age and gender did not moderate the relationship between CT and EI. Furthermore، it was found that neither age nor gender played any significant roles in learners'' level of EQ.

The present study sought to investigate, primarily, the relationship between Iranian EFL teachers‘ critical thinking and self-efficacy in language institutes. Secondly, the role of the teachers‘ years of teaching experience in their critical thinking ability was examined. Finally, the relationship between the teachers‘ age and their critical thinking was studied. To this end, 94 EFL teachers participated from the different language institutes in Mashhad. The teachers sat through the ―Watson-Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal‖ and the ―Teachers‘ Sense of Efficacy Scale.‖ The statistical calculations via ANOVA and correlation revealed that there was no significant relationship between the teachers‘ critical thinking and their self-efficacy. Furthermore, no significant correlation was found between the teachers‘ critical thinking, their teaching experience, and age. The discussion and conclusions of the research are further presented with reference to earlier findings.

This article, first, examined the role of EFL university student's critical thinking (CT) in their self-efficacy beliefs. Second, the role of gender as a moderating factor in the relationship between student's CT and self-efficacy beliefs was investigated. Third, the difference between females and males regarding their CT and efficacy beliefs was studied. To attain the goals of the research, 86 EFL students sat through “Watson-Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal” (Form A) and “Learner's Sense of Efficacy Survey”. The findings of the study indicated that there is a significant relationship between EFL learner's CT and their self-efficacy beliefs and among the constructs of CT, Interpretation had the highest relationship with efficacy beliefs. The results also revealed that gender does not moderate the relationship between CT and self-efficacy. Furthermore, it was found that there is no significant difference between males and females regarding their levels of CT and self-efficacy beliefs.

This study investigated the relationship between Iranian EFL teachers' self-regulation and their critical thinking ability in language institutes. Furthermore, the role played by their length of teaching experience in their self-regulation and the relationship between their age and self-regulation were examined. To this end, 92 EFL teacherswere selected according to convenience sampling from different language institutes in Mashhad. They were requested to complete the 'Watson-Glaser's Critical Thinking Appraisal' and the 'Teacher Self-Regulation Scale' anonymously. The findings yielded via correlation supported the theoretical expectation of a linkage betweenself-regulation and critical thinking. Subsequent data analyses indicated that among the components of critical thinking, 'evaluation of arguments' and 'interpretation' have the highest correlations with teachers' self-regulation. In addition, significant correlations were found between teachers' self- regulation, their teaching experience, and their age. The conclusions and implications of the research are further discussed with reference to earlier findings.