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Darasawang, & Pamararat Wiriyakarun 

 
 

The Attributes of Successful Distance Language Learners 

 

Phuttharaksa Yantraprakorn 

Pornapit Darasawang 

Pamararat Wiriyakarun 

King Mongkut's University of Technology Thonburi, Thailand 
aj_put@hotmail.com   

 

 
Abstract 

With the popularity of distance learning in the form of online learning throughout Thai education 

today, understanding the attributes of successful online learners has become very crucial because it 

can help course developers to prepare materials and help for learners. This study focuses on the 

attributes of learners who study language in a distance learning mode by aiming to investigate 

learners’ attributes that may assist them to learn successfully in a Web-based distance writing 

setting. The study was conducted with distance learners who enrolled in an online English 

language writing course at one of the well-known English language tutorial schools in Bangkok. 

The research instruments included an online survey questionnaire (Self-Efficacy Scale) and 

telephone interviews. The questionnaire was used to determine the learners’ entry-level confidence 

with necessary writing skills and computer skills for online learning in order to predict their 

success and select the highly self-efficacious learners as the subjects for more in-depth study. A 

content-analysis of interview data revealed unique characteristics that are possessed by the online 

language learners and how they dealt with the tasks. 

 

Keywords: Online learners attributes, Self-efficacy, Distance language learning 

 

 

Introduction  

Thai education nowadays uses online technologies to support teaching and learning. The technologies are 

being developed continuously to assist or supplant traditional classrooms. Due to the demand of students 

to learn more at their own time and pace, many institutions offer distance education. The institutions use 

various technologies to provide online learning courses. Those courses offer students educational 

opportunities and the flexibility of when and where they access their courses.  Consequently, the students 

are able to study their selected learning courses at home. Thus, this learning mode is widely used in many 

disciplines including English language learning. 

 

However, when engaging in distance learning, learners may encounter many problems with learning 

online. Learning a language in an online environment, the students must not only learn difficult course 

material but also the technology skills needed to participate in the class. They might feel less confident 

about enrolling and learning in online classes, especially at secondary school levels. Moreover, it is hard 

for online language learners who study productive skills especially writing skills because the skills are 

difficult to do through self-study and they also need feedback. As a result, the learners may find learning 

by this mode very difficult and are likely to drop out, especially for the ones who are used to total 

dependence on a teacher (Hurd, 2000). Therefore, more motivation and skills support are essential for 

learners to learn in a distance language learning environment effectively. 

 

Self-efficacy 

Self-efficacy is defined as self-assessment of ability to do a task or achieve a goal over a specific situation 

(Bandura, 1977). It is a crucial component of social cognitive theory and it determines how learners feel, 

think, motivate, and behave. Self-efficacy is assumed that there are four sources of students’ self-efficacy: 

mastery experience, vicarious experience, verbal persuasion, and physiological arousal. Self-efficacy is 

mailto:aj_put@hotmail.com


AsiaCALL Online Journal (ISSN 1936-9859) 2014 – Special Issue – AsiaCALL2013 Proceedings, Phuttharaksa Yantraprakorn, Pornapit 

Darasawang, & Pamararat Wiriyakarun 

 
 

important in learning because it affects academic motivation and learning achievement (Shunk, 1995; 

Pajares, 1996). In the field of language learning, Mills, Pajares, and Herron (2007) showed the 

significance of self-efficacy especially with writing skills. They pointed out that learners’ self- efficacy 

beliefs powerfully affect their academic performance. It also helps learners adjust to and handle well an 

unfamiliar learning environment (Alivernini & Lucidi, 2011). The self-efficacy construct is new relative 

to online learning context. Studies in distance learning show that self-efficacy in important to contribute to 

the success of the learners. Artino and Stephen (2007) found that when comparing higher with lower 

perceived self-efficacy, self-efficacious learners reported less negative success emotions and greater 

learning performance (Joo, Bong,& Choi, 2000; Wang & Newlin, 2002). Therefore, learners’ self-efficacy 

beliefs might be important for the distance language learning context. More studies need to be conducted 

to investigate distance language learners’ self-efficacy as well as it influences the learners’ attributes. 

 

Attributes of distance language learners 

Previously, many educators studied learners’ attributes in the distance learning environment and found 

that learning in this mode requires proper qualities and learning styles (Buchanan, 1999). They were also 

interested in investigating factors influencing learners’ success and they found motivation was the best 

predictor of learners’ achievement in language learning in a distance learning context (Oxford, Park-Oh, 

Ito & Sumrall, 1993). Educators also found that accompanying the rise of the number of students using 

distance learning is the subsequent increase in students who stop learning before completion. They 

indicated that the dropout rates of online learners are high (The Corporate University Xchange 2000; 

Oblender 2002; Meister 2002).  These studies indicated that students taking online courses tend to drop 

out from those courses. Additionally, the percentage of distance students’ dropout is higher than those of 

students who study in the classroom learning mode (Hiltz, 1997). The student should be prepared before 

and while taking an online course. 

 

A high dropout rate may possibly imply that online learning is not appropriate for all learners. It is 

demanding and challenging for students in ways different from what students face in the traditional 

classroom. The learners have to take full responsibility for their own learning in an online learning 

environment where teachers are at a distance and their support is limited. To be a successful online 

language learner, the learners need to possess a variety of skills and attributes in order to find success in 

the online courses. The learners who are familiar with classroom settings need support to help them 

achieve their learning goals. For that reason, understanding the attributes of successful online learners has 

become very crucial because it can help course developers and instructors to prepare materials and help 

for online learners. 

 

In this study, six individual attributes of distance language learner are posited. The distinctive attributes 

are: goals, attributions, resilience, self-confidence, strategies, and persistence.  

 

 Goal is a desired education result that learners want to accomplish while doing distance learning. 

 Attribution refers to the reasons that the learners give for their successes or failures while they are 

engaging in distance language learning or tasks. 

 Resilience is defined as the ability to stay positive and effective in difficult or challenging 

learning situations and feel positive about online learning. 

 Self-confidence is seen as a realistic belief of achieving success in a distance learning situation. 

 Strategy includes the particular behaviors or thought processes that learners use to accomplish 

their distance language learning. 



AsiaCALL Online Journal (ISSN 1936-9859) 2014 – Special Issue – AsiaCALL2013 Proceedings, Phuttharaksa Yantraprakorn, Pornapit 

Darasawang, & Pamararat Wiriyakarun 

 
 

 Persistence is when the learners continue to learn until they complete the distance language 

learning course. 

 

The six posited attributes stated are considered because of their significance as well as their influence on 

learners who take control of their learning in a distance language learning environment. This study has 

been conducted to examine the unique attributes that are possessed by successful online language learners 

and how they perform their writing tasks. This study is qualitative in nature as telephone interviews were 

employed to collect data to answer the research question: What are the successful distance language 

learners’ attributes? 

 

Context of the study 

The study was carried out at a popular English language tutorial school in Thailand. The selected learning 

course was a writing course. The course used the Internet and a variety of web-based technologies to 

provide a distance language learning environment. The course is a self-paced online course. It is taught 

entirely online and provided for students who want to voluntarily learn writing outside of their regular 

school. The students had to manage their own learning in terms of time and place to study, and select the 

tasks they wanted to do in order to complete the 6-month course from June to December 2012.The main 

objective of the course was to instruct students to acquire proper writing and formatting skills to enhance 

effective communication. Sentence structure, paragraph structure, essay format, grammar and punctuation 

were reviewed in the course. There were 9 tasks and 2 tests to be completed, and the students had to 

decide when they would complete them. They could complete all the tasks or skip some tasks. To 

complete the tasks, students were assigned various types of essays to write using language functions 

learned from the material provided. In this course, the instructors give learners feedback to follow up on 

students’ efforts and performance. They provided feedback on students’ work in the form of correction 

symbols and written commentary. 

 

Subjects of the study 

The subjects for this study were learners who enrolled in the writing course. They were selected based on 

the result of the self-efficacy questionnaire. The questionnaire was used to determine the learners’ entry-

level of confidence in necessary writing skills and computer skills for online learning in order to predict 

their success and select the high level confident learners as subjects for more in-depth study. There were 

114 students who responded to the online survey on their self-efficacy to study at a distance learning 

course. Then, 6 subjects representing highly efficacious learners who believed they could finish the course 

within the expected time were purposefully selected. The six subjects were asked to suggest a pseudonym 

for themselves that the researchers could use. They are Jim, Pam, Ann, Bell, June, and Kim. After that, 

they were interviewed via telephone about their learning in the course. 

 

Instrumentation 

In this study, semi-structured telephone interviews were used for data collection. The purpose of the 

interviews was to investigate students’ attributes and how they dealt with the online writing tasks. The 

students were interviewed at the beginning, during, and the end of the course. At the beginning of the 

study, the students were interviewed in order to elicit students’ learning goal and study plan, such as 

“What are your goals for the future? What goals do you have in learning this course? How do you plan to 

achieve those goals?” During the course, the interviews were conducted and then analyzed to find out 

students’ attributes in terms of self-confidence, resilience, and strategies, for example “What major 

challenges and problems did you face in learning this course? How did you handle them?” At the end of 

the course, the subjects were asked to answer questions about their learning persistence and attributions, 

such as “Did you accomplish your learning goal or succeed? Why do you think you were successful? 



AsiaCALL Online Journal (ISSN 1936-9859) 2014 – Special Issue – AsiaCALL2013 Proceedings, Phuttharaksa Yantraprakorn, Pornapit 

Darasawang, & Pamararat Wiriyakarun 

 
 

What were the possible causes of your success?”  All the interviews were conducted in Thai. Each lasted 

around twenty minutes. They were recorded and transcribed afterwards. 

 

Result and discussion 

Based on the data, when evaluated by the questionnaire responses before learning, the six subjects showed 

a high level of self-efficacy ( X = 2.41-4.00). It means they believed that they could be successful in 

completing the course. At the end of the course, the students who completed the writing course within the 

time provided by the course were regarded as successful learners. Among the six chosen participants, Jim, 

Ann, June, and Kim were successful whereas Pam and Bell were unsuccessful students because they 

dropped out in the middle of the course. Therefore, it is obvious that all six students in this study reported 

that they were highly efficacious learners; however, while engaging in the online learning mode, some 

students were not able to learn successfully because they needed some attributes. 

 

The main findings of this study highlight the importance of six attributes for successful distance language 

learners. These attributes consist of goals, attributions, resilience, self-confidence, strategies, and 

persistence. It is important to emphasize that all four successful students possess each one of the success 

attributes. Each of these attributes is discussed in the following sections. Extracts from participants’ 

interviews are used to help explain each attribute. 

 

Goals 

Goal setting is a powerful process for distance language learning, and for motivating the learners to learn 

by themselves. There are two types of goals: performance and learning (Locke & Latham, 2002). They are 

different in that performance goals focus on how well the students perform the tasks at a particular time 

whereas learning goals focus on how well they eventually learn or master the materials regardless of how 

long it may take. Goals affect a student’s choice and effort. In this study, the successful learners set more 

learning goals which focused on the discovery of effective strategies to attain and sustain expected results, 

while the unsuccessful learners set only performance goals which focused on the end result. Jim, who was 

a successful learner, set a long-term performance goal, which provided direction and meaning to his 

learning. His goal was studying abroad and he said, “My goal is studying abroad. To achieve this goal, I 

need to have some certificates as IELTS.” The goal affected his choice because he made careful decisions 

about the lesson to study. Consequently, he set short-term learning goals by identifying what he wanted to 

learn that was relevant to his long-term goal. He stated, “I will study making a report this week because it 

is similar to the Academic IELTS Test Writing Task 1.” The finding also shows that a goal affects a 

student’s effort because the successful learners developed a plan to counter expected learning problems 

such as Internet and server delays in order to achieve their goals.  

 

While successful distance language learners set learning goals, the unsuccessful ones set performance 

goals to pass the course and to get high scores to prove that they have writing ability. Pam set short-term 

performance goals and she expressed “My goal in learning writing online is to get the best score and get 

a certificate from the school.” She did not plan out her study, so she followed the course outline. 

 

Based on the data, goal-setting affected the learners’ choice on what to focus on, i.e. which lessons are 

goal relevant and which are not. While successful distance language learners set both types of goals to 

gain knowledge and develop writing skills, the unsuccessful ones set only performance goals to get the 

highest scores. Therefore, it might have had a negative impact on their performance because they could 

not finish the course. 

 



AsiaCALL Online Journal (ISSN 1936-9859) 2014 – Special Issue – AsiaCALL2013 Proceedings, Phuttharaksa Yantraprakorn, Pornapit 

Darasawang, & Pamararat Wiriyakarun 

 
 

Attributions 

The perceptions of success or failure from previous learning experiences can motivate or demotivate 

students to perform upcoming tasks. These beliefs play a major role in distance language learning 

motivation as they determine the amount of effort students will expend on learning activities. The most 

commonly inferred causes of success and failure are ability, effort, luck and task difficulty (Weiner, 1992; 

1994). Among these causes, ability and effort have been identified as the most influential perceived 

causes (DÖrnyei, 2003). In this study, successful learners’ attributions are not the same as those of 

unsuccessful learners. The successful distance language learners attributed their success to internal 

factors, their own efforts, while unsuccessful learners attributed failure to ability. Ann, a successful 

learner, believes effort is the key to her success. She says “I succeeded and completed the course on time 

because I studied hard enough. I did all exercises and assignments. It made me pass the tests. I always 

spend my time on reading texts, watching videos and practicing writing. If I do not study hard, I will never 

be good at writing.” In contrast, students consider themselves as unsuccessful online language learners 

because they did not complete the course. They blamed themselves for their lack of English ability as the 

cause of failure more than anything else. Bell was regard as an unsuccessful learner and had done poorly 

on writing assignments, and attributed the bad scores to an inability to learn writing. She expressed “I 

knew myself that I would probably not succeed because I did not understand the course content clearly. I 

am not able to study writing and do assignments well. I am also weak in English grammar and writing.” 

Ability is a stable, uncontrollable factor. Therefore, those who attribute their failure to their ability are 

expected to be unsuccessful in the future because they cannot change their ability to do a task. 

 

According to the data, successful distance language learners perceived that they put enough effort to the 

course. They put their English writing knowledge into practice. The results suggest that effort is a sign for 

improvement because the students attribute their success to effort which is an internal, controllable and 

changeable attribute. The perception of effort as a cause of success implies that the students realize that 

they will be successful if they try harder and it is possible to expect future success (Weiner, 1994). 

Therefore, blaming their inability for their failure may cause students to give up or drop out. This 

perception seems to be critical for their distance language learning. 

 

Resilience 

To be successful in studying online writing by themselves, the learners may experience various 

difficulties and resilience is a key to help them succeed. Resilience can be defined as behaviors which 

people use when faced with stresses or setbacks, life events, and external commitments (Kemp, 2002). 

Resilience is not one specific thing, but a combination of skills and positive views that the students gain 

from their online learning experiences. In this study, successful students demonstrated great resilience 

because they tolerated problems. As Pam explained, “At first I had problems in submitting the course 

assignments … As I got used to the computer program and the course website, I felt that I could be a 

much more competent distance learner.” With that competence, she says, “I became an online learner 

and I know how to learn.” They also had the ability to bounce back from failures. After repeated failures, 

they were able to see and pursue alternative strategies for reaching their goals, and know when a goal had 

to be modified. Ann states, “I have failed many times at the beginning of the course, but I am not a 

failure. I have learned to succeed from my failures.” Furthermore, by the end of the course, these students 

demonstrated that they had developed skills in troubleshooting their own problems. As Kim reflected, “I 

learn a lot about how to solve learning problems …now, I’m just comfortable with my mistakes and I 

think difficult situations are necessary for learning.”  

 

In contrast, Pam, who is regarded as an unsuccessful learner, did not show resilience in her learning; she 

avoided learning and gave up quickly when difficulties arose as seen from her extract “for me the major 



AsiaCALL Online Journal (ISSN 1936-9859) 2014 – Special Issue – AsiaCALL2013 Proceedings, Phuttharaksa Yantraprakorn, Pornapit 

Darasawang, & Pamararat Wiriyakarun 

 
 

challenge was to organize myself because it was the first time I was taking course online. All of my 

lessons and tasks online was a mess, and with a little bit of language ability, I decided to stop learning.” 

In the middle of the course, unsuccessful students believed that essay writing was impossible for them, 

and that whatever they wrote would get a bad score because they lacked and could never develop the 

ability to write. 

 

In this study, successful students showed great resilience to work through difficult situations with self-

confidence. The data reveals that resilience helps the students solve problems, cope with challenges and 

bounce back from disappointments. It means that successful students learn from their hardships. The 

successful students demonstrated an optimistic attitude and a mindset that was open to distance language 

learning. Conversely, the unsuccessful students had feelings of failure, and incapability reinforced through 

their online learning experiences. Thus, they could not cope with learning problems and could not 

complete the course. 

 

Self-confidence 

How distance language learners feel about themselves is a crucial issue in achieving learning goals in this 

mode. Self-confidence is an attitude which allows a learner to have a positive attitude and realistic views 

of himself and his own learning. A self-confident online language learner has a high belief in herself.  

Having self-confidence, the learners will be able to achieve their goals, take advantage of opportunities 

that come their way, and also have the strength to overcome any obstacle. In this study, successful 

learners were more confident than unsuccessful ones. Kim, a successful learner, had high self-confidence 

to complete this course. She says, “I have the confidence in learning myself and study until I finish the 

course.” She used the support provided in the program to maintain her confidence in learning, “I had 

more self-confidence because I could do the all the task by myself. When I made mistakes I can check my 

own work with the answer keys.”  She used the feedback as a way to develop her self-confidence. “I could 

learn and solve my problems I faced by myself without the teacher’s help all the time. Learning online 

help me to gain a high level of self-confidence on my learning and gave me more real experience of 

studying writing outside class.” On the other hand, while engaging in the online independent learning 

mode, some students were not able to do it because their confidence level decreased. Bell confessed that 

she was not confident to do the task, “I am not confident that I will do as well on this task as I would 

like.”  She also added that “I cannot send my task on time as I planned because I had a lot of works in my 

normal class. I had to take some time to do my other works.” And, “I cannot complete my tasks because it 

was nearly the time I had to take the examination. I had to prepare myself for the school examination.” 

Furthermore, “I am not sure I can do well on this task, no matter how much I practice.”  Based on the 

data, Bell did not have self-regulated strategies, and she couldn’t maintain self-confidence.  

 

In this study, the data revealed that learners’ confidence in their capabilities had affected their success in 

the online course. The successful learners trusted themselves to study, and complete the task and the 

course. They also could maintain their confidence level all throughout the course by using the learning 

environment provided effectively.  As Pintrich and DeGroot (1990) stated, in addition to being able to 

learn by themselves, self-regulated or successful students are able to learn from peers, and seek help and 

support from peers and instructors. 

 

Strategies 

Online courses delivered through the Web require students to be responsible for their own learning. The 

students have to decide how and when learning takes place in order to achieve their goals. In other words, 

they need learning strategies to help them become more effective and independent learners. In this study, 

strategy refers to the particular behaviors or thought processes that students use to develop their distance 



AsiaCALL Online Journal (ISSN 1936-9859) 2014 – Special Issue – AsiaCALL2013 Proceedings, Phuttharaksa Yantraprakorn, Pornapit 

Darasawang, & Pamararat Wiriyakarun 

 
 

language learning. Successful learners are able to implement multiple learning strategies across tasks and 

adjust those strategies as needed to facilitate their progress towards their desired goals (Paris & Paris, 

2001). 

In this study, both successful and unsuccessful students reported that they employed many classroom 

learning strategies to learn and accomplish online writing tasks such as note taking, making charts, and 

using dictionaries to understand the lessons, but the successful learners used a variety of self-regulated 

learning strategies to control their own learning in order to achieve their goals, for instance, they used 

organizing and transforming information strategies to compose their assignments. Kim and June reported 

that they composed and edited their essays off-line and then cut and pasted them into the course website to 

submit their tasks. They always used strategies such as structuring the learning environment by setting up 

quiet areas in their homes for learning. To enhance her online learning environment, Kim used music to 

sustain attention to read and relax while writing her essay and Jim searched for a fast computer and 

Internet connection. They also used social assistance seeking strategies to complete their course 

assignments. Jim, Ann, and Kim sought help to clarify expectations on assignments and get feedback on 

writing drafts. All successful students reported that they asked friends and distance learning institute staff 

for help on technical problems. Moreover, they used self-monitoring and record-keeping strategies to 

monitor their leaning progress and evaluate their own learning and strategies for adapting future methods 

based on what they had learned. Ann reported that “I used my calendar application on my smartphone for 

creating my personal calendar to see my progress for learning this course.”  

 

In contrast, unsuccessful students mentioned more memory strategies; however, those could not assist 

them to learn successfully. For example, they just searched for bolded words and memorized their 

definitions, because they thought this strategy worked well the last time. They had to answer questions 

when they read the course materials in their regular class but it did not help them to complete their works 

in this learning context. Bell also added that “I had to write assignment this week. I couldn’t organize it at 

all. I couldn’t get any organization flow going. I kept jumping from point to point. So I got frustrated with 

it.” Then, she tended to stop writing. 

 

This study showed that successful students were active in their learning process. They used different 

learning strategies that were systematically directed towards the achievement of their learning goals. They 

also use strategies to manage other sources of learning such as adaptation of certain aspects of the 

physical environment and the organization of time to learn so that they could become most efficient, and 

did their work carefully. In contrast, the data revealed that even though unsuccessful learners tried to 

transfer learned strategy that worked well in a classroom context to distance learning, they failed. This 

strategy needed to be evaluated before using it in the new context. 

 

Persistence 

In general, the broad definition of persistence in online learning is students staying in a course for as long 

as they can to engage in self–directed study (Comings, Parella, & Soricone, 1999). For this study, 

persistence is essential in terms of intensity and the ability to complete tasks required and the course 

successfully. The findings of this study exhibited that successful and unsuccessful learners persisted 

differently in two main aspects of persistence. The first persistence aspect included instructional hours. 

The successful learners spent between 6 to 15 hours studying (watching and reviewing videos, completing 

course assignments, and reading threaded discussions) each week. 

 

In contrast, unsuccessful learners reported spending approximately 4 hours to study. For another aspect, 

intention to study, successful learners continued learning the course until they reached their goals. They 

worked daily on the course, and completed the course assignments based on their own goals. They stayed 



AsiaCALL Online Journal (ISSN 1936-9859) 2014 – Special Issue – AsiaCALL2013 Proceedings, Phuttharaksa Yantraprakorn, Pornapit 

Darasawang, & Pamararat Wiriyakarun 

 
 

long enough to complete the course and also took the mid-term and final tests. They completed all 

assignments and did well. Thus, they were successful in completing the course. By the end of the course, 

all successful learners said they experienced success in this learning environment and they would consider 

taking another Web-based course, while unsuccessful learners decided to drop out in the middle of the 

course. 

 

The findings show that the successful learners had more persistence because they completed course 

requirements in an appropriate time and spent more time engaging in distance language learning. 

 

Conclusion and Recommendations 

The purpose of this study was to investigate learners’ attributes that may assist them to learn successfully 

in a Web-based distance writing setting. A successful learner in this study was defined as a student who 

completed course requirements in a timely manner.  

 

This qualitative study revealed some attribution differences between successful and unsuccessful learners 

even though they were identified as highly efficacious learners prior to actual learning. The successful 

learners set better learning goals, especially self-regulated learning strategies, attributed their success to 

effort, had more self-confidence for learning by themselves, and exerted more resilience and persistence. 

 

Based on the finding of this study, some major recommendations can be offered for distance language 

course developers and instructors to incorporate support in an online language learning environment in 

several ways. Firstly, the instructor should help learners set goals which focus more on mastering tasks 

and less on performance or scores because unsuccessful learners, according to this study, cannot set 

effective goals. They set only performance goals that might demotivate them when they cannot achieve 

the goals. The instructor should provide explicit and clear instructions regarding the objectives that can be 

learnt with each task, so the learners can establish each as a goal. Secondly, the data reveals that 

unsuccessful learners thought that their failures were because of lack of ability, their efficacies were lower 

after learning for some time, and they did not attempt to do the future tasks and complete the course. 

Thus, instructors should provide learners with feedback linking learning result with effort because this 

attribution is under the learner's control that can help them develop self-efficacy beliefs and enhance 

performance. Finally, this study found that the learning strategies that the unsuccessful learners possessed 

and employed in their learning were not sufficient for them to learn by themselves and deal with the 

writing tasks because they did not have any online language learning experiences. This might have led to 

the decrease in their resilience. Therefore, online learners need to be supported and trained in necessary 

learning strategies for successfully engaging in an online learning context. The online learners can be 

trained in these learning strategies before learning by asking them to identify their learning goals, and then 

plan how to complete the tasks and the course. They may be provided tools and feedback to monitor goal 

progress and evaluate their learning strategies used, learning results, and what they have learnt. The 

teacher may give them informative feedback to help them see their errors and learn how to correct them 

when returning their work. Moreover, the findings from this research study also suggest that instructors 

should be aware of learner confidence. If instructors want to help learners have more learning success, 

they should pay attention to confidence as well as competence. The instructors may give learners 

psychological support and encouragement to facilitate successful results of their efforts. In doing this, it 

would help learners to maintain and have more self-confidence for learning languages by themselves, and 

utilize more resilience and persistence. 

 

The results of this study may have benefits for distance language instructors, as well as learners. Both of 

these groups will gain information regarding learners' self-efficacy, and how it influences the learners’ 



AsiaCALL Online Journal (ISSN 1936-9859) 2014 – Special Issue – AsiaCALL2013 Proceedings, Phuttharaksa Yantraprakorn, Pornapit 

Darasawang, & Pamararat Wiriyakarun 

 
 

attributes may allow the instructors to instruct or train in a way that will accommodate those attributes, 

and enable them to design and implement better teaching. For the learners, the findings may help students 

to better understand crucial attributes that assist them to learn, especially by themselves, in a distance 

language learning context. 

 

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