EFL College Students' Perceptions toward the Use of Electronic Dictionaries

The purpose of this study is two-fold: first, to examine the current status of e-dictionary use in Korea and the attitude toward its use by Korean college students; second, to investigate to what degree e-dictionaries may be useful and effective tools in helping to improve learners' overall English skills. The subjects were 84 college students and they were divided into two groups: the experiment group and the control group. The instrument employed was the Preliminary Student Usage Questionnaire, which was developed by the researcher, together with the questionnaire survey developed by Koyama and Takeuchi (2004), which was modified for the study. The findings from this research are as follows: First, a special instruction session on how to use e-dictionaries made a statistically significant difference among users of the dictionaries. Those subjects who had received the instruction displayed a more positive attitude toward the use of e-dictionaries. Second, the experiment group showed a more favorable attitude toward the use of e-dictionaries. On the basis of the above results, the researcher suggests that proper guidance on the use of e-dictionaries and their benefits should have a positive influence on users. The findings from the current research will shed light on the current status of electronic dictionary use among Korean college students.