Writing Identity among Students of Arabic Language Departments in Colleges of Basic Education and Its Relationship with Their Perception of Academic Writing Standards

Abstract

The current study aimed to identify the level of writing identity among students of Arabic Language Departments, determine their level of perception of academic writing standards, and examine the nature of the correlational relationship between the two variables. The researcher adopted the descriptive correlational approach because of its suitability to the objectives and nature of the study, as it examined the two variables as they occur among students in the university environment and then investigated the degree of association between them.The research population consisted of students in the Department of Arabic Language at the College of Basic Education, Al-Mustansiriyah University, totaling 500 male and female students. The final application sample was selected using stratified random sampling and consisted of 230 male and female students. To achieve the objectives of the study, the researcher developed two scales. The first measured writing identity and consisted of 30 items distributed across three dimensions: authorial confidence, valuing writing, and identification with the role of the author. The second measured the perception of academic writing standards and consisted of 36 items distributed across six domains. The psychometric properties of both scales were verified in terms of validity, reliability, item discrimination, and internal consistency before they were administered in their final form.After statistically analyzing the data, the results showed that students in the Department of Arabic Language possessed a level of writing identity higher than the hypothetical mean of the scale, with an arithmetic mean of 105.917 compared with a hypothetical mean of 90. The results also showed that their level of perception of academic writing standards was higher than the hypothetical mean, with an arithmetic mean of 130.278 compared with a hypothetical mean of 108. In addition, a statistically significant positive correlation was found between writing identity and the perception of academic writing standards, with a correlation coefficient of 0.599, indicating that an increase in one variable is associated with an increase in the other.In light of these findings, the researcher recommended giving greater attention to developing writing identity among students of Arabic Language Departments, incorporating university courses and activities that provide students with opportunities to express their voices and writing positions, and designing training programs that enhance their perception of academic writing standards and improve their performance in producing university-level texts.