Abstract:

Writing is a cognitive task that reflects the writer’s thought; it is a productive skill granting the learners of English as a foreign language (EFL) the opportunity to display their linguistic knowledge and convey their ideas. However, the students think differently which leads them to adopt distinct ways for generating a written product. Therefore, the present study attempts to explore the influence of exploiting different knowledge processing approaches on EFL learners’ writing performance taking into consideration the synergistic function of the students’ awareness and thinking styles in written production. To achieve such an objective, the studied case revolved around a sample of 40 third year EFL learners studying at the English department at TlemcenUniversity. The research instruments included two tests and follow-up questionnaires. The collected data were analyzed quantitatively and qualitatively. The research findings have elicited that EFL students’ writing performance fluctuates depending on the level of thought assessed in the given tasks leading to the conclusion that the quality of the written output is largely determined by the adopted type of thinking style which is closely associated with the learners’ awareness of their personal knowledge and abilities.

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