Developing Autonomy and Self-efficacy in Writing among Intermediate Iranian EFL Learners through Collaborative Vs. Individual Instruction of Formulaic Sequences

The present mixed-methods study investigated the effect of instruction of formulaic language on the autonomy, self-efficacy, and writing ability of 80 Iranian undergraduate intermediate EFL learners. To this end, the participants were randomly assigned to either an experimental group (n = 40) or a control group (n = 40). The experimental group underwent the collaborative EFL writing treatment, while the control group continued with their regular mainstream classes, promoting individual learning of formulaic sequences. Results indicated that the explicit instruc-tion of incorporating formulaic language featuring collaborative learning significantly improved the experimental group EFL learners' writing performance, self-efficacy, and autonomy levels compared with their control group peers. Through engaging in collaborative writing tasks with peers, the learners have the opportunity to negotiate meaning, exchange ideas, co-construct knowledge, and improve their writing using formulaic language. The interview results also re-vealed that the collaborative instruction of the formulaic sequences has a number of ad-vantages, such as useful exchange of knowledge, immediate written feedback, improved lin-guistic features, higher quality work, faster task completion, improved confidence and self-efficacy, improved autonomy, improved interpersonal skills, enhanced negotiation skills, and finally enhanced management skills.