Abstract

This article applies attribution theory to identify the factors that influence nursing students’ perceptions of success and failure in learning English writing skills. The study took place in a language classroom in southern Taiwan involving fifty-one female nursing students, a writing teacher, and the researcher. Teaching activities included five writing cycles based on an online writing platform, process approach, and multiple revisions. Evidence data has been collected from learners’ questionnaires and interviews, teacher’s interviews, classroom observations, teaching materials, and researcher’s diaries. The data has been analysed quantitatively using SPSS and qualitatively with the aid of QSR NVivo software. Results reveal the major factors given by learners involve the amount writing practice given and their perceptions of their competence in vocabulary and with grammar. The work is supported by observations made by the language teacher and the researcher on issues which have emerged on the students’ writing skills, psychology, language competence, and learning context. This article concludes with the implications for teaching.