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One immediate challenge that emerged here was that the list of potential issuesthat could be covered was very long; it was clear from the outset, then, that wewould need to be selective about questionnaire content.b. Drafting questionnaire itemsIn order to explore teachers’ beliefs about what learner autonomy entails, wewanted to include questionnaire items which addressed the different perspectiveson autonomy highlighted in the literature. One set of distinctions that we workedwith was that related to technical, psychological, socio-cultural and political viewsof learner autonomy that we noted earlier. In addition, we also drafted items whichaddressed various other debates in relation to learner autonomy, such as thefollowing:■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■Institutional and individual constraints on learner autonomyThe role of the teacher in learner autonomyThe relevance of learner autonomy to diverse cultural contextsThe extent to which autonomy is influenced by age and proficiencyThe implications of learner autonomy for teaching methodologyIndividualistic vs. social perspectives on learner autonomyThe contribution of learner autonomy to effective language learningThe extent to which learner autonomy is an innovative trendLearner autonomy as an innate vs. learned capacityThe role of strategy training in promoting learner autonomy.These issues were included in Section 1 of the questionnaire, which, by ourthird draft, consisted of 50 Likert scale items on a five-point scale of agreement.Additionally, in this draft, we included a section on the desirability and feasibilityof learner autonomy; teachers were asked, for example, how desirable it wasto involve learners in decisions about course objectives and how feasible theythought, in their context, it was to do so. A further section in our draft askedteachers more specifically about how autonomous they felt their learners wereand about the extent to which they, as teachers, promoted learner autonomy intheir teaching. Spaces were included for teachers to explain their answers to thesequestions (e.g. to give examples of how they promoted learner autonomy).Throughout the process of drafting the questionnaire items we were guided by anumber of principles. In terms of content, we needed to ask questions relevantto our research questions; technically, it was essential for items to be well-written(avoiding many of the design flaws noted, for example, in Brown & Rodgers, 2002);and in terms of the user experience, we wanted the instrument to be relevant,interesting, professional-looking and easy to complete.222 | Teacher Beliefs Autonomy