Students’ perception of learning transfer: Which EAP skills transfer best?

English for academic purposes (EAP) courses improve English academic skills, build learner confidence, and prepare students for future academic success ( Zou & Jiang, 2021 ). To be successful post-EAP, these skills must transfer to other learning contexts ( James, 2023 ; 2025 ; Perkins & Salomon, 1992 ). Yet, whether this occurs is not well understood ( Green, 2015 ; James, 2023 ; 2025 ; Larsen-Freeman, 2013 : Monbec, 2020 ). This exploratory study surveyed ninety-five EAP students from a Canadian university over six semesters to understand which skills learned in advanced EAP courses transferred to disciplinary courses. Results show that students perceive twenty-first-century skills to be more transferable than traditional reading, writing, listening, and speaking skills. Furthermore, students paradoxically report some specific writing and reading skills to be highly transferable and others less so. Finally, reported learning transfer varies according to faculty, self-reported grade, and with graduate vs undergraduate students. Implications concerning curriculum development in EAP are discussed. This article was published open access under a CC BY-NC-ND licence: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ .