Chapter 1 Introduction
1.1The Background of the Study
Serving as a L2 language educator and linguistic graduate, the author has always beenconcerning students' language grades and their English proficiency. It's generally observed that somestudents always keep interested in learning English while others lose their interests to learn Englishor are lack of learning motivation. Consequently, their English proficiency drastically varies fromeach other. It led the author to explore second language learners' motivation.Language learning motivation is one of the dynamic and elusive factors among the languagelearners' inpidual difference. Although the complex and uncertainty nature of motivation, it hasdrawn a number of language researchers and educators' great attention. Being the most determinerand concept in linguist and social psychology, many scholars has given different explanations anddefinitions of its importance. Domyei described that it is one of the most common terms teachers andstudents used to explain what causes success or failure in learning (Domyei, 2009). Motivation hasbeen found to significantly affect language learning success from the numerous previousinvestigations at home and abroad. Along with learning aptitude, motivation study is widelyinvestigated over the past few decades and it's also the greatest consideration for educators andteachers to improve students' language proficiency. If a language learner doesn't have a strong andsufficient motivation to learn a language very well and fails to keep the initial motivation, althoughhe or she possesses high language abilities and aptitudes, neither can an inpidual make greatlanguage achievements in the future (Domyei, 2005).L2 motivation research in the past fifty years has witnessed different developmental phrases.Though the construct of motivation itself is complicated and composited, it has exerted greatinfluences on students learning attitude and enthusiasm. Scholars at domestic and overseas have donemany studies and it is recognized that highly motivated inpiduals work harder than those with lowperformance motivation.
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1.2The Significance of the Study
Domyei introduced the L2 Motivational Self System theory, which is an explanatory power andflexible theory in second language acquisition. L2MSS successfully made an attempt to explain themotivation from different psychological perspectives of self. Since the L2MSS theory's applicationand research was conducted in different cultural setting and context from 2005，there are stillrelatively scant research papers in the Chinese context, except for Taguchi et al (2009)，Liu Fengge(2010), Duan Xiaolu (2012). Although Gao & Zhou (2009) introduced basic ideas and information ofL2MSS, it should deserve much more attention from Chinese researchers and scholars.Thus, in this study, the author tries to test 1) the correlation between L2MSS and their Englishlanguage proficiency; 2) the gender differentiation of L2MSS; 3) the best predictor of motivationamong ideal L2 self, ought-to L2 self and L2 learning experience; 4) family, peer and teacherinfluence toward motivation; 5) the regional difference of L2MSS. This study will give moreadditional empirical evidence to L2MSS in the Chinese context.In terms of teaching application, this study discusses different motivation subscales rules and itscontribution to motivation and it is conducive to improve college students' motivation based ongender difference, language level and types of motivation.
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Chapter 2 Literature Review
2.1 The Development of Motivation Studies
In the second language acquisition studies, motivation has been caught researchers’ greatattentions and it is always a very popular topic to explore because of its importance. As Pit Corder(Corder, 1967, p. 164) once put it, “given motivation, it is inevitable that a human being will leam asecond language if he is exposed to the language data”. So L2 motivation research has always been aresearch hot area in the second language acquisition field during the previous over fifty years.Although motivation is such an important concept and topic in second language acquisition,there is on consensus about the comprehensively accurate interpretation of motivation. Gardner(1985) thought that motivation refers to intended efforts as well as the positive enthusiasm attitudetoward learning a certain language. According to Domyei's view, motivation is caused by incentivefor action and the action can be sustained in the absence of external force disturbance until reachingthe intended target. Motivation study can be changed respectively according to different researchparadigm and theory models. Consequently, types of motivation can be classified into differentcategories. For instance, in terms of social psychological perspective, Gardner (1985) and Lambert(1959，1972) created two types of motivation, i.e. integrative motivation & instrumental motivation,which takes social and cultural context from the big macro approach. However, Domyei and hisfollowers analyzed language learning motivation in relation to school learning and specificclassroom environment, including teachers, textbooks, teaching method, etc. He proposed athree-level motivation theory, including language level，learner level and situational level, which hasdrawn integrative motivation and instrumental motivation and is more powerful and advanced thanthe precedents' theories.
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2.2 The Previous L2MSS Researches
Since Domyei (2005) put forward L2 Motivational Self System, it was soon caught researcher'sattention internationally. This L2MSS theory has been tested in different international languagelearning contexts, e.g. in Hungary (Csizer & Kormos (2009); in Japan (Ryan 2009); among Japanese,Chinese, Iranian (Taguchi et al., & Mostafa Papi 2009) and Korean (Kim, 2009) foreign languagelearners.Analysis drawn from Csizer & Kormos (2009), the participants of 432 high school and collegestudents were from Hungary and the main conclusion were that: motivated learning behavior wassubjective to ideal L2 self and L2 learning experience; classroom teaching had exerted importanteffect on learners' effort; the ought-to L2 self has non-significant correlation with motivated learningbehavior. In Tagui’ Magid and Papi's studies (Tagui, et al), the subjects were chosen from Japan,China and Iran with the total number participants of over 4900. It proved that the integrativenessmotivation is compatible with the ideal L2 self and the validity of L2MSS. Yashima (2009) took 191Japanese high school students as study subjects. It proved that there was non-significant correlationbetween English learning and the construction of the ideal L2 self. The consciousness of Japanesestudents of self could be obtained through care for globalization and the meaning of English learning.
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Chapter 3 Research Design..........18
3.1Research Questions........18
3.2Subjects........18
3.3Data Collection Instruments........18
3.4Procedures........19
Chapter 4 Results and Discussions........21
4.1The Correlations of the Three Components of L2MSS........21
4.2The Correlations between L2MSS and Language Proficiency........23
4.3The Influence of Family, Peer and Teacher towards L2MSS........24
4.4The Gender Differences of L2MSS........27
4.5The Regional Difference of L2MSS........32
Chapter 5 Conclusion........35
5A Main Findings........35
5.2Research Implications........36
5.3Limitation and Suggestions for Further Research........38
Chapter 4 Results and Discussions
4.1 The Correlations of the Three Components of L2MSS
In this session，the author will mainly discuss which components of L2MSS will have aprominent correlation with L2 learners' L2 learning motivation among the three components? Tobegin with, SPSS 17.0 is used to test the three main components' Pearson correlation. As shown from Table 4.2, we can see that in matrix of college students，T values of ideal L2 selfand L2 learning experience are 2.071 and 9.431. and their P values are 0.039 and 0.000，which arelower than 0.01, which shows that ideal L2 self and L2 learning experience both can make prominent effects on learners' L2 learning motivation. Since the standardized coefficients of ideal L2 self andL2 learning experience are all above 0，the relationship between ideal L2 self，L2 learning experienceand L2 motivated learning behavior is prominent positive correlation. T value of ought-to L2 self is0.593, and its P value is 0.554，which is over 0.05，so the effect ought-to L2 self have on learners’motivated learning behavior is not prominent. According to the standardized coefficients, thissuggested that ideal self, ought-to self and L2 learning experience existed throughout all theparticipants and had exerted influence on their L2 learning. Inpidually, L2 learning experience hadthe most impact on the learners' L2 learning motivation; ideal L2 self followed and ought-to L2 selfhad a weakest effect on learners' L2 motivated learning motivation.
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Conclusion
From the discussion and analysis in the Chapter 4，we may draw a conclusion as listed below：
(1)The best predictor of L2 Motivation among the three components of L2MSSThe best predictor is L2 learning experience for college student with non-English major. Thisfinding is in consistency with the previous studies done by Liu Fengge (2010) and Duan Xiaolu(2012). It means L2 learning experience has the most importance in motivating language learners. Itwas found to contribute significantly to motivated learning behavior whereas ideal L2 self alsoplayed an important role in motivating language learners following L2 learning experience. Ought-toL2 self had a least positive correlation with motivated learning behavior.
(2)Correlation between three components of Ideal L2 self, ought-to self, L2 learning experienceand motivated learning behavior.It's obviously shown that for college science students with non-English major correlationbetween ought-to L2 self and motivated learning behavior was not prominent. Ideal L2 self and L2learning experience have a prominent positive correlation.
(3)Correlation between language proficiency and three dimensions of L2MSS.Both ideal L2 self and ought-to L2 self have a significantly positive correlation with languageproficiency level. Specifically, ideal L2 self has the most influence in language level whereas L2learning experience has a weakest effect on language learner’ L2 language proficiency.
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References (omitted)