جستجوی مقالات مرتبط با کلیدواژه « instrumental motivation » در نشریات گروه « ادبیات و زبان ها »

The idea that individual characteristics impact the language learning process has led scholars to consider various aspects in relation to learners and their learning. The current study explored the associations among EFL learners’ language learning strategy use, instrumental motivation, self-efficacy, self-regulation, autonomy, and L2 achievement. To do this, 220 Iranian EFL learners (95 males and 125 females) took part in the study by filling out five questionnaires related to the abovementioned variables. The learners’ GPAs were also collected and adjusted and regarded as their L2 achievement. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was performed to examine the causal relationships among the variables. The results showed that the use of language learning strategies, self-efficacy, and autonomy were significant positive predictors of L2 achievement. However, instrumental motivation and self-regulation did not predict L2 achievement. Furthermore, L2 achievement had the highest positive association with autonomy and the lowest positive association with self-regulation. The results are discussed in detail and the implications are presented.

Research has not investigated the motivation of students toward learning Persian as a foreign/second language. This study examines the integrative, instrumental, intrinsic, and extrinsic types of motivation among language learners learning Persian as a second language. A questionnaire consisting of 40 questions, adapted from Gardner (2001), Ryan and Deci (2000), and Noels et al. (2001), was used to collect the required data. Statistical procedures were followed to analyze the data from 135 (59 females and 73 males) language learners. Results showed that integrative and extrinsic were respectively the most and the least significant forms of motivation among these participants. They reasoned that they mainly learn Persian language to understand Persian art, literature and history, increase their knowledge, and communicate with Iranians. Variables such as gender, education, and age showed significant differences among the males and females concerning instrumental and intrinsic types of motivation. Furthermore, whereas the results indicated significant variation between the participants’ education levels and their integrative motivation, there was not any significant relationship between the age and motivation.

Although Gardner and his associates’ work was most influential in the field of L2 motivation, from the early 1990s onwards, their work has been criticized for several reasons. Some researchers claimed that integrative and instrumental orientations were no longer able to convey the complexity of the L2 motivation construct. To examine this complexity, the present study attempted to investigate the discursive construction of four (two males and two females) Iranian EFL learners’ motivation at Shiraz University, Iran. Employing van Leeuwen’s (2008) legitimation construction framework, the study revealed that depending on their future selves, each participant employed certain discursive strategies unique to him/her to (de)legitimize his/her future self. Therefore, what was observed was the use of strategies which were idiosyncratic to that particular person, in that particular context, for a specific purpose, and for that particular moment. Additionally, given the unique political conditions of Iran in the world, it was found that integrative and instrumental orientations can be best replaced by ideal and ought-to selves in this context. The study has some implications. Motivation researchers need to broaden the unit of analysis beyond the individual learner to the interaction between the individual and the multitude of factors in diverse social settings.

Given that promoting learners’ communicative competence in a second language (L2) is one of the primary foci of communicative language teaching approaches, the late 1980s saw an expansion in research into willingness to communicate (WTC), which is deemed to affect individuals’ predisposition towards the initiation of L2 communication. The principal aims of this study are(a) to reveal whether instrumental motivation and integrative orientation are correlated with WTC, (b) to delve into the contribution of instrumental and integrative orientations to the explanation of WTC, (c) to examine which of the two motivational propensities is a better predictor of WTC, and (d) to find whether 3 groups of learners with low, medium, and high levels of instrumental and integrative orientations differ in terms of their level of reported WTC. To this end, 188 Iranian EFL learners, who were randomly selected, filled out a WTC questionnaire and a language learning motivation questionnaire. Results of path analysis and standard multiple regression revealed that although both motivational orientations significantly contributed to the explanation of WTC, instrumental motivation, which uniquely explained 3.7% of the variance in total WTC, was a better predictor of WTC. Informed by the results of one-way between-groups ANOVA, a significant difference was encountered among the reported L2 WTC levels of the 3 groups of learners with various levels of both instrumental orientation and integrative motivation. The findings could cast light onto the nexus between motivation and WTC in the Iranian EFL context and the intricacies and dynamics of the WTC process.