Abstract
Most studies investigating learners’ motivation have probed into the relationship between motivation and leaners’ linguistic outcomes; however, not many looked into the relationship between motivation and nonlinguistic outcomes such as leaners’ identity formation (Gao et al, 2007; Teer, 2013). Thus, the purpose of the study was twofold; one was to investigate students’ self-identity changes and the other was to determine the correlation between students’ learning motivation and their self-identity changes. A total of 231 Taiwanese college students who majored in the English department participated in the study. The main methods of data collection were surveys adapted from Gardner’s (2004) Attitude/ Motivation Battery Test and Xu & Gao’s Self-identity Change Questionnaire (2011). Results of the study showed that the majority of the students showed high motivation toward English learning. The most prominent change among the six categories of self-identity changes was learners’ self-confidence change. Participants also responded to have experienced productive and additive changes, which indicated that learners appreciated their native languages/culture through the learning of their target language/culture and vice versa. Significant correlation was also found between motivation and students’ self-identity changes, except for split identity changes. It is hoped that this study can be used to provide future researchers and teachers a better understanding of English learners’ motivation and identity formation within the context of English as a Foreign Language (EFL).
Author Information
Pey-Chewn Duo, Ming Chuan University, Taiwan
Min-Hsun Su, Ming Chuan University, Taiwan
Paper Information
Conference: ACE2015
Stream: Languages education and applied linguistics (ESL/TESL/TEFL)
This paper is part of the ACE2015 Conference Proceedings (View)
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