| Summary: | 碩士 === 東海大學 === 外國語文學系 === 98 === University EFL Freshmen’s Motivational Beliefs about Learning English
This study was intended to investigate university EFL freshmen’s motivational beliefs about learning English and their self-regulated English learning behaviors as well as the predictive relationships between the two constructs. In addition, the researcher of the study also examined the differences between high-proficiency and low-proficiency university EFL freshmen in their motivational beliefs about learning English and their self-regulated English learning behaviors as well as in the predictive relationships between the two constructs.
Participants in the study were 359 freshmen of non-English majors from a private university in central Taiwan. Among them, 181 were from high-level classes and 178 from low-level classes. Three instruments, namely, the Personal Background Information Questionnaire (consisting of 8 items), the Motivational Beliefs about Learning English Questionnaire (consisting of 30 5-point Likert-scale items), and the Self-Regulated English Learning Inventory (consisting of 64 5-point Likert-scale items), were used to collect data for the study.
The statistical software SPSS 13.0 for Windows was used to organize, compute, and analyze the collected data to provide both descriptive and inferential statistical results. The significance decision level was set at α < .01 for all the statistical significance tests. Specifically, descriptive and frequency distribution analyses were performed on the data to obtain frequency of response, means, and standard deviations of the instrument items. For inferential statistical analyses, independent-samples t-tests were performed to examine significant differences between high-proficiency and low-proficiency university EFL freshmen in their motivational beliefs about learning English and in their self-regulated English learning behaviors. Furthermore, simple regression analyses were performed to test statistical significance of the predictive relationships between the participants’ motivational beliefs about learning English and their self-regulated English learning behaviors.
The major findings of the study are summarized as follows. First, university EFL freshmen in general manifest moderately high self-rated degrees of motivational beliefs about learning English. However, high-proficiency learners appear to have stronger motivational beliefs than their low-proficiency counterparts. Among the six categories of motivational beliefs about learning English, learning performance attributions stand out to be the most manifested category and self-efficacy for learning English the least one. Second, university EFL freshmen in general report moderately high self-rated degrees of self-regulated English learning behaviors. However, high-proficiency learners tend to be more self-regulated in learning English than their low-proficiency counterparts. Among the eight categories of the self-regulated English learning behaviors, seeking learning resources are the most frequently used and seeking social assistance the least frequently. Third, a significant predictive relationship has been found between university EFL freshmen’s motivational beliefs about learning English and their self-regulated English learning behaviors. However, in this study university EFL freshmen’s motivational beliefs about learning English only account for 54% of the variance of their predicted self-regulated English learning behaviors. Finally, based on the findings of the study, implications and limitations of the study and suggestions for future research were provided.
|
|---|
