Language learning motivation, investment, and disengagement in higher education

2016 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 26870521
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Young Scientists (B)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: Social psychology; Foreign language education
• Research Institution: Hachinohe Institute of Technology
• Principal Investigator: Saito Akihiro 八戸工業大学, 基礎教育研究センター, 講師 (90632084)
• Project Period (FY): 2014-04-01 – 2017-03-31
• Keywords: 外国語学習 / 学習動機 / 学習方略 / 学習離脱

Outline of Final Research Achievements

Language learning constitutes a dynamic, subjective space in which the learner’s body, performance, identity, and emotions are intricately intertwined with one another. This study sought to describe the factors that potentially explain the aversion and indifference to English as a foreign language learning as observed at the researcher’s institution. Meanwhile, it also described the experiences among those who willingly strives to master the language amid the aversion and indifference among the majority of the students at the institution. The research program comprised a questionnaire-development project which sought to investigate the breadth and depth of learner disengagement which was observed in relation to foreign language learning, and another qualitative interview study which explored learner characteristics, such as language learning motives, learning strategies, and learner histories.

Free Research Field

外国語教育