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A Self System Perspective on Young Adolescents’ Motivation to Learn English in Urban and Rural Settings
Author(s) -
Lamb Martin
Publication year - 2012
Publication title -
language learning
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.882
H-Index - 103
eISSN - 1467-9922
pISSN - 0023-8333
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-9922.2012.00719.x
Subject(s) - metropolitan area , psychology , indonesian , perspective (graphical) , sample (material) , mathematics education , language proficiency , test (biology) , linguistics , geography , archaeology , paleontology , philosophy , chemistry , chromatography , artificial intelligence , computer science , biology
This study examined the motivation to learn English of Indonesian junior high school pupils, 13–14 years of age, in three distinct contexts: a metropolitan city, a provincial town, and a rural district. Utilizing Dörnyei's second language (L2) Motivational Self System as the theoretical framework, this study employed a 50‐item questionnaire to sample the views of 527 learners, and a C‐test to measure their current proficiency in English. Motivation was found to be similar in strength and character in the two urban settings but significantly different in the rural setting. A positive view of the experience of learning English was the strongest predictor of both motivated learning behavior and L2 proficiency, whereas the Ideal L2 self was only a significant factor among the metropolitan group.