Motivation in Adult Foreign Language Learning
Abstract: Those who have ever tried to learn a foreign language must know how much time, energy, and brain power is required. It is even more difficult for adults to leap language and cultural barriers. This article examines the factors that influence the motivation to learn a foreign language.
Key words: motivation; language learning and teaching
Everyone on the planet, about six billion people, has learned at least one language as child. A sizable number also speak an extra tongue. It is amazing that the world does not run into chaos. Across the whole world, men, women, and children of all skin colors and nationalities meet with, work next to, converse with others who don't speak their language. People do all this successfully, even though they may speak with accents, use simple words, make mistakes, and do other things that mark them linguistic outsiders. Such encounters between non-native speakers have always textured human experience. In our era, these encounters are peaking, as the ties between language and geography have been weakened by migration, global business, intercontinental travel, cell phone, satellite TV, and the Internet.
For a learner who is lucky enough to have a good memory and is motivated, learning a foreign language is not a feat, but for an adult of normal intelligence, learning another language is a real challenge. It takes large amount of time and a lot of effort to master it. Needs and motivations are behind to push them forward.
1．Definition
Aware of it or not, motivation is much part of our everyday personal and professional life, and no one could ignore its importance in learning a foreign language. As far as the definition is concerned, a great diversity of versions has showed up. Nevertheless most people would agree that it concerns the “direction and magnitude of human behavior, that is the choice of a particular action, the persistence with it, the effort expended on it”. Or “why people decide to do something, how long they are willing to sustain the activity, how hard they are going to pursue it.”（Zoltán Dörnyei, 2005:8）Motivation to learn a foreign language involves both educational and social psychological phenomena, because language learning is deeply socially and culturally bound.In the acquisition of a foreign language, people are not only learning vocabulary, grammar or pronunciation, they identify with other cultures with their willingness and ability.
2．Components of Motivation
Adult learners are individuals whose needs and motivations are different and complex, since life experience widens the gap between them and creates diversity in learning.
2.1 Goal-orientation
“A goal is seen as the ‘engine' to fire the action and provide the direction in which to act. Accordingly, in goal theories, the cognitive perceptions of goal properties are seen as the basis of motivational process.” （Zoltán Dörnyei, 2005:25）Goals affect performances by directing attention and effort to goal-relevant activities, regulating effort expenditure, encouraging persistence until the goal is accomplished, promoting the search for relevant action plans or strategies. It is important to note that the goals are not only ends, but standards as well, by which to evaluate one's performance providing a definition of success. Thus, in the case of long-lasting, continuous activities such as language learning where there is only a rather distal goal of task completion （mastering the language and reaching the people and culture）, the setting of proximal subgoals （taking tests, passing exams）may have a powerful motivating function in that they mark progress and provide immediate incentive and feedback. Attainable subgoals can also serve as an important vehicle in the development of the students' self-efficacy.
Every learner has a goal: maybe a Beijinger is dreaming of migrating to Quebec where the acquisition of French is a must.; maybe an American professor is giving an open lecture on net, whose audience are all over the world; maybe a two-year-old girl in a Chinese welfare house is adopted by a Dutch-American couple, brought up in the States, and gets married to a Frenchman who runs business in Brazil—she is destined to be a multilingual learner and speaker. Ideas, information, goods and people are flowing through space, and this is creating a sensibility about language learning that is rooted more in the tracks of an individual's life than one's citizenship or nationality.
2.2 Personal-social Motivation
Personal motivation concerns issues such as fulfilling personal desires, gaining knowledge to satisfy one's curiosity or to become more educated, gaining self-confidence and self-efficacy on one's achievement. Social motivation, on the other hand, is directly linked to an individual's social environment, emphasizing the interpersonal nature of the motivation. It is usually associated with social welfare goals and social approval goals.
Since most personal cognitions and emotions are more or less socially constructed, in many situations social and personal motivations are difficult to separate. If an individual tries hard to learn a foreign language or even several, he may get approval of his family, peers and the teacher, thus more confidence, thus better educated, better job and better pay, and finally higher social status.
Take language learning history in China for example which is embedded in social, economic and even political demands.
Looking back at Chinese history before late Qing Dynasty, perhaps the only Chinese who really learned a foreign language （Sanskrit）were the Buddhist monks who travelled to India and stayed there for years studying the Buddhist Scriptures. Officials and the intellectual elite had no interest in learning foreign languages out of linguistic or cultural curiosity. For thousands of years, the main pursuit of Chinese educated class had been trying to join or rise up in civil service, totally preoccupied with stereotyped writing. Perhaps most significantly, before modern times at least, Chinese people believed that China was the center of the world, and they would not learn barbarian languages. The barbarians should learn Chinese. Anyway, learning foreign languages brought them neither financial nor social benefits. Meanwhile, by contrast, English had emerged as a global lingua franca.
However, it was not until the 1950s that dramatic changes took place in the newly born China. Language learning at that time put on political colors. During the short-lived “golden years” in Sino-Soviet relation, Russian became the goal that everybody went after, while English was cast aside. In the 1980s, the early days of reform and opening-up, the Chinese were eager to get in touch with the outside world again. Language learning then was out of social and economic needs. The hunger for English in China was unprecedented in history. When the BBC English-teaching series Follow Me was first broadcast in China,it drew audiences of up to one hundred million people. The presenter of the program, Kathy Flower, an unknown in England, was said to be the most familiar British face in China. In the new century, there are more people learning English in China than there are people in the United States. （Bill Bryson, 2009:177）Most Chinese learners are adults attracted by the prestige and utility of English as the most popular language. As goes the advertisement: “Better English, brighter future! ” Up to now, the size of the English market has been valued at 3.5 billion, with as many as thirty thousand companies offering English classes in China.
2.3 Intrinsic Motivation
Intrinsic motivation deals with behavior performed for its own sake in order to experience pleasure and satisfaction.
Alexander Arguelles, an American polyglot and self educator who has mastered many languages, begins the day at two in the morning studying. “There's absolutely no financial gain to knowledge languages.” （Michael Erard, 2012:112）He labors day and night despite social isolation and economic hardship. What drives him on is that he longs to embrace all literatures, all peoples. He wants to touch the origins of literary texts, because if something is worth reading,then it is worth reading as the author wrote it. He believes that to know a language means that you know the culture of its native speakers.
However, such super-learners as Alexander Arguelles are rarely found, the majority of population have no extraordinary memory and are less motivated. They need professional training under the guidance of teachers to improve their language performance. They are so lucky if they have a devoted teacher full of passion.
3．Teaching Motivation
Teaching motivation is intrinsic. “Teaching as a vocational goal has always been associated with the internal desire to educate people, to impart knowledge and values, and to advance a community or a whole nation.” Guiding the intellectual and emotional development of students, whether in nursery school or graduate school, can be profoundly gratifying for teachers, satisfying their psychological needs and contributing to their growth as individuals. （Zoltán Dörnyei, 2005:158）
3.1 Influence on Teacher Motivation
Though it is believed that teaching is a meaningful job, teachers may experience motivational crisis—feeling frustrated, disaffected or bored sometime in their career, which diminish teacher motivation and cause low morale. For language teachers, stress, frustration and lack of self-fulfillment are among the top factors on the list that undermine the base of teaching motivation.
Stress: Teaching is one of the most stressful professions, for a teacher usually spend long hours in an isolated working condition, coping with a group of young adults who need his help and encouragement, and has to keep them motivated. Moreover, standardized language examinations （local, national and international）at all levels go along with the language curriculum throughout, and the grades are the only performance criteria.
Frustration: If considerable members of a class speak a foreign language they are learning with accent, make spelling and grammatical mistakes in writing all the time, make no progress at all, hence feel frustrated and lose confidence, the teacher may well feel frustrated, his motivation gradually wears out, and he abandons eventually.
Dissatisfaction: Dissatisfaction stems from lack of career development, lack of support from the school authorities, lack of career training and everyday repetitiveness in classroom.
3.2 The Relationship Between Teaching Motivation and Learner Achievement
The relationship between learners and the teacher is an interactive one that can be either positively or negatively synergistic. Learners affect their teacher's motivation and behavior just as the teacher affects theirs. An important part of teaching is to transmit the teacher's keen enthusiasm to the learners so as to facilitate a positive rather than a negative cycle. Lack of passion could be recognized by either side at once, which affects teaching and learning negatively. The most influential teachers who are remembered and make a difference in the learners' development are usually those who love their job and show dedication and passion in what they are doing.
However, it is generally agreed that teachers are the designated leaders in class, their values, beliefs, attitudes, behavior and their commitment to the learners constitute prevailing influence on learners' motivation, so it is their responsibility for maintaining the commitment to the teaching process. Effective educators should act as an inspiration and resource, encouraging and supporting learners' intrinsic motivation to learn, explore and experiment.
4．Conclusion
Motivation in learning is complex. Usually it comes from within an individual, yet closely associated with social, cultural and economic factors. There is also an interaction between learner and teacher. A teacher may radiate his infectious enthusiasm to his students and push them to success.
参考文献
1．Bryson,Bill. 2009. Mother Tongue[M].London: Penguin Books.
2．Dörnyei,Zoltán. 2005. Teaching and Researching Motivation[M]．北京：外语教学与研究出版社．
3．Erard,Michael. 2012. Babel No More[M].New York: Free Press.