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1. Introduction
This paper contains two major parts.First, it briefly introduces and discusses some theories concerning two of the major dimensions in personality factor -motivation.Then it tries to analyze how differences in learning strategies can affect development in SLA based on the discussion of the first part.
2. Motivation
Whereas language aptitude concerns the cognitive abilities that underlie successful L2 (Second language) acquisition, motivation involves the attitudes and affective states that influence the degree of effort that learners make to learn an L2."Motivation is commonly thought of as an inner drive, impulse, emotion or desire that moves one to a particular action.Or, in more technical terms, motivation refers to 'the choices people make as to what experiences or goals they will approach or avoid, and the degree of effort they will exert in that respect.'"Actually, the distinction between motivation and attitudes is not always clear in SLA research. "Gardner and Lambert define 'motivation' in terms of the L2 learner's overall goal or orientation and 'attitude' as the persistence shown by the learner in striving for a goal…Gardner (1979) suggests that attitudes are related to motivation by serving as supports of the learner's overall orientation."Based on the extensive research into the role of motivation conducted by the experts such as Gardner , Lambert, Schumann, Brown, Keller etc,Rod Ellis summarized and identified various motivation into four kinds in his book of Second Language Acquisition (2000): instrumental, integrative, resultative and intrinsic.
2.1 Instrumental Motivation
"Learners may make efforts to learn an L2 for some functional reasons - to pass an examination, to get a better job, or to get a place at university." In some learning contexts, an instrumental motivation seems to be the major force determining success in L2 learning.For example, in settings where learners are motivated to learn an L2 because it opens up educational and economic opportunities for them.Students who are required to take L2 courses and pass the corresponding exams before they can graduate and/or get their pursuing degrees are obviously driven more or less by this motivation.
Though this motivation seems more like an obligation, my idea is that under some certain circumstances, it can be well combined with some or all of the other motivations demonstrated below.
2.2Integrative Motivation
Some learners may choose to learn a particular L2 because they are interested in the people and culture represented by the target language group."For example, it is this integrative orientation that underlies the motivation that many English speaking Canadians have for learning French." However, in other learning contexts, we may also find an integrative motivation does not seem to be so important.Some studies found that less integratively oriented Mexican women in California were more successful in learning English than those who were more integratively oriented.
The above idea leads me to suggest that some learners may be influenced by a 'Machiavellian motivation' - the desire to learn the L2 in order to manipulate and overcome the people of the target language.
2.3 Resultative motivation
An assumption of the research referred to above is that motivation is the cause of L2 achievement.However, it is also possible that motivation is the result of learning.That is, learners who experience success in learning may become more, or in some contexts, less motivated to learn.This helps to explain the conflicting researching results."In a context like Canada, success in learning French may intensify English-speaking learners' liking for French culture.However, in California, success in learning English may bring Mexican women into situations where they experience discrimination and thus reduce their appreciation of American culture."
2.4 Intrinsic Motivation
In some learning situations, it may not be learners' general reasons for learning an L2 that are critical in determining their motivation."Indeed, it is possible that many learners do not hold distinct attitudes, positive or negative, towards the target language group.Such is probably the case with many foreign language learners." It does not follow, however, that such learners are unmotivated.They may find the kinds of learning tasks they are asked to do intrinsically motivating.According to this view, motivation involves the arousal and maintenance of curiosity and can ebb and flow as a result of such factors as learners' particular interests and extent to which they feel personally involved in learning activities.
Motivation is clearly a highly complex phenomenon.These four types of motivation should be seen as complementary rather than as distinct and oppositional.Learners can be both interactively and instrumentally motivated at one and the same time."Motivation can result from learning as well as cause it.Further more, motivation is dynamic in nature; it is not something that a learner has or does not have but rather something that varies from one moment to the next depending on the learning context or task."
3 Learning Strategies
Language aptitude and motivation constitute general factors that influence the rate and level of L2 achievement.But how does their influence operate?One possibility is that they affect the nature and frequency with which individual learners use learning strategies.
"Learning strategies or styles are terms used to describe identifiable individual approaches to learning situations:specifically, Keefe (1979:4) defines them as 'cognitive, affective and physiological traits that are respond to the learning environment'"
Learning strategies can be behavioral (for example, repeating new words aloud to help you remember them) or mental (for example, using the linguistic or situational context to infer the meaning of a new word).They can also be typically problem-oriented.That is, learners employ learning strategies when they are faced with some problem, such as how to remember a new word.Based on relative researching results, learners are generally aware of the strategies they use and, when asked, can explain what they did to try to learn something.
Different kinds of learning strategies have been identified.Cognitive strategies are those that are involved in the analysis, synthesis or transformation of learning materials."Cognitive strategies are ore limited to specific learning tasks and involve more direct manipulation of the learning material itself." An example is 'recombination', which involves constructing a meaningful sentence by recombining known elements of the L2 in a new way.Metacognitive strategies are those involved in planning, monitoring , and evaluating learning."Metacognitive is a term used in information-processing theory to indicate an 'executive' function, strategies that involve planning for learning, thinking about the learning process as it is taking place, monitoring of one's production or comprehension, and evaluating learning after an activity is completed." An example is 'selective attention', where the learner makes a conscious decision to attend to particular aspects of the input.Social/affective strategies concern the ways in which learners choose to interact with other speakers."Social/affective strategies have to do with social-mediating activity and transacting with others." An example is 'questioning for clarification' (i.e. asking for repetition, a paraphrase, or an example).
There have been various attempts to discover which strategies are important for L2 acquisition.One way is to investigate how 'good language learners' try to learn.This involves identifying learners who have been successful in learning an L2 and interviewing them to find out the strategies that worked for them."One of the main findings of such studies is that successful language learners pay attention to both form and meaning.Good language learners are also very active (i.e. they use strategies for taking charge of their own learning), show awareness of the learning process and their own personal learning styles and, above all, are flexible and appropriate in their use of learning strategies.They seem to be especially adept at using metacognitive strategies."
Other studies have sought to relate learners' reported use of different strategies to their L2 proficiency to try to find out which strategies are important for language development.Such studies have shown that successful learners use more strategies than unsuccessful learners.They have also shown that different strategies are related to different aspects of L2 learning.Thus, "strategies that involve formal practice (for example, rehearsing a new word) contribute to the development of linguistic competence whereas strategies involving functional practice (for example, seeking out native speakers to talk to ) aid the development of communicative skill." Successful learners may also call on different strategies at different stages of their development.However, the problem is how to interpret this research.Does strategy use result in learning or does learning increase learners' ability to employ more strategies?Still, another concern is how these learning strategies relate to the general kinds of psycholinguistic processes.What strategies are involved in noticing or noticing the gap, for example?Studies which have been made to incorporate the various learning strategies that have been identified into a model of psycholinguistic processing are still far from enough."The approach to date has been simply to describe strategies and quantify their use."
The study of learning strategies is especially of potential value to language teachers.If those strategies that crucial for learning can be identified, it may prove possible to train students to use them.
4 Conclusion
The purpose of studying individual learner variables is to see how they affect SLA.This involves two rather separate issues.The first is what the effects are.The second is how individual factors influence SLA.Regarding to these two issues, this paper has concentrated on 'motivation' for the first and 'learning strategies' for the second by looking at evidence from several linguistic theories on some of the conditions for second language learning that are present in learners.The emphasis has been on motivation and learning strategies - factors which share a relative lack of access to external influence and are not easily changed.Therefore, their direct relevance to language teaching is either in selecting students for special kinds of training or in providing explanations of the likelihood of success or failure of various kinds of learning situations.
However, this paper has covered only two aspects of various individual differences related to second language acquisition.Many other factors such as age, cognitive styles, personality factors, communication strategies etc. have not been discussed here.These aspects are also playing critical roles in the process of the learner's L2 acquisition as well as the two mentioned ones and will be the preferred topics for my next-step research in the direction of 'individual differences in second language acquisition'.
Reference:
[1]Brown, H.D. 2001.Principles of Language Learning and Teaching. Beijing:Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press.
[2]Ellis, R. 1994. Understanding Second Language Acquisition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
[3]Ellis, R. 2000.Second Language Acquisition. Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press.
[4]Spolsky, B. 2000. Conditions for Second Language Learning. Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press.
[5]Widdowson, H.G. 2000. Linguistics. Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press.
[6]Willis, J. & Willis, D. 2002. Challenge And Change In Language Teaching. Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press.
This paper contains two major parts.First, it briefly introduces and discusses some theories concerning two of the major dimensions in personality factor -motivation.Then it tries to analyze how differences in learning strategies can affect development in SLA based on the discussion of the first part.
2. Motivation
Whereas language aptitude concerns the cognitive abilities that underlie successful L2 (Second language) acquisition, motivation involves the attitudes and affective states that influence the degree of effort that learners make to learn an L2."Motivation is commonly thought of as an inner drive, impulse, emotion or desire that moves one to a particular action.Or, in more technical terms, motivation refers to 'the choices people make as to what experiences or goals they will approach or avoid, and the degree of effort they will exert in that respect.'"Actually, the distinction between motivation and attitudes is not always clear in SLA research. "Gardner and Lambert define 'motivation' in terms of the L2 learner's overall goal or orientation and 'attitude' as the persistence shown by the learner in striving for a goal…Gardner (1979) suggests that attitudes are related to motivation by serving as supports of the learner's overall orientation."Based on the extensive research into the role of motivation conducted by the experts such as Gardner , Lambert, Schumann, Brown, Keller etc,Rod Ellis summarized and identified various motivation into four kinds in his book of Second Language Acquisition (2000): instrumental, integrative, resultative and intrinsic.
2.1 Instrumental Motivation
"Learners may make efforts to learn an L2 for some functional reasons - to pass an examination, to get a better job, or to get a place at university." In some learning contexts, an instrumental motivation seems to be the major force determining success in L2 learning.For example, in settings where learners are motivated to learn an L2 because it opens up educational and economic opportunities for them.Students who are required to take L2 courses and pass the corresponding exams before they can graduate and/or get their pursuing degrees are obviously driven more or less by this motivation.
Though this motivation seems more like an obligation, my idea is that under some certain circumstances, it can be well combined with some or all of the other motivations demonstrated below.
2.2Integrative Motivation
Some learners may choose to learn a particular L2 because they are interested in the people and culture represented by the target language group."For example, it is this integrative orientation that underlies the motivation that many English speaking Canadians have for learning French." However, in other learning contexts, we may also find an integrative motivation does not seem to be so important.Some studies found that less integratively oriented Mexican women in California were more successful in learning English than those who were more integratively oriented.
The above idea leads me to suggest that some learners may be influenced by a 'Machiavellian motivation' - the desire to learn the L2 in order to manipulate and overcome the people of the target language.
2.3 Resultative motivation
An assumption of the research referred to above is that motivation is the cause of L2 achievement.However, it is also possible that motivation is the result of learning.That is, learners who experience success in learning may become more, or in some contexts, less motivated to learn.This helps to explain the conflicting researching results."In a context like Canada, success in learning French may intensify English-speaking learners' liking for French culture.However, in California, success in learning English may bring Mexican women into situations where they experience discrimination and thus reduce their appreciation of American culture."
2.4 Intrinsic Motivation
In some learning situations, it may not be learners' general reasons for learning an L2 that are critical in determining their motivation."Indeed, it is possible that many learners do not hold distinct attitudes, positive or negative, towards the target language group.Such is probably the case with many foreign language learners." It does not follow, however, that such learners are unmotivated.They may find the kinds of learning tasks they are asked to do intrinsically motivating.According to this view, motivation involves the arousal and maintenance of curiosity and can ebb and flow as a result of such factors as learners' particular interests and extent to which they feel personally involved in learning activities.
Motivation is clearly a highly complex phenomenon.These four types of motivation should be seen as complementary rather than as distinct and oppositional.Learners can be both interactively and instrumentally motivated at one and the same time."Motivation can result from learning as well as cause it.Further more, motivation is dynamic in nature; it is not something that a learner has or does not have but rather something that varies from one moment to the next depending on the learning context or task."
3 Learning Strategies
Language aptitude and motivation constitute general factors that influence the rate and level of L2 achievement.But how does their influence operate?One possibility is that they affect the nature and frequency with which individual learners use learning strategies.
"Learning strategies or styles are terms used to describe identifiable individual approaches to learning situations:specifically, Keefe (1979:4) defines them as 'cognitive, affective and physiological traits that are respond to the learning environment'"
Learning strategies can be behavioral (for example, repeating new words aloud to help you remember them) or mental (for example, using the linguistic or situational context to infer the meaning of a new word).They can also be typically problem-oriented.That is, learners employ learning strategies when they are faced with some problem, such as how to remember a new word.Based on relative researching results, learners are generally aware of the strategies they use and, when asked, can explain what they did to try to learn something.
Different kinds of learning strategies have been identified.Cognitive strategies are those that are involved in the analysis, synthesis or transformation of learning materials."Cognitive strategies are ore limited to specific learning tasks and involve more direct manipulation of the learning material itself." An example is 'recombination', which involves constructing a meaningful sentence by recombining known elements of the L2 in a new way.Metacognitive strategies are those involved in planning, monitoring , and evaluating learning."Metacognitive is a term used in information-processing theory to indicate an 'executive' function, strategies that involve planning for learning, thinking about the learning process as it is taking place, monitoring of one's production or comprehension, and evaluating learning after an activity is completed." An example is 'selective attention', where the learner makes a conscious decision to attend to particular aspects of the input.Social/affective strategies concern the ways in which learners choose to interact with other speakers."Social/affective strategies have to do with social-mediating activity and transacting with others." An example is 'questioning for clarification' (i.e. asking for repetition, a paraphrase, or an example).
There have been various attempts to discover which strategies are important for L2 acquisition.One way is to investigate how 'good language learners' try to learn.This involves identifying learners who have been successful in learning an L2 and interviewing them to find out the strategies that worked for them."One of the main findings of such studies is that successful language learners pay attention to both form and meaning.Good language learners are also very active (i.e. they use strategies for taking charge of their own learning), show awareness of the learning process and their own personal learning styles and, above all, are flexible and appropriate in their use of learning strategies.They seem to be especially adept at using metacognitive strategies."
Other studies have sought to relate learners' reported use of different strategies to their L2 proficiency to try to find out which strategies are important for language development.Such studies have shown that successful learners use more strategies than unsuccessful learners.They have also shown that different strategies are related to different aspects of L2 learning.Thus, "strategies that involve formal practice (for example, rehearsing a new word) contribute to the development of linguistic competence whereas strategies involving functional practice (for example, seeking out native speakers to talk to ) aid the development of communicative skill." Successful learners may also call on different strategies at different stages of their development.However, the problem is how to interpret this research.Does strategy use result in learning or does learning increase learners' ability to employ more strategies?Still, another concern is how these learning strategies relate to the general kinds of psycholinguistic processes.What strategies are involved in noticing or noticing the gap, for example?Studies which have been made to incorporate the various learning strategies that have been identified into a model of psycholinguistic processing are still far from enough."The approach to date has been simply to describe strategies and quantify their use."
The study of learning strategies is especially of potential value to language teachers.If those strategies that crucial for learning can be identified, it may prove possible to train students to use them.
4 Conclusion
The purpose of studying individual learner variables is to see how they affect SLA.This involves two rather separate issues.The first is what the effects are.The second is how individual factors influence SLA.Regarding to these two issues, this paper has concentrated on 'motivation' for the first and 'learning strategies' for the second by looking at evidence from several linguistic theories on some of the conditions for second language learning that are present in learners.The emphasis has been on motivation and learning strategies - factors which share a relative lack of access to external influence and are not easily changed.Therefore, their direct relevance to language teaching is either in selecting students for special kinds of training or in providing explanations of the likelihood of success or failure of various kinds of learning situations.
However, this paper has covered only two aspects of various individual differences related to second language acquisition.Many other factors such as age, cognitive styles, personality factors, communication strategies etc. have not been discussed here.These aspects are also playing critical roles in the process of the learner's L2 acquisition as well as the two mentioned ones and will be the preferred topics for my next-step research in the direction of 'individual differences in second language acquisition'.
Reference:
[1]Brown, H.D. 2001.Principles of Language Learning and Teaching. Beijing:Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press.
[2]Ellis, R. 1994. Understanding Second Language Acquisition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
[3]Ellis, R. 2000.Second Language Acquisition. Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press.
[4]Spolsky, B. 2000. Conditions for Second Language Learning. Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press.
[5]Widdowson, H.G. 2000. Linguistics. Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press.
[6]Willis, J. & Willis, D. 2002. Challenge And Change In Language Teaching. Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press.