title: Temporal perceptions of second language learning motivation
title: a Japanese context
titleType: Subtitle
Creators: name: Millington, Neil
Publisher: name: Lancaster University
Year: 2016

description: Over the last few decades, motivation has become recognized as crucial in
      language learning success. Researchers have conducted numerous of studies
      which have sought to explain why people select, perform, and continue to
      learn a language. The results and findings of these studies allow us a
      greater understanding of second language (L2) learning motivation.
      However, one area of language learning motivation research that has not
      received as much attention is the temporal aspect of motivational
      fluctuations. In recent years, there have been calls for a more widespread
      adoption of qualitative research methods to investigate what Dörnyei and
      Ushioda (2011) describe as the dynamic processes of a learner’s’
      motivational development. This thesis is a response to those calls.
      
      This thesis attempts to discover perceptions of language learning
      motivation. In particular, the research reported in this thesis is an
      attempt to develop a greater understanding of temporal motivational
      fluctuations of Japanese university L2 learners. As such, the overall aim
      of this longitudinal qualitative study is to explore the temporal
      progression of the motivational thinking of three different age groups of
      Japanese university learners. More specifically, this research sheds light
      on the motivations of L2 learners in a medium-sized university in Japan,
      discovers similarities and differences in language learning motivation
      between different age groups of university learners, and determines how
      their language learning motivation fluctuates over the period of an
      academic year.
      
      The tools of inquiry used in this qualitative research project were
      interviews and diaries. Three sets of interviews were conducted with 23
      learners in a Japanese university over the course of an academic year.
      Seven of the participants were freshmen students and seven were in their
      second year. The remaining nine were in the third grade. Participants
      completed and submitted a total of seven diary entries at regular
      intervals throughout the study and these were used to inform the second
      and third rounds of interviews. The overall findings showed that the
      learners in each grade were influenced by both their sociohistorical and
      cultural context and their values and goals at the start of the study.
      During the middle of the academic year, these goals and values were placed
      on hold as their immediate context seemed to have more motivational
      influence. Towards the end of the study the values and goals returned to
      play a more prominent role in their language learning motivation. There
      were also several subtle differences in the motivation of the three age
      groups and this could be seen most clearly in the educational context
      where institutional pressures were stronger for the older students in the
      study.