First Advisor

Lynn M. Santelmann

Date of Publication

1-1-2011

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts (M.A.) in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages

Department

Applied Linguistics

Language

English

Subjects

Late Learners, Self-Determination Theory, Japanese language -- Study and teaching -- English speakers, Second language acquisition, Motivation in education, Japanese language -- Pronunciation

DOI

10.15760/etd.191

Physical Description

1 online resource (vi, 85 p.) : ill.

Abstract

The present study examined a hypothesized relationship between the following variables: intrinsic and extrinsic motivation as described by Self-Determination Theory (Deci & Ryan, 1985), integrative and instrumental orientation (Gardner & Lambert, 1972), attitudes toward pronunciation, and accent in English-speaking late learners of Japanese. Data collection occurred in two steps: First, English-speaking participants completed three questionnaires designed to measure their motivation and attitudes toward pronunciation; they then provided speech samples in Japanese. Native speakers of Japanese then rated these speech samples holistically on a scale of 1 to 5, with 1 indicating a strong foreign accent, and 5 indicating a native accent. Scores on the questionnaires were then correlated with the accent ratings. None of the English-speaking participants were judged as native or near-native speakers of Japanese. However, results demonstrated a significant positive correlation between ratings of accent and two variables: Intrinsic Motivation Toward Accomplishment and attitudes toward pronunciation. The statistical analysis also revealed a positive correlation between integrative and instrumental orientation and extrinsic motivation, suggesting a relationship between measures of orientation and extrinsic motivation as well. These results highlight the importance of including Self-Determination Theory in the area of second/foreign language acquisition research, as well as clarifying the role of motivation and attitudes toward pronunciation in the present context of late learners of Japanese.

Rights

In Copyright. URI: http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/ This Item is protected by copyright and/or related rights. You are free to use this Item in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights legislation that applies to your use. For other uses you need to obtain permission from the rights-holder(s).

Comments

Portland State University. Dept of Applied Linguistics

Persistent Identifier

http://archives.pdx.edu/ds/psu/7073

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