Mi Tesis PDF

Motivational Strategies:
Students’ and Teachers’ Perspectives
A thesis submitted
to Kent State University in partial
fulfillment of the requirements for the
degree of Master of Arts
by
Ya-Nan He
December, 2009
Thesis written by
Ya-Nan He
B.A., Christ’s College, 2006
M.A., Kent State University, 2009
Approved by
Kristen Precht , Advisor
Ron Corthell , Chair, Department of English
Timothy S. Moerland , Dean, College of Arts and Sciences
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Table of Contents
List of Tables………………………………………………………………………….…iv
Acknowledgements……………………………………………………………………...vi
1. Introduction……………………………………………………….…………….…..1
2. Literature Review………………………………………………………………..…4
2.1 Motivation
2.2 Motivational strategy
3. Method………………………………………………………………………….….12
3.1 Participants
3.2 Instruments
3.3 Procedure
3.3.1 Data analysis
4. Results……………………………………………………………………………...20
4.1 Students
4.2 Teachers
4.3 The comparisons of the motivational strategy ranking between students and
teachers
5. Discussion…………………………………………………………………….........30
5.1 Nationality difference—students
5.2 The comparisons: students’ and teachers’ perspectives
5.2.1 The importance
5.2.2. The frequency
5.3 Sex difference—students and teachers
6. Conclusion and Limitation………………………………………………....….….45

Note……………………………………………………………………………….…......49
References……………………………………………………………………….…..….50
Appendices….…………………………………………………………………………..71
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List of Tables
Table 1 First Language backgrounds………………………………………………..13
Table 2 The level of learning language……………………………………………...13
Table 3 The symbols for each category (macrostrategy)……………………………..15
Table 4-1 The p-value and means of significant differences of the importance
in sex and nationality dimensions………………………………………......21
Table 4-2 The p-value and means of significant differences of the frequency
in years of teaching and teaching experience dimensions………………….22
Table 5 The importance and the frequency of motivational categories
by nationality as shown through means for significant differences………..23
in sex, years of teaching and teaching experience dimensions……………..24
in years of teaching and teaching experience dimensions……………….…25
Table 7 The means and z-scores (ranking) of each scale from students’ and teachers’
perspectives of the importance of the motivational strategies.........................26
Table 8 The means and z-scores (ranking) of each scale from students’ and
teachers’ perspectives of the frequency of the motivational strategies…........27
Table 9 The correlations between the importance and the frequency
of the motivational strategies for students and teachers…………………......28
iv
Table 10 The comparison of the top five ranking of the importance of the
categories between students and teachers……………………………………32
Table 11 The comparison of the top five ranking of the frequency of the categories
between students and teachers…………………………………………….....38
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Acknowledgements
I would like to thank first the staff, teachers and students in the ESL and the
MCLS departments at Kent State University who took part in or assisted with the surveys.
I would also like to thank my advisor, Dr. Kristen Precht, for her considerable
contribution to this project. Especially, I want to thank Jason Csehi for his thoughtful
insight and assistance with editing and revision, and Yung-Yi (Karen) Hung for her
additional help with the statistics. Finally, I am very grateful to my lovely family and
friends for their invaluable support and encouragement.
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1. Introduction
Motivation is demonstrated to be one of the main determinants of second language
learning achievement in numerous studies (Crookes and Schmidt, 1991; Gardner &
Smythe, 1975; Oxford & Shearin, 1994). Indeed, one of the most prominent researchers
in the area of L2 acquisition, Robert Gardner (1985), recognized that motivation has a
pervasive influence on learning a foreign language. Andrew D. Cohen and Zoltán
Dörnyei (2002) contended: "Motivation is often seen as the key learner variable because
without it, nothing much happens" (p. 172). In sum, learning usually does not take place
without motivation. In line with this thought, strategies in motivating learners should be
explored as one of the essential variables for triggering learners’ motivation. Evidence
suggests that teaching strategy influences important deficits from which children with an
extrinsic motivation toward schoolwork suffer (Boggiano & Katz, 1991); extrinsic
motivation is performed to gain some extrinsic reward or rewards, such as getting a bonus
or avoiding punishment. Poonam C. Dev (1997) reported that teachers should concentrate
on strategies to substitute threatening or frightening situations and tasks.

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These studies all point out motivational strategies that are substantial enough to be
explored for increasing motivation for learning a foreign language.
Therefore, several studies were conducted to investigate teachers’ beliefs and
practices concerning which motivational strategies can be used in class. In 1998, Dörnyei
and Kata Csizér conducted an empirical research of Hungarian teachers of English who
were asked to evaluate a list of motivational strategies, indicating how importantly they
considered the strategies to be and how frequently they implemented the strategies. After
their study, Dörnyei (2001) carried out more than 100 motivational strategies that were
presented in his text, Motivational Strategies in the Language Classroom, to enable
teachers to motivate learners. Soon, based on Dörnyei and Csizér’s study and Dörnyei’s
book, Hsing-Fu Cheng and Dörnyei (2007) continued to explore the scope of
motivational strategies. They examined how Taiwanese teachers of English can use
certain strategies to motivate their learners. Further, they examined the differences
between the beliefs and practices of Taiwanese and Hungarian teachers of English.
These studies provide us with evidence of what motivational strategies teachers can
use when motivating learners from the teachers’ point of view. However, if we desire to
motivate learners more effectively, there is an area that should be explored, which is to
know learners’ sentiment toward motivational strategies used by teachers in class. As has
been noted, several studies suggested that students’ personal orientations and beliefs
influence their motivation and performance (e.g., Elliot, 1999; Tobias, 1994; Reeve &
Jang, 2006). This present study is relevant due to a lack of information regarding
motivational strategies from the learners’ perspective, and it will aim at filling in this gap
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in order to enable teachers to obtain a better comprehension of which motivational
strategies are more effective from the learners’ perspective.

2. Literature review
The literature review will explore the background of motivation and motivational
strategy in two subsections that follow. Both subsections discuss numerous studies and
also detail each study concerning motivation and motivational strategy. The literature
review will further elaborate on where the current literature is lacking and will be
investigated and filled by this study.
2.1 Motivation
Motivation is one of the most important factors for learning a foreign/second
language (L2). In order to describe L2 learning motivation, two Canadian scholars,
Robert Gardner and Wallace Lambert (1959, 1972), are often mentioned. Their
overwhelming dichotomy from the social psychological point of view is most often cited:
instrumental and integrative motivation. Instrumental motivation focuses on pragmatic
gains, that is, potential utilitarian gains of L2 proficiency, such as achieving the
requirements for school or university graduation, and reaching a higher social status or
getting a better job (Dörnyei, 1994a; Norris, 2001). Integrative motivation is associated
with a positive attitude and feeling toward a L2 group, such as admiring the culture and
desiring to interact with the people who speak the target language (Dörnyei, 1994a;
Norris, 2001). This dichotomy still influenced most L2 motivation studies before the
1990s, although it was criticized as an oversimplification (Dörnyei, 1994a; Gardner &
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MacIntyre, 1993).
The other of most well-known concepts that distinguish L2 motivation are intrinsic
and extrinsic motivation. The former suggests that rewards associated with intrinsically
motivated behaviors are internal, such as obtaining valued accomplishments, satisfying
one’s curiosity or gaining the pleasure of doing a specific activity (Bateman & Crant, n.d.;
Dörnyei, 1994a), which refers to “motivation [to] engage in an activity for its own sake”
(Pintrich & Schunk, 2002, p. 245). The latter was put forth to gain some extrinsic rewards,
such as getting a bonus or avoiding punishment (Bateman & Crant, n.d.; Dörnyei, 1994a),
which refers to “motivation [to] engage in an activity as a means to an end” (Pintrich &
Schunk, 2002, p.245).
In 1994, Dörnyei created a construct for his study, which consisted of three general
levels: Language Level, Learner Level and Learning Situation Level. These levels
coincided with three basic elements of the second language learning process: second
language, second language learner and second language learning environment. These
levels brought out three different views of language: the social dimension, the personal
dimension and the educational subject matter dimension. Based on this construct,
learning situation level can be divided into course-specific motivational components,
teacher-specific motivational components and group-specific motivational components.
Course-specific motivational components consisted of four categories, interest, relevance,
expectancy and satisfaction, which were postulated by Crookes and Schmidt (1991).
Group-specific motivational components contained four aspects of group dynamics:
goal-orientedness, norm and reward system, group cohesion and classroom goal
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structures. For teacher-specific motivational components, there were three general groups:
affiliative drive, teacher’s authority and socialization. Affiliative drive suggests that
students need to perform well academically to please teachers of whom they think highly.
A teacher’s authority type is dependent on whether the teacher supports autonomy or
whether the teacher controls the class. Socialization of student motivation includ three
main aspects: modeling, task presentation and feedback (Brophy & Neelam, 1986). After
this construct was produced, Gardner and Tremblay (1994) stated that “we also advocate
the exploration of other motivational theories as a way of expanding the motivation
construct but recognize that such [an] endeavour is of no value in the absence of pertinent
empirical research” (p. 366). In response to this, Dörnyei (1994b) noted, “Empirical
research using extended research paradigms would also help integrate old and new
variables” (p. 521). Therefore, many research studies examine adding several new
components to the test of stimulating L2 learners’ motivation.
As previously mentioned, starting in the 1990s, there were numerous studies
undertaken that attempted to redefine L2 motivation. Based on the theories listed below,
the studies of the 1990s reached a consensus with more pragmatic and educational
approaches (e.g., Crookes & Schmidt, 1991; Dörnyei 1994a, 1990; Oxford & Shearin,
1994; Tremblay & Gardner, 1995; Williams & Burden, 1997). Several new approaches
successfully expanded the L2 motivation paradigm: (1) attribution theory and goal theory,
which are relevant to how the causes attributed to previous underachievements and
accomplishments influence forthcoming goal expectations; (2) cognitive theories of
motivation, which is a function of a person’s thoughts, especially those related to the

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learner’s “self,” such as self-efficacy, self-confidence and the need for achievement; and
(3) learning situation, consisting of the factors connected to classroom application, such
as features of both the language course and the language teacher.
2.2 Motivational Strategy
Learner’s motivation is one of the key factors that determine success in learning a
foreign language. Motivation researchers found that motivational strategies that teachers
use can effectively influence learners’ motivation toward learning a foreign language (e.g.,
Banya & Cheng, 1997; Dörnyei, 1994a; Fives & Manning, 2005; Stipek, 1996). In 2001,
Dörnyei presented more than 100 motivational strategies in his text, Motivational
Strategies in the Language Classroom. These motivational strategies could be categorized
into four groups: creating the basic motivational conditions, generating initial motivation,
maintaining and protecting motivation and rounding off the learning experience
(encouraging positive self-evaluation). The concept of all these strategies is based on the
idea that teacher behavior and beliefs significantly affect students’ motivation for learning
a foreign language. For this reason, strategies in motivating language learners should be
seen as an important aspect of motivation toward learning a foreign language. Therefore,
several research studies constructed and summarized motivational techniques for teachers
in classroom application (e.g., Alison & Halliwell, 2002; Brown, 2001; Chambers, 1999;
Williams & Burden, 1997).
Moreover, Dörnyei (1994a) integrated several relevant motivational components
into a multilevel, second-language motivational construct in order to understand second

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language motivation from an educational perspective. Based on these components, he
made a practical motivational strategy list that was comprised of thirty strategies for
helping language teachers better understand what motivates their students in the second
language classroom. The result points out that not only learners’ motivation can be
influenced by motivational strategies, but also that teachers play significant roles to help
learners establish self-confidence and achieve successes that can crucially influence
motivation (Fives & Manning, 2005; Gardner, Masgoret, Tennant & Mihic, 2004). In
Huang’s study (2006), he interviewed three senior business major students to talk about
their EAP (English for academic purpose) reading experience. Based on these interviews,
he created a questionnaire that included 18 statements to describe situations where
learners could be more motivated to read for EAP. Two hundred and twelve students from
five classes in a university of science and technology in Taiwan were selected randomly
to be investigated. The findings show that teachers’ modeling and feedback are
significant factors for motivating students to read. This result corresponds to Cheng and
Dörnyei’s study (2007), which indicates that showing teachers’ enthusiasm through their
behavior is one of the most important and frequently-used motivational strategies. There
is obvious evidence indicating that teachers’ motivational strategies critically manipulate
the development of L2 learning motivation.
Dörnyei and Csizér (1998) conducted empirical research of Hungarian teachers of
English who were asked to evaluate a list of motivational strategies, indicating how
important they considered the strategies to be and how frequently they implemented the
strategies. According to their findings, the researchers formulated ten motivational

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macrostrategies and concluded, “We cannot say with certainty that the Ten
Commandments are valid in every cultural, ethnolinguistic and institutional setting. There
is clearly much room for further research in this respect” (Dörnyei & Csizér, 1998, p.
224). Based on this research, Cheng and Dörnyei (2007) explored the scope of
motivational strategies that Taiwanese teachers of English can use to motivate their
learners and the differences between Taiwanese and Hungarian teachers’ beliefs and
practices. Ten motivational macrostrategies, including 48 motivational strategies,
emerged from the Hungarian study conducted by Dörnyei and Csizér (1998). Based on
the Hungarian study, 387 teachers of English in Taiwan evaluated a list of motivational
strategies, indicating how important they considered the strategies to be and how
frequently they implemented the strategies. The result emphatically proves that some of
motivational strategies are culture-specific. However, both research studies failed to
mention any feedback from the learners’ point of view concerning motivational strategies.
Even though the strategies have been recommended meaningfully, there is an
indication that there may be disagreement between teachers and students about the value
of some motivational strategies. In Raviv, Raviv and Reisel’s study (1990), teachers and
students were asked to respond to the Class Environment Scale (Moos & Trickett, 1974),
which contains nine dimensions. Half of the teachers and students evaluated the ideal
classroom, and the others evaluated the real classroom. The results indicated that the
perception between teachers and students concerning the dimensions are significantly
different. Another study by Banya and Cheng (1997) investigated the beliefs of teachers
and students on foreign language learning. The subjects were 23 teachers of English and
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224 college students in southern Taiwan who were studying English. A path analysis
showed that students may have misconceptions with teachers’ beliefs and the principles
of classroom instruction. In 2008, Bernaus and Gardner examined whether teachers and
students perceive the use of the same strategies differently and the effects of these
strategies on students’ motivation and English-language achievement. Thirty-one teachers
of English as a foreign language and 694 students in Spain were asked to evaluate the
frequency of use of 26 strategies in their classes. The result showed that teachers and
students had agreements on the frequency of some strategies, but not on other strategies.
As such, it can be seen that the evidence suggests that teachers’ and students’ perspectives
are crucially different.
There is much research from the teacher’s perspective on motivational strategies,
but there is a noticeable lack of scholarship concerning the student’s perspective. In order
to help learners develop their motivation toward learning a foreign language, we should
gain a better understanding of the learner’s perspective because “students’ belief about
foreign language learning is found to play an important role in influencing their
motivation, attitude, motivational intensity, strategy use, anxiety and language
achievement” (Banya & Cheng, 1997, p. 26). Therefore, learners’ feedback should be
investigated, as should the comparison between teachers and learners. We can make
motivational strategies more effective if we investigate the learners’ perspective and the
comparison between teachers and students. The following questions guide the
investigation of this current study:
(1) What does learners’ feedback have to say about their perceptions of how
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important the motivational strategies are, and how often should teachers use these
strategies?
(2) Do students and teachers perceive the importance and the use of these
motivational strategies similarly or differently?
(3) Do variables such as sex or culture come into play in social, personal and
situational motivation, or in motivational strategies?
We can get a better understanding of the effectiveness of motivational strategies once
these questions have been asked and analyzed thoroughly.

3. Method
The main goal of this study is to investigate two aspects of the comparisons between
students’ and teachers’ perspectives toward motivational strategies. One aspect considers
how important motivational strategies are for developing students’ motivation. The other
aspect concerns how frequently teachers use motivational strategies in class. As mentioned
in the literature review, this type of study is rarely researched. Also, students’ motivations
toward learning a foreign language would be influenced by their personal beliefs. Therefore,
there is a pertinent reason for examining the comparison between students’ and teachers’
perspectives on the motivational strategies.
3. 1 Participants
The participants for this investigation consisted of 11 teachers and 40 students from
Kent State University. All forty students were learning English in the English as a Second
Language Center (ESL) at Kent State University. The students’ age range was from 17 to
45 years old. The average was 22.8 years old (N=39 with one student not providing an
age). There were 18 female and 22 male students. They came from several different
countries, but their first language backgrounds can be distributed into six categories:
Arabic, Chinese, French, Japanese, Korean, and Turkish. Table 1 shows the number of
students in each language and the percentages of each language that were used in this
study. As can been seen in Table 1, almost half of the students’ first language
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background was Chinese (42.5%), while Arabic (25%), Japanese (15%), Korean (12.5%),
French and Turkish (2.5% each) made up the difference. Six first-language backgrounds
were investigated. Two of the six nationalities however, also first-language backgrounds,
were not examined because of the insufficient number of participating students who came
from Africa (who spoke French) and Turkey (who spoke Turkish). Table 2 presents the
language level of students in the ESL Center at Kent State University. Of the students in
this study, 72.5% came from the Advanced level, 17.5% came from the Intermediate level,
and 10% came from the Elementary level.
Table 1 First Language backgrounds

First Languages N Percent
Arabic 10 25.0%
Chinese 17 42.5%
French 1 2.5%
Japanese 6 15.0%
Korean 5 12.5%
Turkish 1 2.5%
Total 40 100.0%
Table 2 The level of learning language
The levels N Percent

Elementary 4 10.0%
Intermediate 7 17.5%
Advanced 29 72.5%
Total 40 100.0%
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Most teachers were teaching English in the ESL Center at Kent State University.
Only one was a teacher from Department of Modern and Classic Language Studies
(MCLS) at Kent State University, but he/she did not offer information as to which
language he/she teaches. The teachers’ age range was from 27 to 61 years old. The
average was 44.25 years old (N=8). There were 8 female and 2 male teachers, and one
who did not provide gender data. As teaching experience, almost 70% of the teachers had
experience teaching at the elementary and advanced levels, and nearly 30% of the
teachers had experience teaching at the intermediate level. Concerning years of teaching
experience, the participant with the least experience had taught for two years, while three
participants had been teaching for at least 15 years (N=10, one with missing information
concerning teaching data).
3. 2 Instruments
Two questionnaires (see Appendix 1 and 2) were developed containing the same
set of motivational strategies for both students and teachers. This was done in order to
compare teachers’ and students’ perspectives on motivational strategies. The selection of
these motivational strategies to be included in the questionnaires was based on the
systematic overview of motivational techniques devised by Dörnyei (2001), which
considered research that Dörnyei had conducted three years prior with Csizér (1998). A
variant questionnaire was later used by Cheng and Dörnyei (2007); this served as the
source from which the questionnaires used in this current study were drawn. Motivational
strategies were divided into the ten most important motivational macrostrategies (shown
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as “categories” in this study) in Dörnyei and Csizér’s Hungarian study (1998): proper
teacher behavior, recognizing students’ efforts, promoting learners’ self-confidence,
creating a pleasant classroom climate, presenting tasks properly, increasing learners’
goal-orientedness, making the learning tasks stimulating, familiarizing learners with
L2-related values, promoting group cohesiveness and group norms, and promoting
learner autonomy. The symbols for each category are presented in Table 3. Each category
had two to four motivational strategy items represented in both of the questionnaires,
which were presented in English. The items were not identified as such, but they were
presented in random order on the questionnaires. However, wording was adapted to suit the
English level of the participants and some items were deleted to suit the ESL and the
MCLS context.
Table 3 The symbols for each category (macrostrategy)
Symbols Categories (macrostrategies)
C1 Category 1 “Proper teacher behavior”
C2 Category 2 “Recognize students’ efforts”
C3 Category 3 “Promote learners’ self-confidence”
C4 Category 4 “Create a pleasant classroom”
C5 Category 5 “Present tasks properly”
C6 Category 6 “Increase learners’ goal-orientedness”
C7 Category 7 “Make the learning tasks stimulating”
C8 Category 8 “Familiarize learners with L2-related values”

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C9 Category 9 “Promote group cohesiveness and group norms”
C10 Category 10 “Promote learner autonomy”
The final version of the students’ questionnaire had two parts that were made up from
the same set of 28 motivational strategies, which means that 56 motivational strategies
would be rated. See Appendix 1 for details of students’ questionnaire. The questionnaire
covered two aspects of this study. One part focused on asking students to rate the 28
motivational strategies by using a 5-point scale, which ranged from 1 (not important) to 5
(very important). This was done in order to show students’ perspectives of how important
the motivational strategies are. In the other part, students were asked to rate the same 28
motivational strategies by using a 5-point scale, again ranging from 1 (never) to 5 (very
often) with the purpose of rating how often students experience each motivational
strategy that is used by teachers in class.
There were also two parts that were made up from the same set of the 28 motivational
strategies on the final version of the teachers’ questionnaire. A total of 56 motivational
strategies were evaluated on the teachers’ questionnaire. See Appendix 2 for details of the
teachers’ questionnaire. In the first part, teachers were asked to rate the 28 motivational
strategies by using a 5-point scale, which ranged from 1 (not important) to 5 (very
important) with the intention of recounting teachers’ perceptions of how important the
motivational strategies are. In the second part, teachers were asked to rate the frequency
of the same motivational strategies on a 5-point scale, ranging from 1 (never) to 5 (very
often), in order to show the rate of how often they used these motivational strategies in
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class.
3. 3 Procedure
Emails were sent to teachers in the ESL and MCLS Departments requesting their
participation, but some teachers opted not to take part in the study. They were then asked
to complete the surveys themselves and permission was sought to visit their classes to
conduct student surveys. Some of the instructors’ surveys were administered by email, and
some of them filled out hard copies. However, each of the student surveys was
administered in person.
3.3.1 Data analysis
This study was analyzed in two manners: (a) a quantitative analysis of students’
responses and the comparison between students’ and teachers’ responses of the
motivational strategy items, which addressed research questions one and two; and (b) a
qualitative analysis of what role variables effectively play in learning motivation, which
addressed research question three.
There were two parts of the quantitative analysis in this study. The first part of this
study was to find out students’ responses of how important the motivational strategy items
are, and how often teachers should use these strategy items. In the second part of this
study, the comparisons between students and teachers were analyzed to see whether
students and teachers perceive the importance and the use of these motivational strategy
items similarly or differently.

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The questionnaire data were processed using SPSS. For the initial (quantitative)
analysis, the means of the 56 motivational strategy items in the students’ questionnaire
were calculated. In order to effectively analyze the results, all the items were classified
into the ten categories (macrostrategies) listed above and the means of each category
were computed. The data of the teacher surveys were computed in the following analysis
and several comparisons were made. The same procedure was followed to classify and
calculate the 56 items and ten categories contained in the teachers’ questionnaire.
Of the ten categories, the top five rankings for both the students and teachers were
compared in the second part. The findings were based on two aspects: the importance and
the frequency. In order to obtain the ranking of each category from both questionnaires, a
z-score test was used to calculate a standard score for each category regard to the
importance and the frequency. According to the z-scores of each category, the ranking
orders of ten categories from both students’ and teachers’ perspectives were obtained.
The comparisons of the relationships, which were among the importance and the
frequency from the students’ perspectives, the importance and the frequency from the
teachers’ perspectives, the importance of students’ and teachers’ perspectives, and the
frequency of students’ and teachers’ perspectives, were also calculated. These results
were tallied and compared using a correlation test as well.
For the qualitative analysis, after the means of the 56 motivational strategy items in
the students’ questionnaire were calculated, Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) was applied
to these values to investigate significant differences in regard to several dimensions: sex,
status of students’ academic level (i.e., undergraduate or graduate student), the level of
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learning language and nationality. The same procedure followed to investigate the
dimensions of the teachers’ questionnaire included sex, years of teaching and levels of
teaching. ANOVA was applied to this set of data as well as to the teachers’ questionnaire.
4. Results
The findings are divided into three subsections: students; teachers; and the
comparisons between students and teachers. Results of students’ feedback concerning
their perspectives on how important the motivational strategies are and how often the
students experience the motivational strategies used by teachers in class were examined
the differences of their sex, students’ academic level (i.e., undergraduate or graduate
student), the level of learning language (i.e., elementary or intermediate or advanced level)
and nationality. Next, the results of teachers’ perspectives were presented by the
differences of their sex, years of teaching and levels of teaching. The last subsection is
the comparisons between the students’ and teachers’ perspectives in regard to the
importance and the frequency of the motivational strategies. In order to compare the
perspectives of students and teachers, the same 28 strategy items found in the two
sections on both the student and teacher surveys were grouped into ten categories (or
macrostrategies) as mentioned in the instrument subsection.
4. 1 Students
This section of the study focused on two aspects, the importance and the frequency,
of the students’ responses and the teachers’ strategies used to motivate students. There
were ten categories for these strategies, listed in Table 3. Each of these categories was
studied to determine whether there were significant differences in sex, status of students’
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academic level, the level of learning language and nationality dimensions.
The important aspect is shown in Table 4-1. There were three significant results for
sex dimension: 1) C1, “Proper teacher behavior,” 2) C8, “Familiarized learners with
L2-related values” and 3) C10, “Promote learner autonomy.” These data show that males
and females have different needs or preferences, which will be discussed more in the
discussion and conclusion section. For nationality dimension, there are significant
differences in six of the ten categories: 1) C2, “Recognize students’ efforts,” 2) C4,
“Create a pleasant classroom”, 3) C5, “Present tasks properly,” 4) C6, “Increase learners’
goal-orientedness,” 5) C7, “Make the learning tasks stimulating” and 6) C10, “Promote
learner autonomy.” Interestingly, status of students’ academic level and the level of
learning language dimensions had no significant results.
in sex and nationality dimensions
Dimension Category P-value Means
Sex C1 Proper teacher behavior .008** 4.52 > 4.10 (M >F)
C8 Familiarize learners with .014* 4.37 > 4.04 (M >F)
L2-related values
C10 Promote learner autonomy .044* 4.19 < 3.70 (M >F)
Nationality C2 Recognize students’ efforts .008** See Table 5 for

C4 Create a pleasant classroom .0007** the means
C5 Present tasks properly .017*
C6 Increase learners’ .008**
goal-orientedness
C7 Make the learning tasks .001**
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stimulating
C10 Promote learner autonomy .0001**
* p is significant at the 0.05 level (2-tailed).
** p is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed).
M (male) > F (female) means that the means obtained from males are higher than females.
For the frequency aspect is shown in Table 4-2, there were three significant results.
The status dimension, C4, “Create a pleasant classroom” and C5, “Present tas ks properly”
had significant differences. For nationality dimension, only C2 was statistically different.
Nevertheless, Sex and the level of learning language dimensions had no significant
results.
in years of teaching and teaching experience dimensions
Status C4 Create a pleasant classroom .040* 4.43 > 4 > 3.74
(G>O>UG)
C5 Present tasks properly .028* 4.5 > 3.91 > 3.88

(G>O>UG)
Nationality C2 Recognize students’ efforts .020* See Table 5 for

the means
UG (undergraduate student), G (graduate student), O (others)
The nationality dimension for both the importance and the frequency is an
important variable in students’ perspectives. Therefore, we separately represent the mean

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differences of both the importance and the frequency in Table 5.
Table 5 The importance and the frequency of motivational categories
by nationality as shown through means for significant differences
The importance The frequency
Chinese Japanese Korean Saudi Chinese Japanese Korean Saudi
Arabian Arabian
C2 4.26 3.16 4.4 4.35 3.88 3.16 3.3 4.3
C4 4.33 3.77 3.93 4.56
C5 4.26 4 4.6 4.8
C6 4.6 4 4.53 4.36
C7 4.31 3.55 3.96 4.53
C10 4.23 3.38 3.13 4.36
Bold numbers are the highest one in each category.
Underlined numbers are the lowest one in each category.
4. 2 Teachers
The same procedure was used to investigate the dimensions of the teachers’
responses including sex, years of teaching and levels of teaching. For important aspect,
each dimension had one significant result. As can been seen in Table 6-1, for the sex
dimension, C6 was significantly different. For the years of teaching dimension, C2, had
significant result. The teaching experience at the advanced dimension, C2, showed a
24
significant difference.
in sex, years of teaching and teaching experience dimensions
Sex C6 Increase learners’ .018* 3.33 < 4.41
goal-orientedness d
Years of teaching C2 Recognize students’ .008** 4.83 >4.12 >4 >3

efforts (YT1>YT4>YT3>YT2)
Teaching experience C2 Recognize students’ .022* 4.83 > 3.91

at the advanced efforts (NET>ET)
level
** p is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed).
M (male) < F (female) means that the means obtained from males are lower than females.
YT1 (0-5 years of teaching), YT2 (6-10 years of teaching)
YT3 (11-15 years of teaching), YT4 (16 or more years of teaching)
NET (teachers have no teaching experience), ET (teachers have teaching experience)
There were only two significant results from teachers’ perspectives within the
frequency aspect. As displayed in Table 6-2, the years of teaching dimension, C7, was
significantly different. For the teaching experience at the intermediate level dimension,
C7, exhibited a significant difference. However, the sex dimension had no significant
result.
25
in years of teaching and teaching experience dimensions
Years of teaching C7 Make the learning tasks .020* 4.41=4.41>3.66> 3.33
stimulating (YT1=YT4>YT3>YT2)
Teaching experience
at the intermediate C7 Make the learning tasks .022* 4.42 > 3.77
level stimulating (ET>NET)

YT1 (0-5 years of teaching), YT2 (6-10 years of teaching)
YT3 (11-15 years of teaching), YT4 (16 or more years of teaching)
NET (teachers have no teaching experience), ET (teachers have teaching experience)
4. 3 The comparisons of the motivational strategy ranking between
students and teachers
Table 7 shows the means of responses obtained from the students’ and teachers’
questionnaires by categories according to the importance aspect. More than half of the
means from students’ responses were higher than the mean (4.18) of all the strategies.
Only C2 (4.13), C9 (3.82) and C10 (3.98) were lower than the overall mean in students’
responses. Then, for teachers’ responses, most of the means were higher than the mean
(4.24) of all the strategies, except C9 (3.61) and C10 (3.76), which were lower than the
teachers’ overall mean. In order to obtain the ranking of each category from both students
and teachers, the numbers of constituent items for each category should be standardized
using a z-score test to calculate a standard score. According to the z-scores of each
category, the ranking orders of the ten categories from both students’ and teachers’
26
perspectives are displayed in Table 7.
teachers’ perspectives of the importance of the motivational strategies
Categories Students Teachers
(Macrostrategies) Mean Z-score Mean Z-score
(rank order) (rank order)
All the strategies 4.18 4.24

C1. Proper teacher behavior 4.35 0.33 (3) 4.55 1.13 (1)
C2. Recognize students’ effort 4.13 -0.08 (8) 4.27 0.05 (7)
C3. Promote learners’ self-confidence 4.19 0.01 (6) 4.27 0.06 (6)
C4. Creating a pleasant classroom climate 4.21 0.05 (5) 4.42 0.50 (3)
C5. Present tasks properly 4.42 0.45 (2) 4.59 0.71 (2)
C6. Increase learners’ goal-orientedness 4.41 0.49 (1) 4.24 0.00 (8)
C7. Make the learning tasks stimulating 4.18 0.01 (6) 4.33 0.15 (5)
C8. Familiarize learners with L2-related
4.23 0.10 (4) 4.39 0.35 (4)
values
C9. Promote group cohesiveness and group
3.82 -0.53 (10) 3.61 -1.10 (10)
norms
C10. Promote learner autonomy 3.98 -0.26 (9) 3.76 -0.81 (9)
Table 8 revealed the means of the frequency by each category from students’ and
teachers’ perspectives. In the students’ responses, half of the means were higher than the
students’ overall mean (3.88). However, for the teachers’ responses, more than half of the
means were higher than the teachers’ overall mean (4.21). Again, a z-score test was run
27
on standard scores in order to gain the ranking orders of the ten categories from both
students’ and teachers’ perspectives, which are presented in Table 8.
teachers’ perspectives of the frequency of the motivational strategies
(Macrostrategies) Mean Z-score Mean Z-score
(rank order) (rank order)

C1. Proper teacher behavior 4.08 0.32 (1) 4.85 2.79 (1)
C2. Recognize students’ effort 3.83 -0.06 (7) 4.32 0.15 (5)
C3. Promote learners’ self-confidence 3.93 0.07 (4) 4.27 0.10 (6)
C4. Creating a pleasant classroom climate 3.99 0.16 (3) 4.52 0.67 (2)
C5. Present tasks properly 4.05 0.27 (2) 4.55 0.59 (3)
C6. Increase learners’ goal-orientedness 3.62 -0.36 (9) 3.82 -0.48 (8)
C7. Make the learning tasks stimulating 3.86 -0.02 (6) 4.30 0.19 (4)
C8. Familiarize learners with L2-related values 3.71 -0.27 (8) 4.05 -0.27 (7)
C9. Promote group cohesiveness and group
3.54 -0.49 (10) 3.73 -09.84 (9)
norms
C10. Promote learner autonomy 3.88 -0.01 (5) 3.70 -0.88 (10)
As displayed in Table 9, the correlation between students’ perspectives of the
importance and the frequency of the motivational strategies (SI versus SF) was
significant at r = .46 (two tailed) and p < .01. There were significant correlations
between teachers’ perspectives of the importance and the frequency (TI versus TF) at r
28
= .796 (two tailed) and p < .01. The correlation between students’ and teachers’
perspectives of importance (SI versus TI) was significant at r = .695 (two tailed) and p
< .05. However, there was no significant correlation between students’ and teachers’
perspectives of frequency (SF versus TF).
Table 9 The correlations between the importance and the frequency
of the motivational strategies for students and teachers
SI TI TF
SF .460** -- .539
TF -- .796** --
TI .695* -- --
* Correlation is significant at the 0.05 level (2-tailed).
** Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed).
SI—The importance for students SF—The frequency for students
TI—The importance for teachers TF—The frequency for teachers
For the entire results section, some profound results can be gathered from the data.
For students, there are prominent differences in both the importance and the frequency of
the motivational strategies depending on the sex, status, and nationality of the learner.
Similarly, for teachers, there are also relevant differences in both the importance and the
frequency of the motivational strategies, based on the individual’s sex, years of teaching
experience, and levels of teaching. The following section will discuss the comparisons
29
between students and teachers as well as other interesting findings in greater detail.
5. Discussion
There are three interesting findings that will be discussed in the subsections. They
are pertinent to a better understanding of why students and teachers have differences
when ranking the importance and the frequency of the motivational strategies. They are:
Nationality difference—students; The comparisons: Students’ and teachers’ perspectives;
and Sex difference—students and teachers.
5. 1 Nationality difference—students
Nationality difference had a profound influence in the outcomes of the students’
surveys, especially reflecting on the responses obtained from Saudi Arabian and Japanese
students. There were prominent differences in the six categories of the important aspects
of nationality. They were C2, “Recognize students’ efforts,” C4, “Create a pleasant
classroom,” C5, “Present tasks properly,” C6, “Increase learners’ goal-orientedness,” C7,
“Make the learning tasks stimulating” and C10, “Promote learner autonomy.” Then, C2
was significant for the frequency aspect of nationality. As presented in Table 5, Saudi
Arabian students gave the highest scores in C4, C5, C7, and C10 and also in C2 for the
frequency aspect. C2, for the importance aspect, was given the highest score by Korean
students, while C6, at the important aspect, was regarded highest by Chinese students.
Conversely, Japanese students always had the lowest scores in each category shown
in Table 5 except C10 for the importance aspect, in which case Korean students had the
30
31
lowest score. The results indicated that Saudi Arabian students might be the easiest group
to be motivated in comparison to the students of other nationalities, especially by using
these strategies: C4, C5, C7, and C10. Also, these strategies in C2 could be an effective
way to motivate Korean students. Chinese students had more goal-oriented motivations
than other students who have different language backgrounds. In contrast, Japanese
students were probably the hardest group to motivate to learn a foreign language, a
finding which was endorsed by the outcome in Fotos and Jungheim’s study (2001).
Interestingly, the findings of this study corresponded with the results Reid (1987)
suggested, that is, “Arabic, Chinese, and Korean students appear to have multiple major
learning style preferences” (p. 98). Furthermore, Reid (1987) stated that “Japanese
speakers did not, as a group, identify a single major learning style” (p. 98).
Another reason for why Saudi Arabian, Chinese and Korean students gave higher
scores to some categories is that they may be predisposed toward giving positive
responses on questionnaires, while Japanese students contributed by responding
negatively; it could appear that Japanese students might be more critical than students of
other nationalities. If so, that is why they differed significantly in so many of the
statistical analyses. Obviously, culture may certainly play a role for increasing learners’
motivations.
5. 2 The comparisons: Students’ and teachers’ perspectives
This subsection will answer the second research question of this study: Do students
and teachers perceive the importance and the use of these motivational strategies
32
similarly or differently? The question was addressed by the top five categories obtained
from ranking the importance and the frequency of the motivational strategies from
students’ and teachers’ perspectives.
5. 2. 1 The importance
As can be seen in Table 10, the top five categories ranked in order of importance as
perceived by students were C6, “Increase learners’ goal-orientedness,” C5,“Present tasks
properly,” C1, “Proper teacher behavior,” C8, “Familiarize learners with L2-related
values” and C4, “Creating a pleasant classroom climate.” However, from the teachers’
viewpoint, the top five categories were C1, “Proper teacher behavior,” C5, “Present tasks
properly,” C4, “Creating a pleasant classroom climate,” C8, “Familiarize learners with
L2-related values” and C7, “Make the learning tasks stimulating.” The following section
will focus on the discussion of these top five categories as ranked by students and
teachers.
Table 10 The comparison of the top five ranking of the importance of the
categories between students and teachers
C6. Increase learners’ goal-orientedness 1 --
C5. Present tasks properly 2 2
C1. Proper teacher behavior 3 1
C8. Familiarize learners with L2-related values 4 4
C4. Creating a pleasant classroom climate 5 3
C7. Make the learning tasks stimulating -- 5
33
From the students’ perspective, C6, “Increase learners’ goal-orientedness,” was
ranked first, but it was not in the top five of the teachers’ ranking; instead, it was ranked
eighth. Obviously, students and teachers perceived this category differently. This result
probably reflected two points that should be regarded further. One point was that the
students might be mostly motivated by goal-oriented motivational strategies. In the 1990s,
goal-oriented motivation was grouped into two types: instrumental and integrative
orientations (Gardner, 1985); these orientations powerfully affect students’ motivation
(e.g., Dörnyei 1994a; Oxford & Shearin, 1994; Tremblay & Gardner, 1995). Hence, the
motivational strategies of C6 should be considered more important and thus more
frequently used in class. The other point was that the perceived purpose that students
have for learning another language should be considered when teachers make their
curricula.
Surprisingly, many of the participating students from collectivist societies might
perceive “Promote group cohesiveness and group norms” to be more important than
“Increase learners’ goal-orientedness,” which is as an individualistic goal, but the result is
wholly displayed in an opposite manner. The possible explanation for this might be that
one of the main goals for most of the participating students who studied at the advanced
level was to attain better TOEFL scores in order to enter their desired degree programs,
which belongs to an individual (personal) goal not related to groups. However, the main
goal for teachers in ESL programs was to improve students’ English abilities and to
provide as many opportunities as possible for students to use English. As such, the
different goals for the two groups caused the significant difference between how students
34
and teachers perceived this category. To be aware of what students’ needs and learning
goals are provides a better understanding for teachers and is one of the more effective
ways to motivate students who learn a foreign language.
C5, “Present tasks properly,” was ranked second by both students and teachers,
which means that students and teachers had similar perceptions of this point. The finding
was highlighted in the Hungarian teacher survey (Dörnyei & Csizér, 1998) and the
Taiwanese teacher survey (Cheng & Dörnyei, 2007). This is especially true for Cheng
and Dörnyei (2007), who stated that “Communicating an appropriate rationale and
strategic advice concerning how to approach a particular activity is endorsed by
Taiwanese English teachers as an essential ingredient of a motivating teaching practice”
(p. 162). Particularly important was that the result of this study confirmed this point again,
which means that presenting tasks properly was not only relevant from the teachers’
perspective but also the students’ perspective. In addition, this result reflected that teacher
modeling and presenting the meaning or purpose of a specific task would more
effectively increase student motivation. Students would then be willing to complete a task
with clear instruction and a meaningful purpose.
The third ranking of the importance from the students’ perspective was C1, “Proper
teacher behavior.” However, it was placed in the number one position in the teachers’ top
five rankings. Especially interesting was that this outcome corresponded to the results
found in both the Hungarian study (Dörnyei & Csizér, 1998) and the Taiwanese study
(Cheng & Dörnyei, 2007), indicating that no matter the culture, teachers consider
appropriate behavior on their part to be a crucial factor when motivating students.

35
However, this is not so for students. Also, from the teachers’ point of view, teachers
showing their enthusiasm could influence students’ motivation because Kunter (2008)
suggested that “Teachers who were more enthusiastic about teaching showed higher
quality instructional behavior: both self-reported and student-rated” (p. 468). Interestingly,
from the other way to see this outcome, a point deserving of mention was that
maintaining the positive image of the teacher would be quite important for teachers. This
means that teachers would like to keep their positive image with students and this might
be one of the ways to establish positive relationships with students, which is the most
important strategy as rated by students (see Appendix 3). Also, this strategy is the second
most important strategy in the teachers’ rankings, which means teachers and students
perceive this strategy similarly as being effective for increasing learners’ motivation. As
can be discerned, teachers are on the right track to motivate learners in this study.
Students and teachers perceived the importance of C8, “Familiarize learners with
L2-related values,” similarly, which was ranked fourth in both surveys. From the teachers’
position, there were two points that needed to be discussed. One point was that one of
four items in C8 corresponded with one of the main goals about teaching language, which
was encouraging students to use the target language as often as possible. Assuredly,
getting more chances to use the target language could increase their language abilities.
The other point was that teachers in the ESL program definitely face cross-cultural
problems or different cultural values, so helping students familiarize L2-related values is
an essential way to help students learn English.
Further, this point coincided with the students’ perspective, and this result might be
36
caused by the same reason, which probably was that the participating students who study
in the ESL program lived in the United States when they submitted their questionnaires.
Their lives were involved in American culture and they also had many opportunities to
experience life in the U.S. Because of this, they would probably like to understand more
about American culture. Here, teachers play a role in not only helping students learn
English, but also in adapting to life in the U.S. The result of this study suggested that
teachers could bring or introduce more topics or tasks about the culture of the target
language, especially some of the special festivals or holidays that are celebrated in the
U.S. Students would likely be willing to learn or be motivated if they can know more
about the cultural background of the target language.
C4, “Creating a pleasant classroom climate,” was rated the last of the top five
rankings by students, whereas it was in the middle of the teachers’ top five rankings.
Even though there was a diversity of opinions between students and teachers, making the
classroom climate more enjoyable has been found to play an important role in influencing
student motivation and achievement (e.g., Brophy, 1987; Cunniff, 1989; Grolnick & Ryan,
1990; Nabholz, 1944). The outcome reflected that teachers are aware that creating a pleasant
climate for the learning process in class would be an effective strategy to motivate
students; students’ responses also confirmed this point, but not to the extent that the
teachers did.
The fifth place in the teachers’ ranking was C7, “Make the learning tasks
stimulating,” which was in the second half of the students’ rankings. It was not relatively
different because of one ranking order difference between students and teachers. Around
37
the end of the twentieth century, many researchers suggested that a variety of stimulating
and challenging activities would be apt to be a magnet for catching and holding the
student's interest in a task (e.g., Adelman, 1978; Adelman & Taylor, 1986; Gottfried,
1983; Hatter, 1978, 1974). As we know, people would like to spend an amount of time
and energy on the activities in which they are interested. Because of this, there are still
many researchers who have been investigating how to motivate learners through arousing
their interests in learning since the end of the twentieth century (Maclellan, 2008; Jang,
2008; Palmer, 2009). Even though the result of this study showed that the importance of
C7 was in the middle of students’ and teachers’ rankings, making the learning tasks
stimulating and challenging would likely enhance students’ motivation. Learning interests
is an area that warrants further academic investigation, especially in light of the fact that
the concept of “interest” has become one of the crucial components for L2 learning
motivation (Crookes & Schmidt, 1991; Dörnyei, 1994; Tremblay & Gardner, 1995).
5. 2. 2 The frequency
After discussing students’ and teachers’ beliefs on the importance of the
motivational strategies, this subsection focuses on the use of the motivational strategies
perceived by students and teachers in class, that is, the comparison of the top five
rankings of the frequency between students and teachers as presented in Table 11. The top
five ranking orders of the frequency perceived by students were C1, “Proper teacher
behavior,” C5, “Present tasks properly,” C4, “Creating a pleasant classroom climate,” C3,
“Promote learners’ self-confidence” and C10, “Promote learner autonomy.” On the other
38
hand, from the teachers’ point of view, the top five rankings were C1, “Proper teacher
behavior,” C4, “Creating a pleasant classroom climate,” C5, “Present tasks properly,” C7,
“Make the learning tasks stimulating” and C2, “Recognize students’ effort.” The
following table and section concentrate on the discussion of these top five categories
obtained from students’ and teachers’ questionnaires.
Table 11 The comparison of the top five ranking of the frequency of the categories
between students and teachers
C1. Proper teacher behavior 1 1
C5. Present tasks properly 2 3
C4. Creating a pleasant classroom climate 3 2
C3. Promote learners’ self-confidence 4 --
C10. Promote learner autonomy 5 --
C7. Make the learning tasks stimulating -- 4
C2. Recognize students’ effort -- 5
The top three categories of the frequency of the motivational strategies in the
students’ rankings were C1, “Proper teacher behavior,” C5, “Present tasks properly” and
C4, “Creating a pleasant classroom climate.” Similarly, the same three categories were
the top three ranking from the teachers’ perspective, but there was an order difference,
which was the converse order of the second and the third positions in the teachers’
rankings. Therefore, the teachers’ top three rankings were C1, “Proper teacher behavior,”
C4, “Creating a pleasant classroom climate” and C5, “Present tasks properly.” From the
teachers’ viewpoint, these outcomes were associated with the teachers’ beliefs, that is, the
39
teachers frequently used the strategies they think are most important in class, indicating
that teachers’ beliefs relate positively to their behaviors. As shown in Table 9, the
importance of teachers’ perspectives significantly correlated with the frequency of
teachers’ perspective (TI versus TF) when r = .796 and p < .01. Moreover, the correlation
between students’ perspectives of the importance and the frequency of the motivational
strategies (SI versus SF) was significant when r = .46 and p < .01. It is known that TI and
TF have a stronger relationship than SI and SF, which means that the teachers’ actions
reflected their beliefs stronger than the students’ actions did. Nevertheless, and not
surprisingly, the results here revealed that students indeed had a similar perception of
these strategies, which teachers regarded more important and used more in class.
In the second half of the frequency in the teachers’ ranking was C3, “Promote
learners’ self-confidence,” which was ranked fourth by students. The result showed that
the students did perceive these strategies used by teachers in class, but it seems that it did
not correspond with teachers’ responses. However, several studies pointed out that the
way to develop a positive motivation to learn is likely to help students have no fear of
failure but also have high self-esteem (Adelman, 1978; Adelman & Taylor, 1986; Brophy,
1983; Mastropieri & Scruggs, 1994; Smith, 1994). Then, the way to maintain high
self-esteem is to provide students with positive responses instead of reprimands (Dev,
1997). Also, in 1983, Gottfried stated that positive responses to students’ questions can
increase students’ motivation. In addition, praise facilitates the learner in developing a
feeling of competence (Brophy, 1981; Gottfried, 1983; Swann & Pittman, 1977). Hence,
these strategies of promoting learners’ self-confidence could be examined as the effective

40
factors to motivate students to learn. Nevertheless, the reason for this difference between
students and teachers might be that teachers did use these strategies of promoting learners’
self-confidence in class, but they did not consider these strategies to be the main
strategies used to motivate students. For example, teachers would give positive feedback
by saying “good job,” “nice,” “excellent,” and so on after the students answered the
questions or presented their tasks. Even so, from the students’ viewpoint, they did receive
a considerable number of positive responses from teachers.
Interestingly, from the teachers’ viewpoint, the fourth ranking of the frequency was
C7, “Make the learning tasks stimulating,” which was rated in the second half of the
students’ ranking. The outcome indicated that teachers exert a pull on motivating students
by employing various stimulating and challenging activities or tasks, but students did not
experience this as much as teachers did. Nonetheless, in order to increase students’
motivation toward learning language, providing the learner with challenges is one of the
essential factors of making the learning tasks stimulating (Pittman, Emery, & Boggiano,
1982). One thing that needs to be considered, though, is that the task should not be too far
beyond the students’ achievable ability level, that is, the student should have the
possibility of success (Dev, 1997).
The fifth ranking of the frequency from the students’ perspective was C10,
“Promote learner autonomy,” which was placed seventh in the teachers’ survey. This
indicated that students experienced the use of the motivational strategies used by teachers
differently. Since Deci and Ryan (1985) investigated self-determination theory,
autonomy-supportive style has become a prominent area of concern for enhancing

41
intrinsic motivation. In 1997, Ryan, Kuhl and Deci suggested that “self-determination
theory (SDT) is an approach to human motivation and personality that uses traditional
empirical methods while employing an organismic metatheory that highlights the
importance of humans' evolved inner resources for personality development and
behavioral self-regulation” (Ryan & Deci, 2000, p. 68). SDT concentrates on the extent to
which human actions are performed by an individual of his or her own accord; it includes
much retrospect on the actions undertaken (“Self-determination,” 2008). It was noted that
“Autonomy is a basic human need having influence on motivation” (Harper, 2007, p. 23).
Furthermore, a classroom that students perceived as safe, supportive of their autonomy
and of their learning was indicated to increase intrinsic motivation (Oginsky, 2003).
Resultantly, Deci and Ryan’s and Ryan and Deci’s studies (1985 & 2000) reveal that
teachers’ motivating styles can be conceptualized as a continuum extending from
controlling style to autonomy-supportive style. The result of this study showed that the
participating teachers’ style tended to be the autonomy-supportive style when observed
from the students’ perspective, and students perceived these strategies used in class more
than teachers realized. One possible reason for this might be because more than half of
the participating students came from East Asia, where teachers’ motivating style is apt to
be controlling in nature. In contrast to the teachers’ style in the ESL program, which has a
rather different communicative style (the autonomy-supportive style), the students might
have an impressionable experience while they study in the Western education system.
Conversely, C2, “Recognize students’ effort,” was ranked last in the teachers’ top
five rankings of its frequency, but it was not in the students’ top five rankings; it was
42
rated in the seventh position. In 1986, Schunk & Cox conveyed that providing students
with feedback concerning efforts has been found to increase intrinsic motivation by
helping students attribute successful outcomes to their own efforts, which was confirmed
by the participating teachers’ actions. As such, teachers should encourage students to trust
in their own efforts for successful outcomes (Dev, 1997). It can be gathered, then, the
participating teachers were on the right track to motivate students by using these
strategies, even though students and teachers had a diversity of experiences concerning
these strategies when used in class. One explanation for this may be that the manner in
which teachers use these strategies did not permit students to experience as much as they
would like.
5. 3 Sex difference—students and teachers
The sex of the participants played an important role in ranking the categories.
From the teachers’ perspective, female and male teachers had a diversity of beliefs about
C6, “Increase learners’ goal-orientedness,” where the means for female and male teachers
were 4.41 and 3.33, respectively. This result was likely to point out that female teachers
were more concerned about learner’s needs and learning goals than male teachers were.
Also, according to Prime, Carter, and Welbourne (2009), women’s leadership
behaviors were effectively more care-taking than men’s whereas men’s leadership
behaviors were effectively more take-charge than women’s. As can be gathered, women
might be more care-taking and manage in a more hands-on way than men. Therefore, one
possible explanation for this difference is that female teachers are likely to regard what
43
students’ needs are more objectively, but male teachers might subjectively assume that
they know what students need. Then, from the students’ viewpoint, there were noticeable
differences of the importance for C1, “Proper teacher behavior,” C8, “Familiarized
learners with L2-ralated values” and C10, “Promote learner autonomy.” The mean
differences of female and male in C1, C8 and C10 were 4.10 and 4.52, 4.04 and 4.37, and
3.70 and 4.19, respectively.
In contrast to teachers, male students achieved higher mean scores than female
students did in each of the three categories. According to Ryker, Mayton and Granby
(1992), males and females hold different value priorities, which corresponded with the
outcome here. Males put higher value priorities on a comfortable life, an exciting life,
pleasure, social recognition, self-control and so on (Ryker, Mayton & Granby, 1992). In
somewhat of an opposition, females set higher value priorities on world peace, equality,
inner harmony, self-respect, being loving and similar notions (Ryker, Mayton & Granby,
1992). Therefore, female teachers regarded C6 highly and male students were concerned
with C8 and C10 because of their different value priorities. Female teachers want to be
friendly in order to attain peace and harmony by considering students’ needs and learning
goals. However, males place a higher value priority on social recognition and self-control,
which reflects C8 and C10 because they were regarded more important in male students’
responses.
Surprisingly, male students considered C1 to be more important than females did,
which showed us that establishing teachers’ positive images and creating a positive
relationship with students play important roles for male students in the learning process
44
and when motivating male students.

6. Conclusion and Limitation
This was a small sample of the participants in this study who may be specific to one
group of ESL students at Kent State University; therefore, this study may not be
applicable to groups at other colleges. Nonetheless, this study was still beneficial for
gaining a better understanding of which motivational strategy was most effective from the
learners’ point of view.
The current study examined two aspects of the comparisons between teachers’ and
learners’ perspectives toward these motivational strategies. One aspect was how important
motivational strategies are for developing learners’ motivation. The other aspect was how
frequently teachers use motivational strategies in class. Concerning the importance aspect,
students and teachers had similar perceptions of the motivational strategies “Present tasks
properly” and “Familiarize learners with L2-related values.” Conversely, they perceived
the strategies of “Increase learners’ goal-orientedness,” “Proper teacher behavior,”
“Creating a pleasant classroom climate” and “Make the learning tasks stimulating”
differently. However, concerning the frequency aspect, there were similarities on the
strategies “Proper teacher behavior,” “Present tasks properly” and “Creating a pleasant
classroom climate,” whereas students and teachers had differences of opinion concerning
the “Promote learners’ self-confidence,” “Promote learner autonomy,” “Make the
learning tasks stimulating,” and “Recognize students’ effort” strategies.
The results showed that goal-oriented motivation is an effective teaching strategy
45
46
for the students who participate in an ESL program, indicating that teachers should gain a
better understanding of learners’ needs and learning goals in order to increase learners’
motivation for learning a foreign language. This confirmed the long-term objective of this
study, which was developing evidence to enable teachers to gain a better understanding of
which motivational strategy is most effective from the learners’ point of view. This is in
line with the outcome in Dev’s study (1997), where he stated, “The suggested strategies
for enhancing intrinsic motivation are adaptable for a variety of student needs and
abilities” (para. 33), quickly adding that “Educators need to keep in mind that individual
differences are likely to influence the efficacy and outcome of the strategies used to
enhance academic intrinsic motivation” (para. 31). Nevertheless, it is not possible to
satisfy every student’s needs, providing instead a suggestion for teachers to make their
teaching styles, curricula, assessments and policies flexible enough to meet learners’
needs in the classroom (Adelman & Taylor, 1986).
Interestingly, though quite unexpected, presenting tasks properly is more important
than making tasks stimulating for learners in this study, reflecting that even though a task
is not interesting to learners, they will be willing to do or learn if the task is given clear
instruction. Also, providing students with a familiarity of L2-related values, such as
presenting cultural background of the target language or encouraging learners to use the
target language as much as possible, is a prominent strategy for increasing learners’
motivation. The results suggest that teachers should provide understandable instructions
and sufficient cultural values of the target language to motivate learners.
Another finding is also worthy of mention: establishing a positive relationship with

47
students is the most effective strategy in motivating learners. This result suggests that
teachers should establish a positive relationship with their students, especially in regard to
providing a supportive learning environment. In 2006, Reeve suggested that building
positive relationships with students produces academic and developmental benefits for
learners; furthermore, Reeve and Jang (2006) added that the relationship should be of
high-quality as well as rich in attunement and supportiveness, which validates the
suggestion in this study.
In terms of nationality and sex differences, they indeed influence learners’ and
teachers’ perceptions of the motivational strategies in certain ways. The results would
seem to indicate that Saudi Arabian students are more easily motivated and Japanese
students are not-so-easily motivated. Sex difference is a general factor but is always
worthy of being evaluated in any research. With this in mind, the findings reveal that
females and males do occasionally have different beliefs in regard to some of the
motivational strategies. However, the specific reasons for these differences are the areas
that merit further exploration.
The results suggest possible interpretations of how or why students and teachers
have similar and different perceptions of the motivational strategies, as well as what kind
of the motivational strategies are more effective in motivating learners. Nevertheless,
these results may be specific to one group and not universal to learning a foreign
language as a whole. One limitation to the study is that the participants were a small
sample in an immersion situation, which means that the participants in this survey are
almost all from one department in one university. It remains to be seen whether students
48
at other universities, or even in other departments within the same institution, would
show similar results.
In spite of the limitation of having a small sample of participants in a specific
situation, the findings presented here conclude that understanding which motivational
strategy is most effective from the learners’ perspective is associated with helping
teachers to select and implement effective strategies for teaching a foreign language. It is
hoped that this evidence will provide a better comprehension of increas.ing learners’
motivation for learning a foreign language for teachers.

Note
The participants of this study were expected from both the ESL department and the
MCLS department at Kent State University; unfortunately, however, there were no
participants from the MCLS except one instructor. Based on this circumstance, there is
one explanation for why C8, “Familiarize learners with L2-related values,” is ranked
fourth for importance in the teachers’ survey, but it does not exist in the top five rankings
of the frequency as ranked by the teachers. Two of the strategy items in C8, item number
4,“Increase the amount of English/the target language you use in the class,” and item
number 11, “Invite native speakers to class,” are not frequently used in class. This is
because the teachers in the ESL department, who all are native speakers, only speak
English in class. As such, these strategy items are considered high in the importance
aspect but are not reflected in the frequency from the teachers’ perspective.
49
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Appendices
Appendix 1: Questionnaire for students
Motivational Strategy Survey for Students

Part 1: Please express your opinions about how important teachers’ actions are for you
by checking the proper response.
Very Less not
Teacher’s actions: Important Important So-so Important Important
1. Establish good relationship with
students
2. Bring in and encourage humor
3. Ask students to work toward the
same goal
4.Increase the amount of English/the
target language you use in the class
5. Make sure grades reflect students’
efforts and hard work
6. Introduce various interesting
topics
7. Make clear to students that
communicating meaning effectively
is more important than being
grammatically correct
8. Create a supportive classroom so
students will take risks
9. Show your enthusiasm for
teaching
10. Use a short and interesting
opening activity to start each class
11. Invite native speakers to class
12. Give good reasons to students as
to why a particular task is meaningful
13. Help students develop realistic
goals about learning English
14. Familiarize students with the
cultural background of the target
language
15. Encourage students to set
personal learning goals
16. Break the routine by varying the
presentation format
17. Encourage students find out
mistakes by themselves
18. Let students suggest class rules
58
59
19. Monitor students’ progress and

celebrate their victories
20. Encourage students to use
English/the target language outside
the classroom
21. Find out students’ needs and build
them into a course
22. Give clear instructions by
showing examples
23. Encourage students to share
personal experiences and thoughts
24. Be yourself in front of students
25. Make tasks challenging
26. Encourage learning from
classmates in small groups
27. Provide students with positive
feedback
28. Give students choices in deciding
how and when they will be graded
Part 2: Please express your experiences about how frequently you experience teacher’s
actions below in class by checking the proper response.
Very hardly
Teacher’s actions: often often sometimes ever never
students
same goal
4.Increase the amount of English/the
target language you use in the class
5. Make sure grades reflect students’
60
efforts and hard work

6. Introduce various interesting topics
9. Show your enthusiasm for teaching
to why a particular task is meaningful
language
presentation format
the classroom
21. Find out students’ needs and build
them into a course
61

showing examples
feedback
28. Give students choices in deciding
how and when they will be graded
The motivational strategy items were adapted from Cheng and Dörnyei (2007).
Other comments:
Name:___________________
Age:__________
Sex: □ Female □ Male
Status: □ Undergraduate □ Graduate □ Others:____________
Country of origin:___________
First language:_____________
Language of learning:______________
The level of learning English/the language: □ Elementary □ Intermediate □
Advance
Years of learning English/the language:___________
Email:________________________________
62
Appendix 2: Questionnaire for teachers
Motivational Strategy Survey for Instructors

Part 1: Please express your opinions about how important each strategy is for
developing learners’ motivation by checking the proper response.
Very Less not
Important Important So-so Important Important
students
same goal
4.Increase the amount of
English/the target language you use
in the class
5. Make sure grades reflect
students’ efforts and hard work
topics
teaching
to why a particular task is
meaningful
63

language
presentation format
the classroom
21. Find out students’ needs and
build them into a course
showing examples
feedback
28. Give students choices in
deciding how and when they will be
graded
64
Part 2: Please express your experiences about how frequently you use each strategy by
checking the proper response.
Very hardly
often often sometimes ever never
students
same goal
4.Increase the amount of
English/the target language you use
in the class
5. Make sure grades reflect
students’ efforts and hard work
topics
teaching
to why a particular task is
meaningful
65

language
presentation format
the classroom
21. Find out students’ needs and
build them into a course
showing examples
feedback
28. Give students choices in
deciding how and when they will be
graded
The motivational strategy items were adapted from Cheng and Dörnyei (2007).
66
Other comments:
Name:___________________
Age:__________
Sex: □ Female □ Male
Country of origin:___________
First language:_____________
Years of teaching:___________
Language of teaching:______________
The courses of
teaching:_______________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
___________
The students’ level of teaching: □ Elementary □ Intermediate □ Advance
The students’ academic level of teaching: □ Undergraduate □ Graduate □
Other:____________
67
Appendix 3: Students—the means, mean differences, standard deviation (SD) and

z-scores of the motivational strategy items and ten categories
The importance for students (SI)

Scales and items Mean Z-score
Mean diff SD (rank
order)
All the strategies 4.18 .382

C1 “Proper teacher behavior” 4.35 0.17 0.51 0.33 (3)
1. Establish good relationship with students 4.78 0.60 0.42 1.41
9. Show your enthusiasm for teaching 4.29 0.11 0.87 0.13
24. Be yourself in front of students 3.95 -0.23 1.04 -0.22
C2 “Recognize students’ efforts” 4.13 -0.05 0.72 -0.08 (7)
5. Make sure grades reflect students’ efforts
4.23 0.04 0.95 0.05
and hard work
19. Monitor students’ progress and celebrate
4.03 -0.15 0.92 -0.17
their victories
C3 “Promote learners’ self-confidence” 4.19 0.01 0.53 0.01 (6)
7. Make clear to students that communicating
meaning effectively is more important than 4.10 -0.08 0.81 -0.10
being grammatically correct
27. Provide students with positive feedback 4.28 0.10 0.68 0.14
C4 “Create a pleasant classroom” 4.21 0.03 0.61 0.05 (5)
2. Bring in and encourage humor 4.40 0.22 0.67 0.33
8. Create a supportive classroom so students
4.10 -0.08 0.98 -0.08
will take risks
10. Use a short and interesting opening
4.13 -0.05 0.82 -0.07
activity to start each class
C5 “Present tasks properly” 4.42 0.24 0.54 0.45 (2)
68
12. Give good reasons to students as to why a

4.18 0.00 0.85 0.00
particular task is meaningful
22. Give clear instructions by showing
4.68 0.50 0.53 0.94
examples
C6 “Increase learners’ goal-orientedness” 4.41 0.23 0.46 0.49 (1)
13. Help students develop realistic goals
4.38 0.20 0.67 0.29
about learning English
15. Encourage students to set personal
4.43 0.25 0.64 0.39
learning goals
21. Find out students’ needs and build them
4.43 0.25 0.84 0.29
into a course
C7 “Make the learning tasks stimulating” 4.18 0.00 0.55 0.01 (6)
6. Introduce various interesting topics 4.62 0.44 0.54 0.80
4.00 -0.18 0.91 -0.20
presentation format
25. Make tasks challenging 3.95 -0.23 0.80 -0.29
C8 “Familiarize learners with L2-related
4.23 0.04 0.44 0.10 (4)
values”
4.Increase the amount of English/the target
4.50 0.32 0.68 0.47
language you use in the class
11. Invite native speakers to class 3.80 -0.38 1.11 -0.34
14. Familiarize students with the cultural
4.23 0.04 0.77 0.06
background of the target language
20. Encourage students to use English/the
4.38 0.20 0.90 0.22
target language outside the classroom
C9 “Promote group cohesiveness and
3.82 -0.36 0.68 -0.53 (9)
group norms”
3. Ask students to work toward the same goal 3.82 -0.36 0.91 -0.39
18. Let students suggest class rules 3.48 -0.71 1.15 -0.61
69
23. Encourage students to share personal

4.23 0.04 1.00 0.05
experiences and thoughts
C10 “Promote learner autonomy” 3.98 -0.21 0.78 -0.26 (8)
17. Encourage students find out mistakes by
3.98 -0.21 1.17 -0.18
themselves
26. Encourage learning from classmates in
3.98 -0.21 1.00 -0.21
small groups
28. Give students choices in deciding how
3.98 -0.21 1.05 -0.20
and when they will be graded
The frequency for students (SF)

Scales and items Mean Z-score
Mean diff SD (rank
order)
All the strategies 3.88 .50

C2 “Recognize students’ efforts” 3.83 -0.05 0.79 -0.06 (7)
4.13 0.25 0.86 0.29
and hard work
3.50 -0.38 1.06 -0.36
their victories
7. Make clear to students that communicating
meaning effectively is more important than 3.75 -0.13 0.81 -0.16
being grammatically correct
70
3.93 0.04 0.94 0.05
will take risks
3.88 0.00 1.09 0.00
12. Give good reasons to students as to why a
3.65 -0.23 0.98 -0.24
particular task is meaningful
4.45 0.57 0.71 0.80
examples
C6 “Increase learners’ goal-orientedness” 3.62 -0.26 0.73 -0.36 (9)
3.68 -0.21 1.02 -0.20
3.70 -0.18 0.91 -0.20
learning goals
3.48 -0.41 1.04 -0.39
into a course
C7 “Make the learning tasks stimulating” 3.86 -0.02 0.72 -0.02 (6)
3.58 -0.31 1.15 -0.26
presentation format
3.71 -0.17 0.66 -0.27 (8)
values”
4.23 0.35 0.74 0.47
71

3.80 -0.08 1.04 -0.08
3.70 -0.18 1.09 -0.17
C9 “Promote group cohesiveness and -0.49
3.54 -0.34 0.69
group norms” (10)
3. Ask students to work toward the same goal 3.53 -0.36 0.91 -0.39
4.10 0.22 0.84 0.26
C10 “Promote learner autonomy” 3.88 0.00 0.71 -0.01 (5)
3.65 -0.23 1.03 -0.22
themselves
4.28 0.40 0.88 0.45
small groups
3.70 -0.18 0.88 -0.20
72
Appendix 4: Teachers—the means, mean differences, standard deviation (SD) and

z-scores (ranking) of the motivational strategy items and ten categories
The importance for teachers (TI)

Scales and items Z-score
Mean Mean-diff SD (rank
order)

C2 “Recognize students’ efforts” 4.27 0.03 0.61 0.05 (7)
4.18 -0.06 0.98 -0.06
and hard work
4.36 0.12 0.67 0.18
their victories
communicating meaning effectively is more 3.82 -0.42 0.87 -0.48
important than being grammatically correct
5.00 0.76 0.00 --
will take risks
3.91 -0.33 0.83 -0.40
73
12. Give good reasons to students as to why

4.45 0.21 0.69 0.31
a particular task is meaningful
4.73 0.49 0.47 1.04
examples
C6 “Increase learners’ goal-orientedness” 4.24 0.00 0.62 0.00 (8)
4.36 0.12 0.81 0.15
3.91 -0.33 1.22 -0.27
learning goals
4.45 0.21 0.52 0.41
into a course
4.36 0.12 0.67 0.18
presentation format
4.39 0.15 0.42 0.35 (4)
values”
4.64 0.40 0.92 0.43
4.36 0.12 1.03 0.12
4.91 0.67 0.30 2.22
3.61 -0.63 0.57
group norms” (10)
3. Ask students to work toward the same
3.73 -0.51 0.90 -0.57
goal
74
4.27 0.03 0.79 0.04
C10 “Promote learner autonomy” -0.81
3.76 -0.48 0.60
(9)
4.00 -0.24 1.00 -0.24
themselves
4.27 0.03 0.65 0.05
small groups
3.00 -1.24 1.00 -1.24
The frequency for teachers (TF)

Scales and items Z-score
Mean Mean-diff SD (rank
order)

24. Be yourself in front of students 4.91 0.70 0.30 2.32
C2 “Recognize students’ efforts” 4.32 0.11 0.72 0.15 (5)
4.27 0.06 0.90 0.07
and hard work
4.36 0.15 0.81 0.19
their victories
75

communicating meaning effectively is more 4.00 -0.21 0.77 -0.27
important than being grammatically correct
4.82 0.61 0.40 1.50
will take risks
3.82 -0.39 1.08 -0.36
12. Give good reasons to students as to why
4.27 0.06 0.79 0.08
a particular task is meaningful
4.82 0.61 0.40 1.50
examples
C6 “Increase learners’ goal-orientedness” -0.48
3.82 -0.39 0.82
(8)
3.73 -0.48 1.01 -0.48
3.55 -0.66 1.13 -0.59
learning goals
4.18 -0.03 0.75 -0.04
into a course
4.09 -0.12 0.70 -0.17
presentation format
76
C8 “Familiarize learners with L2-related -0.27

4.05 -0.16 0.62
values” (7)
4.55 0.34 1.21 0.28
4.27 0.06 1.01 0.06
4.64 0.43 0.67 0.63
3.73 -0.48 0.57
group norms” (9)
3. Ask students to work toward the same
3.91 -0.30 0.70 -0.43
goal
4.64 0.43 0.67 0.63
C10 “Promote learner autonomy” -0.88
3.70 -0.51 0.59
(10)
4.18 -0.03 0.60 -0.05
themselves
4.18 -0.03 0.87 -0.03
small groups
2.73 -1.48 1.27 -1.17

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Motivational Strategies:

Students’ and Teachers’ Perspectives

to Kent State University in partial

fulfillment of the requirements for the

degree of Master of Arts

Kristen Precht , Advisor

Ron Corthell , Chair, Department of English

Timothy S. Moerland , Dean, College of Arts and Sciences

6. Conclusion and Limitation………………………………………………....….….45

Table 2 The level of learning language……………………………………………...13

Table 3 The symbols for each category (macrostrategy)……………………………..15

in sex and nationality dimensions………………………………………......21

in years of teaching and teaching experience dimensions………………….22

Table 5 The importance and the frequency of motivational categories

by nationality as shown through means for significant differences………..23

in sex, years of teaching and teaching experience dimensions……………..24

in years of teaching and teaching experience dimensions……………….…25

perspectives of the importance of the motivational strategies.........................26

teachers’ perspectives of the frequency of the motivational strategies…........27

Table 9 The correlations between the importance and the frequency

of the motivational strategies for students and teachers…………………......28

categories between students and teachers……………………………………32

between students and teachers…………………………………………….....38

friends for their invaluable support and encouragement.

Motivation is demonstrated to be one of the main determinants of second language

pervasive influence on learning a foreign language. Andrew D. Cohen and Zoltán

on strategies to substitute threatening or frightening situations and tasks.

explored for increasing motivation for learning a foreign language.

Therefore, several studies were conducted to investigate teachers’ beliefs and

presented in his text, Motivational Strategies in the Language Classroom, to enable

in order to enable teachers to obtain a better comprehension of which motivational

strategies are more effective from the learners’ perspective.

investigated and filled by this study.

Motivation is one of the most important factors for learning a foreign/second

language (L2). In order to describe L2 learning motivation, two Canadian scholars,

instrumental and integrative motivation. Instrumental motivation focuses on pragmatic

1990s, although it was criticized as an oversimplification (Dörnyei, 1994a; Gardner &

motivated behaviors are internal, such as obtaining valued accomplishments, satisfying

Schunk, 2002, p.245).

learning situation level can be divided into course-specific motivational components,

teacher-specific motivational components and group-specific motivational components.

Course-specific motivational components consisted of four categories, interest, relevance,

Group-specific motivational components contained four aspects of group dynamics:

A teacher’s authority type is dependent on whether the teacher supports autonomy or

the exploration of other motivational theories as a way of expanding the motivation

components to the test of stimulating L2 learners’ motivation.

As previously mentioned, starting in the 1990s, there were numerous studies

accomplishments influence forthcoming goal expectations; (2) cognitive theories of

motivation, which is a function of a person’s thoughts, especially those related to the

as features of both the language course and the language teacher.

2.2 Motivational Strategy

Strategies in the Language Classroom. These motivational strategies could be categorized

seen as an important aspect of motivation toward learning a foreign language. Therefore,

Williams & Burden, 1997).

Moreover, Dörnyei (1994a) integrated several relevant motivational components

into a multilevel, second-language motivational construct in order to understand second

language motivation from an educational perspective. Based on these components, he

he created a questionnaire that included 18 statements to describe situations where

is obvious evidence indicating that teachers’ motivational strategies critically manipulate

the development of L2 learning motivation.

Dörnyei and Csizér (1998) conducted empirical research of Hungarian teachers of

strategies. According to their findings, the researchers formulated ten motivational

practices. Ten motivational macrostrategies, including 48 motivational strategies,