The development of motivation research in educational psychology: the transition from early theories to self-related approaches

Motivation has been one of the earliest concepts of interest in general and educational psychology. Learning is mediated by individuals’ reasons and choices to do something or to abstain from it. The current paper is an attempt to summarise and review the development of motivation theories, models and frameworks within educational psychology. It specifically focuses on the emergence of self-related theories in motivation research. The earlier trends and theories such as expectancy-value theories, goal theories, and attribution theories are briefly described and the influential scholars who contributed to these theoretical developments are introduced. Then, the theoretical transition to self-related theories of motivation is highlighted. A general review of self-worth, self-determination and self-efficacy theories that stemmed from the concept of self is also provided

Pragmatics: A Book Review

Pragmatics was written by Chapman (2011) and published by MPG Books Group, Bodmin and Kings Lynn in Great Britain. Chapman’s monograph offers a beautifully clear and wide-ranging introduction to all the major developments in core theoretical pragmatics, from the very beginning to the present day. With increasing scholarly interest in meaning in context in the field of linguistics (e.g. Halliday, 2001; Hasan, 2009; Van Dijk, 2009), it seems like a timely contribution. The author’s aims of this book are to describe both early and recent developments in pragmatics, and also to show how pragmatics relates to the study of language more generally. It does more than provide an introductory overview. It encourages the reader to engage with some of the fundamental issues faced by pragmatics, and to appreciate the current controversies and debates in which they are engaged. The primary aim of this book is to contribute students taking undergraduate degree level courses in pragmatics or in linguistics more generally,  it should also be useful to postgraduate students in these areas and to researchers in linguistics and related disciplines who are interested in finding out about what is currently going on in pragmatics

Carroll's Autonomous Induction Theory: Combining Views from UG and Information Processing Theories

Without other mechanisms such as induction and parsers, UG-based approaches to linguistic cognition seem to fail to explain the logical problem of language acquisition. Hence, a property theory has to be adopted to combine UG views with other cognitive mechanisms like information processing and restructuring (Ellis, 2008). Pienemann (1998, 2003)'s Processibility Theory, and Levelt’s (1989) psycholinguistic theory of speech production, Jackendof's (1987, 1997, 2002) MOGUL, and Carroll’s (2001, 2002) Autonomous Induction Theory (AIT) are among the models which try to add new views to the UG-based approaches. Although suffering from a number of criticisms and having a high degree of abstractness, AIT with its major premises and conceptions related to the role of induction, attention, input, input processing, feedback, learning, and UG seems to be able to explain some of the UG enigma in second language acquisition

The Impact of Feedback Types on Farsi Speaking EFL Learners’ Recognition and Production of Relative Clauses

The presen­t study compared the impact of metalinguistic feedback, explicit feedback, and implicit feedback on the recognition and production of relati­ve clauses in fifty-nine intermediate Persian-speaking English learners’ performances. The three groups were matched according to the instructional time, conten­t, and methodology and received differen­t feedbacks on their writings for eight sessions. Analysis of the research data obtained from an immediate and a delayed 45-item multiple-choice focused grammar test and writing post-test displayed the difficulty hierarchy of learning relati­ve clauses. Significan­t improvemen­ts on the immediate post-test for all groups were observed, but no effect on the delayed posttest was found. The metalinguistic feedback group, however, achieved significan­tly higher levels of accuracy in their use of relati­ve clauses on the writing post-test. The findings support the Interpretabi­lity Hypothesis and the Complex Adapti­ve System Principles Model and suggest that metalinguistic knowledge can serve as compensatory mechanisms to the correct production of relati­ve clauses

An Activity Theory Perspective on the Role of Cooperative Assessment in the Reading Comprehension of Iranian EFL Learners

Reading comprehension has recently been reconceptualized in EFL reading instruction to foreground the importance of putting a social perspective on learning. Developed as a crucial aspect of Vygotskian sociocultural theory, activity theory views reading as a socially-mediated activity, for which the prerequisite cognitive processes are distributed among teacher, individual reader, other students, and artifacts (Cole & Engeström, 1993). Given that cooperation and division of labor are the central tenets of activity theory, this study aimed at investigating whether assessing cooperative learning had a decisive effect on the reading comprehension of Iranian EFL learners. To this end, 60 sophomores majoring in English translation at Islamic Azad University, Tehran Central Branch, were selected as the participants of the study. The reading instruction was geared to cooperative learning based on the elements of activity theory. Over the course of 12 weeks, both the process and products of cooperative reading were self-, peer-, and instructor-assessed. The findings indicated that assessing cooperative reading through the lens of activity theory had a significant effect on the participants’ reading comprehension. In addition, there was a statistically significant difference between the products of cooperative reading in predicting the participants’ reading comprehension posttest scores. Furthermore, the results showed that the participants held favorable perception toward activity theory-based cooperative assessment. The findings are hoped to shine a light on collective reading and highlight the need for more innovative constructivist approaches to EFL reading in Iran

EFL Learners’ Deployment of Motivational Self-Regulatory Strategies and their Academic Achievement

Self-regulation of learning has been extensively investigated in second language (L2) learning. Many studies have focused on the strategies that language learners employ to regulate their own learning processes. However, motivational self-regulation is considerably less explored. The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between motivational self-regulatory strategies (MSRSs) and academic achievement. A motivational self-regulation questionnaire was administered to 64 male and female adult Iranian EFL learners to measure their choice of various strategies. The quantitative data was analyzed by applying correlational and multivariate analyses. The results demonstrated that there was a strong relationship between motivational self-regulatory strategy use and academic achievement. However, no difference was found between male and female learners in their use of the strategies. Further examination revealed that higher-achieving students differed from lower-achieving participants in their preference for strategies. The article concludes that while all learners use extrinsic rewards to self-regulate their motivation, more successful learners tend to manipulate learning tasks to make the tasks intrinsically interesting and pleasant. Also, more successful learners set both long-term and short-term goals to motivate themselves. The results underscore the importance of students’ personal interests, needs and goals, and suggest that teachers foster learners’ command of the strategies through instruction and cooperative activities

Development and Validation of an English Language Teacher Professional Identity Scale (ELTPIS)

The notion of teacher professional identity has become a regular fixture in numerous theoretical and empirical studies in both mainstream and L2 teacher education. Consequently, a number of scales have been designed and developed to quantify this construct. To be sure, the extant instruments are general with regard to both context and subject matter, and this line of inquiry has not addressed the quantification of the concept in the ELT profession. The present study was, therefore, an attempt to provide a (re)conceptualization of L2 teachers’ professional identity through exploring its underlying components. To this end, an initial 61-item, self-assessment questionnaire was developed using a comprehensive review of the related literature and experts’ opinion. The trial scale was then administered to a sample of 676 ELT teachers. Results of exploratory factor analysis reduced the instrument to 42 items, leading to a six-factor model which indicated that L2 teacher identity includes: researching and developing one’s own practice; language awareness; institutional and collective practice; engaging learners as whole persons; appraising one’s teacher self; and sociocultural and critical practice. Confirmatory factor analysis substantiated the resultant six-factor model as a robust and valid tool for measuring ELT teachers’ professional identity

Learning to Become L2 Teachers: Prospective Teachers’ Professional Identity Development

Learning to teach is conceptualized as a complex process of identity development. To address this process, this study explored Prospective Teachers’ (PTs) professional identity development at different stages of learning to teach within a four-year Second Language (L2) initial teacher education program. Participating in a sequential explanatory mixed-methods approach, 140 PTs filled out the English language teacher professional identity questionnaire three times: at the end of the second year, third year, and fourth year. Then, after each round of the questionnaire administration, 12 PTs were asked to participate in the interview phase to gain further insight into the participants’ professional identity development. Three separate sets of Freidman test and grounded theory were employed to evaluate the questionnaire and interview data, respectively. The results of both quantitative and qualitative data analyses revealed that the second-year PTs’ language awareness had a major contribution to the enactment of collective identity of language analyst and language user roles as part of their professional identity. Teaching practicum experiences also helped the third-year PTs develop a sense of belonging to the school community by aligning themselves with its rules and policies, which helped them develop their professional identity in a prescribed manner, informing institutionally situated identity of formal teachers. The fourth-year PTs’ identification of themselves with regard to their prospective learners’ needs was also the identity development observed in the form of learner-oriented attitude toward learners as whole persons, all conducive to imagined future identity of needs analysts. The results and implications are further discussed

Persian Speakers’ Recognition of English Relative Clauses: The Effects of Enhanced Input vs. Explicit Feedback Types

Despite consensus in focus on form (FOF) instruction over the facilitative role of noticing, controversy has not quelled over ways of directing EFL learners’ attention towards formal features via implicit techniques like input-enhancement or explicit metacognitive feedback and interactive peer-editing on the output they produce. This quasi-experimental study investigated the impact of input enhancement (IE), metalinguistic feedback (MF), and peer-editing (PE), on 73 intermediate female Iranian EFL learners’ recognition of relative clauses (RCs). The participants, in three intact classes ranged in age between 18 and 30, were randomly assigned as IE (N=23), MF (N=29), and PE (N=21) groups. The 18-session treatment in all groups was based on identical teaching materials and methodology following a reading to writing orientation focused on RCs. The only difference was related to the focus on form that was through enhanced reading texts in the IE group, metalinguistic feedback on discussion of content in the MF group, and peer-editing in pair-discussion of the content in the PE group. Two parallel sets of 40-item multiple choice researcher-made validated tests focused on RCs were employed to measure the participants’ recognition of RCs at the onset and the end of the study. The one-way between-groups analysis of covariance demonstrated significantly higher gains in the MF and PE groups compared to the IE group; the MF achieved higher levels of mastery. The findings highlight the effectiveness of MF and offer implications for more effective teaching of RCs to Iranian EFL learners

The Effect of System-Nested, Genre-Oriented, Structurally-Mediated Model (SGSM) of Writing Instruction, and Swalesian Model (SM) upon Iranian Learners’ Writing Performance: A Comparative Study

The purpose of the present study was first to offer a tentative solution to the problems observed in writing pedagogy in Iran by devising a more comprehensive approach to genre-based writing instruction. In the second phase, a quasi-experimental research design was adopted to determine how effective the model was in writing instruction, compared with the traditional, product-oriented approach, as well as Swales’ genre-based approach. The participants were selected randomly and then divided into three groups: A control group (CG) (N=8) that received product-oriented instruction, Swales’ model (SM) group (N=8), and the system-nested, genre-oriented, structurally mediated model (SGSM) group (N=7). The results obtained through One-way ANOVA revealed that the SM group outperformed the CG group on the posttest of writing. Moreover, the SGSM group outperformed the other two groups on the posttest of writing. The pedagogical and theoretical findings of the study were then discussed.Keywords: writing, genre-based instruction, system-nested, genre-oriented, structurally-mediated mode