A call for a multifaceted approach to language learning motivation research: Combining complexity, humanistic, and critical perspectives
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Date
2012
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Zakład Filologii Angielskiej Wydział Pedagogiczno-Artystyczny Uniwersytetu im. Adama Mickiewicza w Kaliszu
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Abstract
In this paper I give an overview of recent developments in the L2 motivation field,
in particular the movement away from quantitative, questionnaire-based methodologies
toward smaller-scale qualitative studies incorporating concepts from
complexity theory. While complexity theory provides useful concepts for exploring
motivation in new ways, it has nothing to say about ethics, morality, ideology, politics,
power or educational purpose. Furthermore, calls for its use come primarily
from researchers from the quantitative tradition whose aim in importing this paradigm
from the physical sciences appears to be to conceptualize and model motivation
more accurately. The endeavor therefore remains a fundamentally positivist
one. Rather than being embraced as a self-contained methodology, I argue that
complexity theory should be used cautiously and prudently alongside methods
grounded in other philosophical traditions. Possibilities abound, but here I suggest
one possible multifaceted approach combining complexity theory, a humanistic
conception of motivation, and a critical perspective.
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Keywords
motivation, positivist research, reductionist research, complex systems, humanistic perspective
Citation
Studies in Second Language Learning and Teaching, 2012, vol. 2, no. 4, pp. 349-366.