Thai Undergraduate Students’ Motivation and Achievement in Learning Chinese as a Foreign Language: A Case Study at a Private University in Thailand
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Abstract
Abstract
This study aimed to investigate the way in which Thai undergraduate students in their first, second, third and fourth years of study were motivated to learn Chinese as their major in Thailand and test a hypothesis whether their motivation correlated with their learning achievement. Findings collected from 274 students randomly recruited at a private university with mixed research methods and the second language motivational self-system framework explained that they were inspired to learn Chinese due to their positive attitudes towards communicating with foreigners in Chinese fluently, using the language as a tool to have a good job and pursuing higher education in the future. Their personal and cultural duties to obey their parents and their personal values to finish the bachelor’s degree, their friendly and helpful classmates, useful Chinese teaching materials, interesting teaching approaches and useful Chinese classes highly inspired them to learn Chinese. The quantitative findings of motivation and the scores of the official HSK Test analyzed by Pearson Correlation disconfirmed the hypothesis perhaps because many students neither use Chinese to join any activities outside the class nor speak Chinese at home. The findings can be useful for lecturers of Chinese in a Thai context, where Thai is the only language officially used in Thailand, to be aware of the study environment and consider giving more opportunities to their Thai students to Chinese exposure both inside and outside of the class. Activities such as affordable excursions and short-term exchange programs are recommended.
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