Age of onset, language attitudes and identities

Authors
M. Amiri 1
R. Ghafar-samar 2
R. Kiany 2
R. Akbari 3
1 Ph.D. student in English Education, Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, Iran
2 Associate Professor of English Education, Tarbiat Modarres University, Tehran, Iran
3 Assistant Professor of English Education, Tarbiat Modarres University, Tehran, Iran
Abstract
The present study aimed at investigating the initial and final attitudes of Iranian EFL learners in two different age groups (8 and 11 year olds) during one year of inquiry and seek to witness whether the language learners’ age of starting foreign language learning can influence their attitudes or not. The participants’ attitudes were measured via questionnaires and interviews. The modified AMTB (Attitude Motivation Testing Battery) used in this study was designed in such a way as to measure the learners’ attitude in eight different domains (Learners’ interests in foreign language, Attitudes toward English speaking people, Attitudes toward learning English, National identity, Integrative orientation, Instrumental orientation, English class anxiety and parental encouragement). Our focus in the present study was on the participants’ performance on the first four attitudinal domains and also their performance on the whole questionnaire so the participants’ answer to these relevant items on the questionnaire (items related to the first four domains) and also the whole questionnaire was subject to statistical analysis .For the first four domains, results of the study showed that our participants hold positive attitudes towards foreign language learning and learning English both at the beginning and also at the end of inspection. For their attitudes towards English culture and its speakers and also their national identities, our learners in different age groups revealed different patterns. Taking the total attitude picture into consideration (the questionnaire as whole with all its 8 domains) however, there was not any significant difference between the attitudinal behaviors of participants of two different age groups of this study.

Keywords

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Language Related Research
Volume 7, Issue 5
November and December 2016
Pages 217-238