An Investigation Into The English Learner Autonomy Of College English Majors From The Prospective Of Learning Motivation

Nowadays, with the tendency of English learning among Chinese students, theresearch of learning English as a foreign language is in the most prosperous stageand gets more and more attention. There has been a considerable growth inlanguage learning. Among them, the research on the correlations between leaningmotivation and learner autonomy has dominated a large part.The thesis explored into the way of English learning is made through threeperspectives, i.e. learning motivation, learner autonomy and the college entranceexamination. First of all, the author described the four types of leaning motivationand made clear that language learners should be sure about their learning goal andmotivation in learning language before their autonomous learning. Learners canenhance autonomous learning, and take the most appropriate language learningmethods and ultimately improve learning proficiency based on their own learningmotivation.The subjects involved90students from3different Universities, i.e. Xi’anInternational Studies University, Xi’an International University and QinghaiNormal University. They were chosen as subjects according to their collegeentrance examination and performance. Questionnaire and interview were used.The results indicate that CEMs (College English majors) with higher scores onlanguage learning understand far more than the students with lower scores interms of the knowledge about learning motivation and learner autonomy, andlearning proficiency has a significant positive correlation with learning motivationand learner autonomy. Furthermore, all the four types of learning motivation,namely, instrumental motivation, integrative motivation, intrinsic motivation andextrinsic motivation also have a prominent positive correlation with learnerautonomy. Instrumental motivation is the dominant type of learning motivation forCEMs, and it has the strongest correlation with learner autonomy; extrinsic motivation has a closer correlation with learner autonomy compared withintegrative motivation and intrinsic motivation; integrative motivation has theweakest correlation with learner autonomy. As a whole, there is a positivesignificant correlation among the college entrance examination, learner autonomy,and learning motivation. The more learners are sure about their own types oflearning motivation, the more autonomous they will be in learning process. Inother words, learners can learn language autonomously and well based on theirown types of English learning motivation so as to get higher scores.Based on the research, the author comes up with some suggestions forteachers and learners in learning English. The research on the correlation betweenlearning motivation and learner autonomy has prominent significance in learningEnglish. English teachers should help promote learner autonomy in order toimprove learning proficiency.