An Investigation Into English Learning Demotivation Of Senior High School Students

Language researchers at home and abroad have widely accepted the idea that motivation is the key factor that determines the level and success of second or foreign language learning.In recent years,however,the study of negative motivation in language learning has become a popular trend which has attracted the attention of language researchers and experts.Under the influence of a series of factors,the phenomenon that learners’ motivation level decreases can be called demotivation.In the process of English learning,the negative influence of learning motivation cannot be ignored.It is a common phenomenon that senior high school students’ English learning motivation declines.Some students even show little interest in English class.The positive aspects of motivation have been widely concerned,while the negative aspects of motivation-demotivation should also gain its due attention.Therefore,taking high school students as the research sample to carry out demotivation research is of great significance.In this paper,969 students from a senior high school in Mile City were investigated by using the quantitative method.To better understand the influence of internal and external influences on senior high school students’ English learning,this paper focuses on three research questions:(1)what is the overall level of senior high school students’ English learning motivation?(2)what are the characteristics of senior high school students’ demotivation in EFL learning? What factors lead to their loss of motivation? Which factors have the greatest impact and the least impact?(3)Are there any differences in students’ negative emotions according to different variables(gender,grade,race)? The questionnaire data were analyzed by SPSS 17.0.The results of quantitative analysis reveals that:(1)students’ failure experience and teachers’ competence are the most influential demotivating factors in students’ English learning process,which is different from the results of other previous studies;(2)"Learning content" is the weakest demotivation factor.(3)The results of this study also show that there are significant differences in the degree of demotivation among students with different English scores.(4)However,"gender" has no significant effect on students’ demotivation in English learning;(5)There is no significant difference between students of different grades and among different ethnic students;(6)The decline of students’ learning motivation is a common phenomenon.The factors affecting students’ learning motivation include: failure experience,teachers’ competence,loss of interest,teachers’ behavior and learning materials.In students’ English learning,"failure experience and teacher’s competence" rank before all other negative factors,while "learning material" is the lowest of all negative factors.