A comparative study of American-born Chinese and non American-born Chinese students' language learning motivation, language acquisition, and ethnic identity development in Chinese language schools

This dissertation is a non-experimental comparative and correlational study. It compares the three variables of language learning motivation, language acquisition, and ethnic identity between American-Born Chinese (ABC) and Adopted Chinese students (Non-ABC) at Association of Chinese language schools on the East Coast of the United States. One hundred and eighty-two ABC and 70 non-ABC students enrolled in Chinese language classes in the fall semester of 2004 participated in this study. Additionally, this study identifies the teaching categories that are most commonly applied in the Chinese language school classroom.; The data were collected through a survey method. The research instruments used for this investigation consisted of questionnaires of students' learning motivation, language acquisition, and ethnic identity, and the nine teaching categories used by teachers. The statistical techniques adopted to analyze the data included Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) and multiple regression analysis.; The results of this study indicated that ABC and non-ABC Chinese language students differed in learning motivation and ethnic identity. For the most part, ABC students were more positive about their participation in the Chinese language schools. Additionally the nine teaching categories were found to be correlated with the three variables. For example, Learning Through Culture was correlated with Learning Motivation; Providing Reminders Instruction was correlated with Language Acquisition; and Helping Students Link Language with Content was correlated with Ethnic Identity. Moreover, this study suggests that lack of cooperative learning techniques and student readiness activities may inhibit development of effective language acquisition and positive ethnic identification in the Chinese language schools.