An Investigation Into The Influences Of ESL Proficiency And Motivation Levels On Language Attrition Amongst Chinese College Students

The study of language attrition as a field of academic research was first formallyrecognized at the conference on the Attrition of Language Skills at the University ofPennsylvania in 1980. Since this conference, the term "language attrition" hascommonly been understood to refer to "the loss of any language or any portion oflanguage by an individual or speech community" (Freed, 1982:1). In the present study,this term is defined as the loss of L2 or FL skills in the individuals after thetermination of their formal English language training program.The study of language acquisition and more specifically that of L2 acquisition arenot complete without research on language attrition. It provides a new perspective forthe study of language acquisition.The attrition research published in English has reported on a wide spectrum oflanguages, mainly in European, American as well as Japanese context. However,compared with its popularity abroad, language attrition receives little attention inChina. Till now, none of domestic scholars have reported any research into languageattrition of Chinese students except several literature review essays. Besides, noobservations have been reported abroad on the attrition of English as a second or orforeign language in Chinese context. This research into the attrition of English as asecond or foreign language in Chinese context helps test whether the present theoriesor hypotheses are universally applicable.The main objective of the present study is to make a tentative study to investigatethe L2 attrition amongst Chinese three-year college students after a period ofsix-month disuse of English. This paper mainly explores what kinds of skills would beaffected by attrition, which linguistic skills would be more vulnerable to attrition, andhow relevant variables, including initial proficiency and motivation, would influencethe attrition of language skills. Linguistic skills concerned in this research wouldoperationally include lexical knowledge and grammatical knowledge. The objectiveof the study is to probe into the linguistic features that undergo attrition over time.For this purpose, one hundred second-year non-English major students were selected from Anhui Economic and Management Institute. Two research instruments,the Student Questionnaire and the specially designed proficiency test, were used in thestudy. The data collection to establish the subjects' baseline started in June. Thefollow-up started start six months later. Data collected from both the initial andfollow-up studies were analyzed by SPSS 11.5.The findings of the research can be summarized as follows: 1) Participants as awhole undergo attrition after six months of non-use. Their lexical knowledge is moresusceptible to attrition than grammatical knowledge. 2) Initial proficiency is proved tohave an effect on the attrition of language skills. It has been found negatively relatedto the attrition of language skills. 3) Motivation also impacts on the attrition ofvocabulary as well as grammatical skills. Motivation is positively strongly related tothe attrition of participants' language skills. These two factors work together to impacton the attrition of language skills. 4) A further study concerning the types ofvocabulary which may suffer attrition indicates that high frequency words arerelatively stable in participants' knowledge and invulnerable to attrite. Mediumfrequency words, which constitute the main part of participants' vocabulary, undergoquickest attrition. As for the low-frequency words, low attrition rate is reported aswell, but the explanation can be found in the data from the initial study, which showsthat participants have not acquired enough words during their academic life.The writing consists of five chapters. It begins with an introductory chaptersetting the context of the problem and presenting research questions. This chapter alsoclarifies the significance and originality of the study. Chapter Two reviews relatedliterature in the field of language attrition. Focus is given on two issues: what is lostand what might cause the loss. In Chapter Three, research methodology is outlinedand verified. This chapter also explains the ways data are collected and the proceduresby which the data are analyzed. Chapter Four presents the results of data analyses inrelation to four research questions. Chapter Five discusses and summarizes the resultsof the study. It then discusses the implications of the study. On the basis of an analysisof potential limitations in this study, suggestions for the future research are made.