A Research On The Correlation Between English-major Undergraduates' Intercultural Communication Competence And English Learning Motivation

Based on Gao Yongchen's(2014)intercultural communication competence model and English learning motivation taxonomy proposed by Gao Yihong et al(2003),the present study adopts two questionnaires to explore the correlation between English-major undergraduates' intercultural communication competence(ICC)and English learning motivation(ELM).The intercultural communication competence questionnaire is revised based on Gao Yongchen and Shen Juming's(2015),comprising of six dimensions:awareness,knowledge,critical thinking,attitude,skill and strategy.The English learning motivation questionnaire is revised based on Gao Yihong et al's(2003),including seven types of motivation: intrinsic interest,immediate achievement,learning situation,going abroad,social responsibility,individual development and information medium.Research subjects in this study are 104 sophomores from three different majors(English Education,Business English and English Translation).Collected data are computed in SPSS 26 to get the answers to the following questions:(1)What is the status quo of English-major undergraduates' ICC and ELM?(2)Is there any correlation between their ICC and ELM? If there does exist correlation,what is the correlation like?(3)What are the features of the correlations between ICC and ELM among the three majors?Through data analysis and discussion,the research findings can be concluded as follows:(1)English-major undergraduates have satisfactory overall ICC,but their ICC can be further improved through improving their intercultural knowledge and intercultural critical thinking ability;English-major undergraduates generally have medium level ofELM,and they have five types of predominant motivation,including intrinsic interest motivation,learning situation motivation,social responsibility motivation,individual development motivation and information medium motivation,which are obviously stronger than their immediate achievement motivation and going abroad motivation.(2)English-major undergraduates' ICC significantly and positively correlates with four types of motivation,namely intrinsic interest motivation,social responsibility motivation,individual development motivation and information medium motivation.(3)As for English Education majors,their ICC significantly and positively correlates with the above four types of motivation;as for Business English majors,their ICC significantly and positively correlates with intrinsic interest motivation,social responsibility motivation and information medium motivation;as for English Translation majors,their ICC positively correlates with intrinsic interest motivation and negatively correlates with learning situation motivation.Based on the research findings,the following pedagogical implications have been provided for school administrators and English teachers.First,to help increase English-major undergraduates' intercultural knowledge,the schools should offer more intercultural courses and provide more affordable exchange programs,and the teachers should integrate intercultural knowledge into every course and every lesson.Second,English teachers are supposed to introduce practical discourse analysis methods,language expressing skills and organize various classroom activities.Third,to improve English-major undergraduates' ICC,English teachers should further stimulate and sustain students' intrinsic interest motivation,social responsibility motivation,individual development motivation and information medium motivation,which can positively promote the development of their ICC.However,English teachers should adopt different methods according to different majors.