INTEGRATIVE MOTIVATION: CAUSE OR RESULT OF SUCCESSFUL SECOND LANGUAGE ACQUISITION?

Michael Strong University of California at San Francisco

This study examines the relationship between integrative motivation and acquired second language proficiency among a group of Spanish-speaking kindergartners in an American classroom. Integrative motivation was measured by finding out the children’s preferences for friends and playmates and workmates and scoring them according to their tendencies to nominate members of the target language group. Communicative English proficiency was assessed by analyzing spontaneoub language and deriving measures of structural knowledge, vocabulary breadth, and pronunciation skill. A Kendall’s tau test showed no positive association between integrative motivation and acquired English proficiency. A further comparison of beginners and advanced level English speakers found that the advanced children showed significantly more integrative orientation to the target language group than the beginners, lendingsupport to the notion that integrative attitudes follow second language acquisition skills rather than promoting them.

Pioneering work by Gardner and Lambert (1972) on motivation in second language learning introduced researchers to the terms integrative and instrumental orientation.’ Integrative motivation implies

that success in mastering a second language depends on a particular orientation on the part of the learner, reflecting a willingness or a desire to be like representative members of the “other” language community. and to become associated, at least vicariously, with that other community. (p. 14)

An instrumental orientation, on the other hand,

is more self-oriented in the sense that a person prepares to learn a new code in order to derive benefits of a non-interpersonal sort. (p. 14)

The extremely integratively motivated learner is oriented principally towards members of the target language community, with whom he or she would like to develop personal ties. The opposite type of learner has few signs of interest in members of the other cultural group, but is intent on

‘ I a m vcrygrateful to Kevin Delucchi of U.C. Berkeley for valuable advice on the analysis of the data presented here.

2 Language Lxarning Vol. 34, N o . 3

using them and their language as a n instrument of personal satisfaction for s’uch benefits as social recognition or economic advantage.

Over a period of many years Gardner and Lambert studied theeffects of these and other motivational and attitudinal factors in different settings inside and outside North America. The Canadian studies (Gardner and Lambert 1959; Gardner 1960) showed that, for high school students learning French, oral language performance correlated with an integrative motivation. The American studies were conducted on French language learners in Louisiana, Maine, and Connecticut (Gardner and Lambert 1972). Here the results were more complex. While motivation to learn French was an important factor in obtaining good grades in all settings, integrative motivation per se surfaced a s a significant factor only in Connecticut. As there were no French speakers around, this was represented by “an integrative orientation toward the language-learning process and a realization of the usefulness of knowing the language” (Gardner and Lambert 1972: 133)-a rather flimsy manifestation of integrative motivation, it would seem. A further study in the Philippines of learners of English as a foreign language showed instrumental orientation to be important for acquiring fluency in English among some students, but for another subgroup oral proficiency correlated with integrative motivation. The authors took this finding as a sign that integrative motivation should be encouraged among foreign language learners in the U.S., where it was largely not in evidence. For minorities learning English as a second language, however, Gardner and Lambert advocated that “both instrumental and integrative motivation must be developed” (1972: 142). They stressed that becoming bilingual should not involve losing one’s cultural identity.

This last group, namely, minority learners of English in the U.S., was left unrepresented in the extensive studies of Gardner and Lambert. Others, however, have studied them. Olleret al. ( 1977) looked at a group of Chinese graduates in the United States. They were interested in comparing direct methods of attitude assessment (the Gardner-Lambert approach) with an indirect method (after Spolsky 1969), while a t the same time examining the relationship between attitudes and proficiency. Their findings indicated that indirect measures of attitude produced more meaningful variance, but the relation between attained proficiency and attitudes was somewhat complex. Surprisingly, positive attitudes towards the students’ own cultural group were the best predictors of proficiency (measured by cloze tests). Attitudes towards members of the target language culture also

Strong 3

appeared important but were difficult t o interpret. In general, Oller et al. concluded that their findings partially supported the distinction between integrative and instrumental orientation, but they advocated a redefinition of these terms to be based on personal traits the learner associates with target group members.

A recent study by Genesee et al. (1983) looked at both learner motivation and the motivational support the learner expects from the target language group. Both of these factors were found to be significant predictors of various aspects of second language proficiency. Self-rating scales were used to determine both predictor variables and two of the four criterion variables among 34 high school students in Canada who were learning French. Two further measures of French proficiency were taken from results of Ministry of Education tests taken one year earlier. The authors did not report how well these two methods of second language proficiency correlated with one another.

Wong-Fillmore (1976) studied a small sample of young Spanish- speaking children and concluded that the fastest learner owed her success largely to a strong desire to become accepted into the Anglo world. This was so powerful a motivation that “the signs were. . . she wasalso rejecting that part of her that was Spanish-speaking” (1976577). On the subject of motivation, Wong-Fillmore ( 1976:666) concludes:

Typically, the learner is motivated not so much to learn the language as to become a part of the social world of its speakers.

Wong-Fillmore’s study is important in that it applied the concept of integrative motivation (by implication) t o very young children. While the evidence from this study is only anecdotal, it was based on an extended period of observation.

In general, the intuitive appeal of the notion of a relationship between attitudes and second language acquisition is more convincing than the research evidence itself. Oller et al. (1977:3) point out that Gardner’s summary (1975) of the Canadian studies indicates a highest average correlation between a motivational variable and a language proficiency measure of only .21, a figure that represents only 5% of the variance in the language proficiency measure. Furthermore, the relative importance of an integrative versus a n instrumental motivation is also not clear. For example, Lukmani (1972) found (in India) that the two kinds of motivation were related to one another as well as to ESL achievement, and that,

4 Language Learning Vol. 34, N o . 3

contrary t o expectation, instrumental motivation was more highly ’correlated with achievement than integrative motivation.

Backman (1976) measured at t i tude and motivation among 2 I Venezuelan college students learning English using two methods: a controlled interview and a bilingual adaptation of Gardner’s attitude scales. Neither method produced significant correlations with progress in second language learning over periods of three o r six months. Backman also cited a doctoral dissertation by Oyama (1973) in which the author found that “neither motivation nor identification with the adopted culture seemed to be powerful determinants of proficiency in the second language” (p. 78) among 60 Italian male immigrants.

Other problems concern the very definition of the concepts integrative and instrumental. Oller et al. (1977:4) pointed to Gardner’s admission (Gardner and Lambert 1972) that researchers disagree with one another on this issue. Lukmani ( 1972) considered “travel abroad” as instrumental, while Burstall et al. (1974) categorized it as integrative. The distinction is by no means self-evident, and is open to interpretation both by researchers and by respondents.

Recent research by Hermann (1980) has raised a further fundamental issue concerning the relationship between motivation and language learning. She proposes a n equally plausible but hitherto ignored hypothesis, namely, that the act of learning another language may affect cultural attitudes rather than vice versa. She states (Hermann 1980:249) that

the mere satisfaction (a learner) derives from his achievement of the learning task may influence his attitude to the ethnolinguisticgroup inquestion and even result ina change of such attitudes.

Hermann refers t o this as the resultative hypothesis, which she tested with a sample of 750 German children learning English as a foreign language. One group had had five years of English and the others were beginners. She found that the five-year group showed a significantly higher level of positive att i tudes towards the target culture than the beginners. Furthermore, among the higher proficiency learners in the five-year group there was no consistent pattern of integrative orientation towards the target group, while the lower proficiency group showed significantly more prejudice. Thus, her resultative hypothesis was confirmed.

Strong 5

The Study

Given this history of research into motivation and second language learning, the present study attempts to extend the inquiry to young learners of English in a U.S. school setting(a1ong the lines of Wong-Fillmore’s 1976 work, but using a more formal design). The subjects were Spanish- speaking kindergarten children aged between four years eleven months and six years four months a t the beginning of the school year.2

The class consisted of about 21 Spanish-speaking children and 24 monolingual English speakers and was team-taught by a monolingual English teacher, a bilingual teacher, and a bilingual aide. The children spent some time divided into two groups according to first language and some time together. At recess they all played in the same area, set aside for kindergartners only and separated from the children of higher grades by a fence. Some of the activities in class were performed in small groups arranged by the teacher, but on other occasions the children were able to choose with whom they wished to work. In all, there was ample opportunity for the two groups to intermingle both inside and outside the classroom.

The Spanish speakers could be divided into two groups-those who began the school year with almost no English at all (15 NES children) and those who were already advanced at the onset of kindergarten (6 AES children). Two members of the first group left before the end of the year, reducing the number of non-English speakers to thirteen. The school administered the BINL (Basic Inventory of Natural Language) to test the children’s language dominance at the beginning of the year, and the researchers also interviewed each child to assess general presence or absence of English. It was hypothesized that, of the beginning group, those who showed signs of a n integrative orientation to members of the target culture would develop communicative skills in English faster than those who showed no evidence of integrative motivation.

With children of kindergarten age, direct questions concerning their attitudes towards learning English were not called for. Furthermore, as

‘These subjects were under investigation in a project funded by the National Institute of Education to Lily Wong-Fillmore (#OENIEG 7901 18) at U.C. Berkeley. T‘hedata discussed here were gathered during this project and formed part of that analyzed in the present author’s doctoral dissertation (Strong 1982).

6 Language Learning Vol. 34, N o . 3

noted earlier, indirect methods appear more desirable. T o this end the technique of sociometry was employed, whereby children nominate others as friends or playmates and thus reveal their allegiances. This method, which yields data on group structure that may be plotted in diagrammatic maps called sociograms, can be used for a variety of purposes. Anastasi (1968) lists many uses and suggests that sociograms

. . . may also be utiliied in studying attitudes toward minority group members within a group.

She adds:

, . . Sociometric nominations have generally proved to be one of the most dependable of rating techniques.. . . When checked against a variety of practical criteria dependent on interpersonal relations, such ratings have been found to have good predictive validity.

Anastasi maintains that perhaps the most important reason for this

. . . is the fact that the opinions of group members- -right or wrong-influence their actions and hence partly determine the nature of the individual’s subsequent interactions with the group. (1968:541-542)

In order to obtain sociometric data, and thus an indirect measure of integrative motivation, the researchers questioned the children every two months during the school year concerning their preferences for play and work partners and their best friends. Each child was taken to one side and asked for the following information (in Spanish if necessary):

1. Who d o you like to play with at recess? 2. Who d o you like to sit next to in class‘? 3. Who is your best friend? In answer t o the first two questions, children were encouraged to name

more than one child, but for question 3, only one name was called for. The data gathered in this way were then plotted into sociograms which showed the relationships formed between the children in the class by linking the names with arrows pointing in the direction of the nominees. This revealed at any one sampling period who was popular and who was isolated from the group, how much the two language groups related to one another, which cliques were forming, and so on (for examples, see Figure 1). For the purposes of this study it was a very effective way of estimating thestrength of the language learners’ attitudes toward and tendencies for associating

I

/ \

Strong 7

Spanish speakers

Anglos

Figure 1. Sample sociogram ofpart of the classshowinga clique (Ch, Al, En), a popular child or “star ”(JI) , an isolate (Rc), and reciprocal (Ri -+ Sa) and unreciprocal (Sa i- Ro) pairs.

with members of the target group, traits considered by previous authors (Gardner and Lambert 1972; Wong-Fillmore 1976) as representative of an integrative motivation.

A measure of communicative language proficiency was derived from spontaneous language samples collected towards the end of the school year. This included a measure of structural knowledge, a measure of vocabulary breadth, and a measure of pronunciation accuracy. The measure is considered “communicative”in that the children were not tested formally; rather, natural language samples were collected in communica- tive settings.

8 Language burning Vol. 34, No. 3

Structural knowledge was measured by examining interview and playtime language transcripts for the existence of any of 29 features of English sentence s t r ~ c t u r e . ~ (See Appendix.) Scores on this measure were obtained by awarding one point for each of the 29 structures used correctly in a given number of utterances from the playtime or interview transcripts of the subjects, and then adding them together. This yielded a measure of how many different structures were used by the subject, whereas a simple count of all instances of all structures would have confounded structural breadth with repetitiveness and verbosity.

Vocabulary breadth was assessed from the transcripts of playtime sessions where each subject played in a controlled environment with an English-speaking peer. All new vocabulary items from the subjects’ verbal interactions with their playmates were recorded separately. Repetitions or echoes were not included. Obvious formulaic utterances like Lpmme see and I’m gonna, disco dance, and Right here were treated as single items. The resulting lists were then checked against the spoken word frequency counts published by Hart, Walker, and Gray (1977) in their report on the spoken language of young children between the ages of two-and-a-half and six-and-a-half. Single words which fell outside the one hundred most frequent words at the six-and-a-half age level were given one point. The same was true for two- and three-word formulas. In other words, the vocabulary measure was simply a count of nonfrequent words produced in a given number of utterances from naturalistic conversation by the subjects in identical settings.

Pronunciation was assessed using three independent paid judges, who listened to segments of the tape-recorded interviews with the subjects and rated them on their pronunciation, intonation, and overall fluency. A 10- point scale was used, where 10 equaled a native-like proficiency and zero represented incomprehensibility. Interrater reliability between the three judges ranged from .63 t o .79, showing a moderately high rate of agreement. The resulting scores were averaged to form a single percentage score for each subject.

The sociometric nominations from all three of the stimulus questions were divided between votes for Spanish speakers and votes for English

’Thcse features had been identified by the Southwest Regional Laboratoryfor Educational Research (SWRL) in their project to develop a language skills framework which could serve as a resource for bilingual programs. SWRL (1980) found that these structural features were normally within the control of native English-speaking first gradera.

Strong 9

speakers. The greater the proportion of votes for English speakers the more that child could be said to be integratively motivated. These proportions had been weighted according to the total number of votes cast.

The thirteen NES children who were still in school a t the end of the year were ranked on their level of acquired communicative proficiency and on their tendencies to nominate members of the monolingual English group when asked about their friends and play and work partners (see Table 1 ) . The degree of association between these two rankings was measured by means of a Kendall's tau test. The tau statistic of 0.29 was not significant. indicating no association between integrative motivation as measured by preference for associating with members of the target language group and communicative language proficiency.

Given this result, a further test was conducted to see if there was evidence to support a resultative hypothesis with regard to integrative motivation and second language proficiency. This was performed as follows. The second group of Spanish speakers. namely, those who had started kindergarten with advanced English skills, was compared with the beginning group with regard to their tendencies to nominate target language group members as friends and play- or workmates. It was hypothesized that the advanced learners would show a significantly greater

Table I Ranking.\ o/ 13 N E S c,hildren on Eng1i.c.h c,omrnunic.ative profi'i,ienc:1, scores and .sociotne/ric

nomination.\ 0fEngli.c.h .speakers

Ran kings Language # English

Sub.ject proficiency speakers Raw scores*

Ma I R 0:x En 2 4 2:12 S y 3 6.5 I :9 Al 4 I 4:12 .la 5 13 0: I I AY 6 9 0:7 Ch 7 2 2:8 Sa 8 5 2:15 An 9 3 3: I4 M b 10 6.5 I .9 S h I I 10 0:x H u 12 12 0:IO Ri 13 I I 0:9

* I he 1 1 r ~ i numhcr reprc\cnt\ botcs CB\I l o r Fnglirti\pcakar\. t h c x c u n d numheri\ thetotal nurnbcrotditlercnt nominat ion\

I0 Language Learning Vol. 34, No. 3

tendency in this direction than the beginners, indicating that greater ability i n English resulted in a n integrative orientation, and not the other way around. A Wilcoxon two-sample median test was performed on the combined rankings of the two groups (see Table 2). The resulting t-score was -2.28 (decision-rule, reject H o if Z = <-1.645, one-tailed), significant at the .05 level, supporting the resultative hypothesis.

Table 2 ran king.^ of' NESgroup and AES,yroup on nutiiber o/ tiominatrotis 10 English .speakers

NES R a n k AES R a n k

Al Ch An E n Sa M b

Ma

S h R i H u .la

S)'

AY

4 5 h 9

10 1 1 . 5 1 I . S 14 15 16 17 18 19

Discussion

The findings reported here d o not support the notion that an integrative orientation towards members of the target language group enhances acquisition of that language. The quicker learners among the children observed here did not exhibit any of the behavior patterns witnessed in Wong-Fillmore's Nora (1976), who was perhaps not as typical of good Spanish-speaking language learners as originally assumed. The (albeit small) correlations between language learning success and integrative motivation recorded by Gardner and Lambert (1972) in their studies of North Americans learning French are not to be found among these children, who were learning English in an American environment with ample opportunity for integratively motivated individuals to demonstrate and fulfill their inclinations. It appeared that the faster learners (who had learned to communicate quite well by the end of the year as assessed by the measures used in this study, but who were still not to the level of those who had started the year with advanced English skills) were able to progress

Strong 11

without an overt desire to identify with Anglo children and showed no tendencies, discernable from the observational records, towards a rejection of their own culture, either by avoiding Spanish peers as playmates, anglicizing their names, o r hesitating to take part in Hispanic cultural events. However, from the longitudinal data of bimonthly nominations, i t can be seen (Table 3 ) that there was an apparent trend towards increased association with English speakers.

Furthermore, the children who were more inclined to play with and befriend Anglo children seemed to derive no measurable language learning advantage from this orientation, although none of them evidenced cross- cultural associations as strong as those observed in Wong-Fillmore’s star learner. A single-minded orientation of that magnitude may indeed enhance language learning proficiency.

The fact that those children already relatively fluent in English did show a significantly greater desire t o associate with Anglos supports the resultative hypothesis developed by Hermann ( 1 980) from observations among German children learning English in Germany. Intuitively, the idea that integrative attitudes follow a degree of proficiency in the second language makes as much sense as the Gardner and Lambert hypothesis, and there is now research evidence from two settings to support it. This in no way challenges the validity of Gardner and Lambert’s work, but it seems

Table 3 Dic rrihurion of.soc.iornerric~ wrc.\ o f N E S children hj, lunguugc o/nortiinee

Spanish English Month n speakers T;, spea kers ! i

September 12 21 95 I 5 November 14 30 I00 0 0 January 15 23 92 2 8 April 14 24 80 6 20 June 13 21 79 7 21

to indicate that integrative motivation does not play the same role in the second language learning of young children that it might for adults.

These findings have implications both for researchers and for teachers. The sociometric method has shown itself to be a useful research tool, especially for examining the social inclinations of young children. I t provides a simple means for obtaining an indirect measure of integrative orientation by asking children questions which they have no trouble

12 Language Learning Vol. 34, N o . 3

answering. Their responses are even verifiable by observing their actual behavior, although that was not an issue in this study as the focus was on the child's attitudes o r orientation, rather than actual behavior. The extensive observational data, however, corroborated the overall patterns which emerged through the sociometric maps. Future research o n motivation might now focus on the resultative effects among samples of learners from other age groups and other settings.

If it is true that second language learning is most enhanced through exposure to meaningful input and that young children are unlikely to expose themselves to such input while they are still beginners, then teachers should take pains to encourage students from different language groups to work and play together. Care should be taken to foster meaningful interaction through collaboration on joint projects, peer tutoring. paired assignments, and so on. In this way teachers may counteract some of the negative effects of a phenomenon which delays the point a t which young language learners develop inclinations to integrate socially with members of the target group.

REFERENCES

Anastasi. A. 1968. f.sj~chologic.al Testing. 3d ed. New York: Macmillan. Backman. N . 1976. Two measures of affective factors as they relate to progress in adult

second-language learning. Working Papers on Bilinguali.tn7 10. Rurstall. C., M. .Jamieson, S. Cohen. and M. Hargreaves. 1974. frirnarj, Frenc.h in the

Balun1.e. Windsor, England: NFER Publishing Co. Ltd. Gardnei-, R . 1960. Motivational Variables in Second-Language Acquisition. Doctoral

dissertation, McGill University. Gardner. R. 1975. Social factors in second language acquisition and bilinguality. Paper

presented at conference of the Canada Council's Consultative Committee on the Individual. Language. and Society. Kingston. Ontario. November-December, 1975.

Gardner, R., and W. Lambert. 1959. Motivational variables in second language learning. Canadian Journal vf Ps,,chologj> 13:266-272.

Gardner, R, and W. Lambert. 1972. Atlitudesand Motivarion in Second Language Learpiing. Rowley. Mass.: Newbury House.

Genesee. F.. P. Rogers. and N . Holobow. 1983. The social psychoiogy of second language learning: another point of view. Language Learning 33:209-224.

Hart, N.W.M., R.F. Walker. and B. Gray. 1977. The Language of Children: A Ke?' 1 0

Liieracj,. Reading. Mass.: Addison-Wesley. Hermann, G. 1980. Attitudes and success in children's learning of English as a second

Strong 13

language: the motivational versus the resultative hypothesis. English L ~ n g ~ g r 7i.uching Journal 34:247-254.

Lukmani, Y . 1972. Motivation to learn and language proficiency. Lunguagr l m r n i n g 2 2 : 2 6 1 - 273.

Oller. .I., A. Hudson, and P. Liu. 1977. Attitudes and attained proficiency in ESI.: a sociolinguistic study of native speakers ofChinese in the United States. Lunguuge I x a m i n g 21: 1-27.

Oyama. S. 1973. A Sensitive Period for the Acquisition of a Second Language. 1’h.D. dissertation. Harvard.

Southwest Regional Laboratory for Educational Research (SWRL). 19x0. Lunguugr Ski/ / , \ Frummwrk 1. Los Alamitos. Calif.: SWRL..

Spolsky. B. 1969. Attitudinal aspects of second-language learning. Lunguagr Leurninx l9:27 1-283.

Strong, M. 1982. Social Styles and the Second Language Acquisition of Spanish-speaking Kindergartners. Doctoral dissertation. U .C. Berkeley.

Strong. M . In press. Social styles and the second language acquisition of Spanish-speaking kindergartners. TESOL Quurter/j,.

Wong-Fillmore. 1.. 1976. The Second Time Around. Doctoral dissertation, Stanford.

APPENDIX

Sentence Structure Features Identified by S WRL as Being Normally Within the Control of Native-Speaking

First Graders (SWRL 1980)

I . 2.

3 . 4. 5 . 6. 7.

8.

9. 10. 1 1 .

Yes/ no questions: auxiliary and “be” inversion Wh-questions in which the subject of “be” is questioned (e.g., “Who went?” and “Who is that girl?”) Present tense verbs: third person singular with nonsyllabic suffixes Past tense verbs: nonsyllabic suffixes Regular plurals: nonsyllabic suffixes Possessives: nonsyllabic suffixes Demonstrative adjectives: distance not evinced (i.e., the difference in proximity implied between “this” and “that”) Indirect objects and benefactives: introduced by prepositions (e.g., “the letter to Jim” and “a book for Marsha”) Present tense verbs: third person singular with syllabic suffix Past tense verbs: syllabic suffix “Don’t” in negative declarative sentences

14 Language Learning Vol. 34, No. 3

12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26. 27. 28. 29.

“Do” in yes/ no questions Regular plurals: syllabic suffix Possessives: syllabic suffix Demonstrative adjectives: distance evinced Possessive adjectives: “its,” “their” Demonstrative pronouns: distance evinced Relative clauses: relative pronoun a s subject Relative clauses: relative pronoun a s object Simple imperatives Negative simple imperatives Requests beginning with “will,” “can,” “could,” “would” Requests beginning with “can 1,” “may I ” Passive sentences with “be”: agent not specified “Doesn’t,” “didn’t” in negative declarative sentences “Does” and “did” in yes/ no questions “Do,” “does,” “did” in wh-ques t ions Irregular plurals Relative clauses: relative pronoun omitted