Investigating Master One Motivation for Learning EFL at the University of Mohamed Seddik Ben Yahia, Jijel

Abstract

Although English is a global and the world’s lingua franca, we have noticed that students’ do not seem quite motivated to learn English at the Department of English Language at Mohammed Seddik Seddik Ben Yahia University, Jijel. There are many factors that motivate and others demotivate learners to learn English as a foreign language. This study is concerned with learners’ motivation for learning English as a foreign language and their motivating and demotivating incentives. In order to investigate this research problem and inform our research questions we have conducted a survey questionnaire and an interview with first year English Master students at Jijel University. According to the hypotheses set at the beginning which are; almost all first year English Master students are motivated to learn English as a foreign language, second first year English Master students are mostly motivated by instrumental incentives, the third and the last one first year English Master students are demotivated by some factors such as the learning atmosphere. The results showed that learners are motivated, more specifically, they have an instrumental motivation. However students have also some demotivating incentives such as the learning atmosphere, some teachers’ incompetence, and the lack of job opportunities.