Motivation is a key factor in predicting students’ language learning success. Given the complex nature of motivations in real-life scenarios, a person-centered approach is likely to be more valuable than a variable-centered one, in that the former will allow researchers to identify different combinations of group traits simultaneously at an individual level, and reveal relations that generally remain unrecognized when approaches based on linear variables are used. This study used a person-centered approach to identify the motivational profiles of students taking online language courses, and to examine such profiles’ relationships to their learning outcomes, genders, and reasons for enrollment. Cluster analysis of 466 students revealed the existence of four profiles: high- and low-quantity, and good- and poor-quality.Students in the high-quantity profile demonstrated comparable learning outcomes to those in the good-quality profile; and there wassignificant gender- and enrollment-reason differences across the four motivational profiles. The study’s results underscore the usefulness of person-centered approaches to explorations of multiple profiles of motivation, and to capturing the nuanced differences among them.This studyis a critical first step towards understanding the multiplicity of motivational profiles both within and between students in online language-learning contexts, and calls for a replication of its methods across other online-learning domains and settings.

主讲人：张亦凝

清华大学外文系助理教授。清华大学文学学士，美国斯坦福大学教育学硕士，美国密歇根州立大学教育学博士。研究方向为二语教育心理、科技辅助语言学习、教育定量分析。所著论文发表于SSCI期刊British Journal of Educational Psychology, Computers & Education, British Journal of Educational Technology, Educational Technology Research and Development。

主持人：郭茜

时间:2019年5月16 日周四 11:45-12:45

地点:文南楼204会议室