An Investigation of Chinese New HSK Test Takers' Learning Motivation in Thailand

Authors

  • Yan Ye

Keywords:

Chinese New HSK Test Takers, Learning Motivation, Extrinsic Motivation, Intrinsic Motivation, Self-efficacy for Learning, Demographic factors, Thailand

Abstract

This research aimed: (1) to identify the Chinese new HSK test takers’ demographic factors including their gender, years of learning Chinese, studying school, family background and test levels; (2) to determine the levels of their learning motivation including the extrinsic motivation, intrinsic motivation, and self-efficacy for learning; (3) to compare the test takers’ learning motivation according to their demographic factors; (4) to determine the effects of these demographic factors across extrinsic motivation, intrinsic motivation, and self-efficacy for learning.

The sample included all Chinese new HSK test takes for Levels 1-6 at Bangkok University Test Site in the year 2015. A total of 311 Thai students from the different schools of Thailand were selected using the convenience sampling technique.

The research found that: (1) the majority of new HSK test takers were female students, from the public schools, with Thai-Chinese family background, learning Chinese for about 1-6years, and having taken the Chinese new HSK tests for the beginner and intermediate levels (Levels 1-4); (2) the level of new HSK test takers’ motivation for learning Chinese was moderate, their extrinsic motivation high, their intrinsic motivation and their self-efficacy for learning moderate; (3) the female students have higher learning motivation than the male students; students who learned for 1-6 years had higher learning motivation than those who learned for 7 years up; students from Thai-Chinese families had higher learning motivation than those from pure Thai families; students at the beginner level had higher learning motivation than those at the intermediate and advanced levels; (4) the effects of gender, years of learning Chinese, school type and family background and test level existed across the combination of three scales of motivation. Students’ gender, years of learning, family background, and test level had effects on their extrinsic motivation; gender, school type, family background and test level had effects on their intrinsic motivation; and gender, years of learning, school type, family background and test level had effects on their self-efficacy for learning at .05 level of significance.

A discussion about each finding and recommendations for Chinese teachers and schools as well as for the future researchers were provided at the end of this study.

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Published

2016-12-30