An Investigation into the Effects of Integrative and Instrumental Orientations on Language Learning Strategies

This study examines the effects of two motivational orientations on the use of language learning strategies at overall, category, and specific-item levels. 184 students (males and females) from a Korean university responded to the following two questionnaires: the Motivational Orientation Questionnaire (MOQ) developed by the author and Oxford's Strategy Inventory for Language Learning (SILL). The results showed that both integratively- and instrumentally-oriented students were moderate strategy users overall. Integratively-oriented learners were found to use learning strategies more often and a broader spectrum of strategies than instrumentally-oriented learners. A noteworthy finding, however, is that strategy use was not motivation orientation-specific. In other words, the two motivational groups were found to share the similar patterns of strategy use. Independent samples t test results revealed that integratively-oriented students exhibited significantly greater use of overall strategy than instrumentally-oriented students. This phenomenon held true for the use of cognitive, metacognitive, and social categories. At the specific item levels, 13 of the total 50 individual strategies were shown to be employed significantly more often by integratively motivated learners than by their instrumentally motivated peers.