Language awareness survey among university students

In this study we examined the linguistic awareness and dialect attitudes of university students studying at the University of Nyíregyháza. It is particularly important that the future teachers have a positive attitude towards the varieties of the Hungarian language and share their knowledge with their learners in an effective way. However, the results of various research studies show that in many cases, mother tongue education in schools does not build on a multi-standard approach to language varieties, and as a consequence, non-standard varieties are perceived more negatively than standard ones. The aim of this research is to find out what the university students in the research study know about the regional variation of language, conscious language use and how they view dialect speech. The study was conducted through an online questionnaire survey involving 70 respondents. As a starting point for the research, it was assumed that the respondents’ dialect attitudes and language awareness would be determined by their experiences at school, and thus negative attitudes towards dialect speech would be observed in their value judgments. It was also assumed that respondents would be less accepting of the occurrence of dialect phenomena in their own language use and in the speech habits of others in their locality. The results showed that the majority of the students surveyed did not have a negative opinion of dialect phenomena, so the first hypothesis was not confirmed. However, the second hypothesis was partially confirmed, as far fewer respondents acknowledged the occurrence of dialect phenomena in their own language use than in the speech of the people in their locality. Overall, the majority of respondents to the survey have a positive attitude towards linguistic diversity and strive to use the language consciously. It is hoped that the students surveyed here will adopt the right approach to teaching about linguistic diversity in their teaching practice, thus positively influencing learners’ attitudes towards dialects and linguistic diversity.