Japanese language learners’ motivational types and trajectory: Accounts from university students in Australia

Self-determination theory (SDT) was developed to analyse the motivation behind human behaviours, but it has been adopted and utilised in language learning contexts in recent years. Past second language (L2) motivation studies utilising SDT have mostly focused on English as Foreign Language learning and significantly fewer studies have applied SDT to learners of other languages, including Japanese as a foreign language (JFL). Therefore, this study examined the motivation types of JFL learners and the major factors influencing their motivation, and how it changed during a university semester and a semester break. The study found that the students’ motivational trajectory during the semester was relatively stable and that they were mostly driven by intrinsic motivation and identified regulation (goal-driven). The most prominent factors that influenced the students’ motivation were learning content, teaching methods, and perceptions of competence and relatedness. As expected, all the participants were not motivated to study Japanese using formal content during the semester break although some of them maintained their motivation by engaging with informal or semi-formal Japanese learning content. The study carries implications regarding the pedagogical directions for improving tertiary students’ motivation during the semester as well as the semester break.