A Comparative Study of Language Attitude Towards English, Urdu and Punjabi in Government and Private Schools

This paper explores the language attitude of students to English, Urdu and Punjabi as an educational language in the Faisalabad city in Pakistan. Using the Language Attitude Theory by Robert Gardner and Wallace Lambert, the study will analyze the integrative and instrumental aspects of motivation, and contrast any of the attitudes between government and private secondary schools. A quantitative survey design was used and 154 students (77 in the government schools and 77 in the private schools) were surveyed using a structured questionnaire, a five point Likert scale. The scores of the composite attitude in each language were created and evaluated with the reliability tests and descriptive statistics, independent samples t-tests, and Pearson correlation. The results indicate that students have an overall positive attitude towards all three languages, but students show the highest level of attitudes and highest levels of proficiency in Urdu, then English, and then Punjabi. School type had a significant impact on English and Punjabi attitude: the students of the private schools expressed more positive attitudes towards English, and the students of the government school expressed more positive attitudes towards Punjabi. There was no significant difference in attitude toward Urdu. The good positive interrelation between integrative and instrumental motivation causes the assumption that individual interest and practical intention plays off to support the positive attitudes towards language. The research demonstrates the role of school context, motivation and home language exposure in determining linguistic preferences and abilities of students and provides valuable findings on language policy and curriculum planning, as well as inclusive education practices in multilingual classrooms.