Attitudes and Motivation: Their Role in Second-Language Acquisition

My intent in this paper is to review some of the research we have conducted which indicates just how dynamic and potent the role of the parent might be in the language-learning situation. I should say at the outset that most of our research has not dealt with ESL programs, but that nonetheless the phenomenon we have observed would seem as relevant to the ESL program as to any other second-language situation. I think it is meaningful to distinguish two roles of the parent which are relevant to his child's success in a second-language program. For want of better labels, I'm going to refer to them as the active and passive roles, even though these labels are not completely descriptive. By the active role, I mean that role whereby the parent actively and consciously encourages the student to lear the language. In the active role, the parent monitors the child's language-learning performance, and to the extent that he plays this role he attempts to promote success. That is, the parent watches over the child and makes sure he does his homework, encourages him to do well, and in general reinforces his successes. I believe it is safe to assume that differences in the extent to which parents vary in this encouragement function would have some influence on the child's performance in any learning situation. The other type of role, the passive role, is more subtle, and I think more important, primarily because the parent would probably be unaware of it. By the subtle role, I mean the attitudes of the parent toward the community whose language the child is learning. These attitudes are important, I believe, because they influence the child's attitudes, and it is my thesis (and I'll try to convince you of its validity) that the child's attitudes toward the other language community are influential in motivating him to acquire the second language. To contrast these roles, let me suggest one possible example. An Englishspeaking parent might actively encourage a child to lear French. He may stress the importance of doing well in that course, and might see that the child does his homework, and so forth. To himself, and to any observer, he might be perceived as actually helping the child. This is the active role. This same parent might hold positive or negative attitudes toward the French community. To the extent that he holds negative attitudes, he may be undermining his active role, by transferring to the child negative