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Effects of motivational regulation strategies on writing performance: a mediation model of self-regulated learning of writing in English as a second/foreign language

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Abstract

Motivational regulation has long been recognized as an essential but insufficiently investigated aspect of self-regulated learning (SRL), especially in relation to learning English-as-a-foreign-language (EFL) writing. This study intends to fill the gap by investigating the predictive effect of motivational regulation strategies on EFL students’ writing performance mediated by SRL strategies. Data were collected from undergraduate students in mainland China (N = 512) through self-report questionnaires and an English writing test. Results of structural equation modeling (SEM) confirmed a partial mediation model in which motivational regulation strategies, as a whole, not only had direct and indirect effects on students’ writing performance but were also significantly correlated with their reported use of SRL strategies relating to cognition, metacognition, and social behavior. In addition, only cognitive and metacognitive strategies were found to be significant mediators in the model while social behavior strategies were not. The findings suggest that cumulative knowledge of motivational regulation is an antecedent of the reported use of other SRL strategies in affecting EFL writing performance. The inclusion of SRL strategies in the mediation model also contributes to a clear understanding of L2 writing processes within the SRL mechanism for improving writing outcomes.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Faculty of European Languages and Literature, Heilongjiang University, Harbin, 150000, China

    Lin Sophie Teng

  2. Woolf Fisher Research Centre, Faculty of Education and Social Work, University of Auckland, Auckland, 1023, New Zealand

    Lin Sophie Teng

  3. Faculty of Education and Social Work, School of Curriculum and Pedagogy, University of Auckland, 74 Epsom Avenue, Auckland, 1023, New Zealand

    Lawrence Jun Zhang

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  1. Lin Sophie Teng
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  2. Lawrence Jun Zhang
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Correspondence to Lawrence Jun Zhang.

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Conflict of interest

We declare that this paper was based on the first author, Lin Sophie Teng’s doctoral thesis, which was completed with the assistance of a scholarship from The University of Auckland, New Zealand. We both declare that there are no conflicts of interest whatsoever in connection with this publication. The doctoral scholarship does not have any strings attached to it for the recipient of the scholarship. It was awarded to worthy candidates purely for academic study that should lead to the award of the Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) Degree. It is not commercially motivated whatsoever.

Appendices

Appendix 1: Writing Topic

Prompts: It was recently reported in a newspaper that six students who shared a dorm at a local university hired a cleaner to do laundry and cleaning once a week. And each of them paid her 60 yuan a month. This has led to a heated debate as to whether college students should hire cleaners.

Please write a composition of more than 200 words on the following topic: Should College Students Hire Cleaners?

Appendix 2

Table 2 Descriptive statistics of six SRL strategies
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Appendix 3

Table 3 Descriptive statistics of motivational regulation strategies
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Appendix 4

Table 4 Correlation matrix of all measured latent variables
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Teng, L.S., Zhang, L.J. Effects of motivational regulation strategies on writing performance: a mediation model of self-regulated learning of writing in English as a second/foreign language. Metacognition Learning 13, 213–240 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11409-017-9171-4

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