Demotivating Factors Affecting Iranian High School Students’ English Learning

Abstract

A multitude of positive and negative factors affect the learning behaviours and learning outcomes of English language learners. The available literature, however, reveals that, in the context of Iran, researchers and practitioners have been more interested in investigating the effects of positive factors (e.g., Alavi, 2004; Asghari, 1998; Fazel, 2003; Hasani, 2005; Neisi, 2007; Ramazanian, 1998; Roohani, 2001; Samaie, 2006; Sedaghat, 2001), and little or no attempt has been made to examine complementary negative factors. Those who are interested in investigating English as a foreign language (EFL) students’ motivational behaviours might pose questions such as these: Why do some foreign language learners lose their motivation to continue studying the target language with the passage of time? What are some of the causes which lead to students’ reduction of motivation? Such questions point to the negative or demotivating factors which affect students’ learning behaviour. Examining the causes of demotivation may be intriguing, not only for researchers, but also for many practitioners who see some learners becoming demotivated in their classrooms. For researchers, investigating demotivation sheds light on and leads to a better understanding of theories on motivation; teachers may want to understand the possible causes of their students’ demotivation in order to try to mitigate these demotivating factors in their classroom practices (Sakai & Kikuchi, 2009).