Do Adult English Language Learners and Their Teachers Have Similar Approaches to Success?

Abstract

This study explores the similarities and differences between adult language learners' and their teachers' attributions of perceived success and failure in learning English as a foreign language in an intensive program. It examines attributions along with three dimensions: locus of causality, stability and controllability. 319 students and 81 teachers responded to a self-administered questionnaire and reported more attributions for failure than for success. The most frequent attributions both groups stated were effort, teacher, motivation, and participation. Causal dimensionality patterns of success and failure-oriented students did not show much differences. They both had significantly more controllable and unstable attributions. Teachers' dimensionality patterns did not differ from that of the students except for locus of control dimension. Causal dimensionality of both teachers and students seemed to be healthy attributional styles according to Weiner's attributional model of achievement motivation.