Youth Culture and EFL Students’ Development of Integrative Motivation

Abstract

The aim of this study is to examine the role of the habitual use of English mediums (English T.V programs and English websites), being informal learning contexts, in Syrian non-English majors university students’ development of integrative motivation. Furthermore, this study aims at highlighting the importance of integrative motivation in foreign language acquisition whether for teachers, learners or language policy makers. Results showed that the students professed positive attitudes towards learning English in general and a good level of integrative motivation. Furthermore, resorting to correlational formula has proven that students’ habitual use of English mediums do have a role in developing integrative motivation especially viewing English T.V programs. It was also noticed that the students’ integrative motivation did have a positive influence on their achievement in the English language course. The most significant implication of this research is that once learners realize that they could use English for self expression, as a desire brought on by the impacts of the international youth culture, they will be more integratively motivated to learn the language.