L2 Motivation and Writing Performance by Proficiency Level: A process Approach to Motivation

The present study was designed to investigate the motivational backgrounds of writing behaviors of Korean EFL students. In so doing, structural relationships between motivational orientations, students' past and present expectancy, and English writing outcome were examined by a series of SEM (structural equation modeling) analyses. Results of the present study showed that extrinsic motivation was not significantly related with any of the two measures of writing outcome (perceived writing competence and final course grades) either directly or indirectly. This finding was consistently replicated across two groups of student writers (i.e., High vs. Low writing ability group). Intrinsic motivation, however showed a significant indirect relationship with students' perceived writing competence as well as writing course grades across the two writer groups, hence highlighting the role played by intrinsic motivation in the Korean EFL writing classroom. Pedagogical implications are discussed in terms of the major findings.