Motivational Strategies Adopted in Postgraduate English Academic Writing Courses: Perspectives of Doctoral Students

Abstract

Despite postgraduates’ struggles to master English academic writing, the fulfilment of postgraduates’ motivational needs in classes of English academic writing has been scarcely researched. This study examines the motivational practices of teachers of postgraduate English academic writing, the perceived effectiveness of the adopted strategies, and possible ways to further enhance their effectiveness. Reflective writing was collected from 59 doctoral students who spoke English as a foreign language (EFL) and were enrolled in a thesis writing course. The major findings are: (1) The reported motivational strategies correspond fairly closely to those endorsed in Dörnyei’s influential framework, yet some appear to be common teaching techniques; (2) the majority of the reported positive effects pertain to enhanced knowledge, performance, and confidence; and (3) the participants called for increased use of motivational strategies, more student engagement, and diverse facilitative input from the English teacher. The findings confirm the need to extend studies on the use and perceptions of motivational strategies to postgraduate language teaching contexts.