EXAMINING THE IMPACT OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE PROFICIENCY ON ACADEMIC MOTIVATION AMONG UNIVERSITY STUDENTS

Abstract

This study aimed at investigating the effect of English Language Proficiency (ELP) on Academic Motivation (AM) of university students in Lahore. In the global educational context, English language proficiency is regarded as vital and it is important in the students' academic performance, self-confidence, and learning motivation. The causal-comparative research design was used to investigate the effect of English language proficiency on university students' motivation in learning. The population consisted of all the enrolled students of public and private universities of Lahore District. The sampling technique used was two-stage sampling in public and private universities, and a quantitative approach was adopted to select the sample of 500 male and female students. Three standardized questionnaires were used for data collection. The Edgar R. Eslit English Language Competence Scale was employed to determine students' English language competency. The scale developed by Niazi and Zahid (2016) was used to assess academic motivation. The English language scale had a reliability of .946, and the motivation scale had a reliability of .926, meaning that they were very reliable internally. Data was analyzed by statistical analysis using IBM SPSS version 20.0 after the data was collected. Differences in responses were compared by independent sample t-tests based on demographic variables (gender, program) and mean differences were compared between institutions and departments using one-way ANOVA. The results showed that academic motivation is strongly positively influenced by English language competence. Academic motivation was high among students who were more proficient in English. This study suggests that the improvement of English language proficiency plays a vital role in motivating students and increasing their participation in the school activities. The universities are encouraged to have dedicated language support programmes including workshops, tutoring and digital learning materials, which are designed to enhance students' English proficiency and academic motivation.