PERSONALITY AND LANGUAGE LEARNING

A. THE AFFECTIVE DOMAIN

The affective domain describes learning objectives that
emphasize a feeling tone, an emotion, or a degree of acceptance or
rejection. Affective objectives vary from simple attention to selected
phenomena to complex but internally consistent qualities of character
and conscience. We found a large number of such objectives in the
literature expressed as interests, attitudes, appreciations, values, and
emotional sets or biases.
Receiving is being aware of or sensitive to the existence of
certain ideas, material, or phenomena and being willing to tolerate
them. Examples include: to differentiate, to accept, to listen (for), to
respond to.
Benjamin Bloom et al. (1964) define the affective domain
outlining five levels of affectivity as follows:
Responding is committed in some small measure to the ideas,
materials, or phenomena involved by actively responding to them.
Examples are: to comply with, to follow, to commend, to volunteer,
to spend leisure time in, to acclaim.

Valuing is willing to be perceived by others as valuing certain ideas,

materials, or phenomena. Examples include: to increase measured
proficiency in, to relinquish, to subsidize, to support, to debate.

Organization is to relate the value to those already held and bring it

into a harmonious and internally consistent philosophy. Examples
are: to discuss, to theorize, to formulate, to balance, to examine.

Characterization by value or value set is to act consistently in

accordance with the values he or she has internalized. Examples
include: to revise, to require, to be rated high in the value, to avoid,
to resist, to manage, to resolve.

B. EGOCENTRIC FACTORS

1. Self Esteem
We use the phrase self-esteem to talk about the beliefs you have
about yourself what you think about the type of person you are,
your abilities, the positive and negative things about you and what
you expect for your future.
If you have healthy self-esteem, your beliefs about yourself will
generally be positive. You may experience difficult times in your
life, but you will generally be able to deal with these without them
having too much of a long-term negative impact on you.
If you have low self-esteem, your beliefs about yourself will often
be negative. You will tend to focus on your weaknesses or mistakes
that you have made, and may find it hard to recognise the positive
parts of your personality. You may also blame yourself for any
difficulties or failures that you have.
2. Inhibition
Inhibition is closely related and in some cases subsumed under
the notion of self-esteem. New born baby learns to identify a self
that is different from others. This process continues into adulthood.
Individuals with higher self-esteem and ego-strength are more able
to oppose with threats to their existence and, therefore, their
defenses are lower.
C. TRANSACTIONAL FACTORS
1.
Empathy
Empathy is the process of reaching beyond the self and
understanding and feeling what other person is understanding or
feeling. Someone can not fully empathize until he adequately
knows himself. In order to communicate effectively, someone needs
to be able to understand the other persons affective and cognitive
states.
2.

Extroversion

It is a common belief among the teachers in general that

introversion is an undesirable behavior. It is imaginable that
extroversion may be a factor in the speaking of a foreign language
(FL), but not in aural and reading comprehension, nor in writing.
3.
Aggression
Aggression is a behavior necessary for survival. For example,
consistent refusal to be aggressive in self-defense, physically or
emotionally, could result in physical and mental illness and/or
death. Aggression could be central factor determining motivation to
learn language and FL teaching methods have to capitalize on
positive and constructive aggressive behavior.
D. MOTIVATION
A learner will be successful with sufficient motivation.
1.

Basic needs and drives

Motivation is usually consideration as an inner drive, impulse,
emotion, or desire that moves one to a particular action. There are
six desires or needs of human organisms which strengthen the
construct of motivation:

2.

The need for exploration

The need for manipulation

The need for stimulation

The need for knowledge

The need for ego enhancement

Instrumental and Integrative Motivation

Motivation is classified into two categories based on two different

kinds of attitude:
v Instrumental motivation
Refers to motivation to acquire language as a means for getting
instrumental goals, such as furthering a career, reading technical
material and translation.

v Integrative motivation
Is used when a learner wishes to integrate himself within the
culture of L2 group to identify himself with and become a part of
that society.

E. COMMUNITY LANGUAGE LEARNING

Community language learning (CLL) is a relatively successful method.

There are several stages undergone by the learner using CLL:
1.

Stage of intense struggle and confusion may continue for many

sessions, but always with the support of the counselor and the
fellow clients.

2.

The learner gradually becomes able to speak a word or phrase

directly in a foreign language, without translation.

3.

As the learner gain more and more familiarity with the Fl, more
and more direct communication can take place with the counselor
providing less and less direct translation and information.

4.

The learner acquires fluency in the spoken language.