A Study On Attributions Of Art And Physical Education Majors In English Learning

Attribution refers to an individual’s analysis on other’s or its own behavior, it is a process to point out the nature or deduce the reason. The theory of attribution is a social psychological theory about how the percipient deduces or explains the cause of other’s or its own behavior. In modern education psychology, American psychologist Weiner’s attribution theory mainly has the greatest influence. In Weiner’s (1986) view, one’s success or failure depends on the three factors, control point, stability and controllability. Weiner believed that attribution theory has four factors, i.e. ability, effort, task difficulty and luck, which can fall into two categories:locus of causality (internal or external) and stability (stable or unstable). Ability and effort belong to internal factors, while task difficulty and luck belong to external factors from the perspective of the dimension of locus of causality. Ability and task difficulty belong to stable factors, while effort and luck belong to unstable factors from the angle of the dimension of stability.Based on Weiner’s attribution theory, the survey of the thesis is conducted through quantitative and qualitative research. The researcher makes a survey of 169 art and physical education majors from Guang Xi Normal University about their attribution tendencies in English learning, of which 102 are male students,67 are female students. And 4 students of low score group are chosen as participants of the interview. This thesis aims to get a comprehensive understanding of their attribution tendencies in English learning and analyze the characteristics of their attribution. In this way, some meaningful suggestions can be provided to guide them to find positive attribution and improve their English learning.The specific questions of this research are below:(1)What is the general attribution of art and psychical education major students in English learning? (2) Are there any significant differences in English learning attribution between males students and female students and high score group and low score group? If there are, what are they? (3) What factors are more likely to attribute to their success and failure? SPSS 16.0 is used to analyze the data.The results obtained are as follows:(1) In general, art and physical education majors’ attribution tendencies are positive. They attribute their failure or success in English learning to two internal factors, namely effort and individual ability, while they are seldom attribute them to external factors, such as luck or study environment. (2) There are significant differences between male students’ and female students’ attribution of failure in ability and luck. Female students tend to attribute failure to ability while male students tend to attribute it to luck. (3) There are significant differences between high score group and low score group in terms of ability, effort and learning environment, while there is no significant difference in luck. Students of high score group incline to attribute their success to effort and ability, and attribute failure to effort and learning environment. While students of low score group attribute success to learning environment, and attribute failure to ability. (4)Five main factors are found to have influence on attribution of students with low score, namely confidence, interest, teachers’ concern and guidance, learning environment and help from classmates.Therefore, according to the research results, the thesis puts forward some advice, firstly, teacher should train students of art and physical education majors to attribute positively and cultivate their interest towards English learning; secondly, it is necessary for teacher to build up students’ confidence in English learning and develop harmonious relationships with them; thirdly, it is important to promote cooperative learning among the art and physical education majors students.