Investigating Influences Of English Writing Motivation And Writing Strategy On The English Writing Performance Of Non-english Major College Students

English writing ability is the embodiment of students’ comprehensive language ability,which has higher requirements on students’ language learning.However,the pedagogical situations of college English writing in China are far from satisfactory.With the development of psycholinguistics,researchers have paid more attention to the influences of individual differences on language learning.As two of the factors,learning motivation and learning strategy have attracted researchers’ attention.Most domestic studies focused on only one factor,while few studies combined learning motivation,learning strategy and learning performance simultaneously,especially in English writing.Based on D?rnyei’s three-level motivation theory and the combination of O’Malley and Chamots’ classification of learning strategies and Yang’s classification of writing strategies,this study explores the relationship among English writing motivation,English writing strategies and English writing performance.This study attempts to answer four questions:(1)What is the relationship between English writing motivation and English writing performance of college non-English majors?(2)What is the relationship between English writing strategies and English writing performance of college non-English majors?(3)Is there relationship between English writing motivation and English writing strategy? If yes,what’s the relationship between them?(4)What are the differences in writing motivation and writing strategies between high proficiency writers and low proficiency writers?In this study,176 non-English major sophomores from a normal university in Jiangxi province were involved as participants.Two questionnaires,a writing test and an interview were used to collect research data.After data collection,the author conducted descriptive analysis,correlation analysis and independent-samples t test on the data with SPSS 23.0.The results show that :(1)Among writing motivations,Writing interest,writing efficacy,value of writing and learning environment are positively correlated with writing performance,while writing avoidance and writing performance are negatively correlated;(2)Metacognitive strategy,pre-drafting strategy and post-drafting strategy are positively correlated with writing performance;(3)Writing efficacy and learning environment motivation are positively correlated with most writing strategies,while writing avoidance is only negatively correlated with mother tongue avoidance and post-drafting strategies.(4)In terms of writing motivation,there are significant differences in writing interest,writing efficacy,writing avoidance,learning environment and value of writing between high proficiency writers and low proficiency writers.In terms of writing strategies,metacognitive strategy,pre-drafting strategy and post-drafting strategy can distinguish the high proficiency writers and low proficiency writers.The results of this study prove that writing motivation and writing strategy are important factors influencing English writing performance and provide important conclusions for second language writing instruction.In addition,this study is helpful for teachers to have a deeper understanding of students’ writing motivation and help students learn to use effective writing strategies.This study also provides practical suggestions for the improvement of students’ English writing in the college English writing teaching.