Bilingual Families: Parental Motivation in Children’s Minority Language Acquisition

Abstract

This article reports on a study that addresses the following question: To what extent does the motivation of the parents affect the minority language acquisition of their children, and do other aspects such as beliefs on bilingualism and the child’s intelligence and personality play a role? Data through qualitative interviews and a quantitative survey were collected from four families with nine children who spoke at least 2 languages on a frequent basis at home. The results show that the children in these families all had high levels of proficiency in their majority language, but had various levels of proficiency in their minority language. The differences in the level of proficiency in the minority language mostly correlated with the level of motivation the parent showed, except in one case where a parent with a high level of motivation had a reversed effect on the child. Parental beliefs and attitudes on the minority language also showed a considerable effect on the level of proficiency of the children, along with the child’s personality. The One Parent, One Language approach appears to be the most effective approach to teach children their minority language.