The Impact of the Big Five Personality Traits and Motivational Self-System on Iranian EFL Learners’ Intended Effort: An Investigation into McAdams’ Model of Personality

Abstract

Although L2 Motivational Self System has received extensive attention over the past decade or so, its relations with the Big Five Traits and their impact on effort expended towards L2 learning within a dynamic Model of Personality has remained largely unexplored in second language (L2) studies. Accordingly, this article details a quantitative study drawing on McAdams’s (1995) model to investigate the contribution(s) of the Motivational Self System and the Big Five Traits on L2 learners’ intended effort. To this end, 654 Low-intermediate to Intermediate English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learners were asked to complete the Big Five Inventory-2 along with the Motivational Factors Questionnaire. The predictive power of the variables under the study were analysed through multiple regression including standard and sequential regressions. Among the personality traits, Open-mindedness had the greatest impact and Conscientiousness had significant, yet moderate effect on the learners’ intended effort. Among the motivational facets, Ideal L2 Self had the greatest contribution, Attitudes Towards Learning English had the second most significant part, and lastly, Ought-to L2 Self had moderate, yet significant effect on learners’ intended effort. The findings also indicated that the motivational facets overshadowed the personality traits when they were entered in to the model simultaneously. The implications and suggestions for further research were also highlighted.