Attitude Literature Review

Chapter 2

Literature Review

This chapter provides a review of the literature that is relevant to the study. This includes the concepts of attitudes and a review of the related studies.

Attitude

1) Definitions of Attitude

In early work on attitude, Allport (1935) claimed that attitude was the most indispensable concept in psychology, and it has been a core concept in sociolinguistics since Labov’s (1966) seminal work on the social stratification of speech communities, and how language change is influenced by the prestige and stigma afforded by speech by communities to specific linguistic. The concept of attitude, however, is not easily defined. Definitions vary in their degree of elaboration and in the weighting given to different features of

Construct cannot be observed directly, and so we have to rely on abilities to infer them from the sort of thing that Oppenheim lists: emotional reaction, statements etc. The fact that we cannot observe attitude directly does not mean that they are bogus, that we are just ‘imagining thing’. Perloff (2008) argues that mental and emotional phenomena are no less real than physical behaviors.

2) Aspects of Language Attitude

2.1) Behavioral Aspect of Attitude

The behavioral aspect of attitude deals with the way one behaves and reacts in particular situations. In fact, the successful language learning enhances the learners to identify themselves with the native speakers of that language and acquire or adopt various aspects of behaviors which characterize the members of the target language community.

2.2) Cognitive Aspect of Attitude

This aspect of attitude involves the beliefs of the language learners about the knowledge that they receive and their understanding in the process of language learning. The cognitive attitude can be classified into four steps of connecting the previous knowledge and the new one, creating new knowledge, checking new knowledge, and applying the new knowledge in many

In Popham’s (2011) point of view, affective domain is important for its impact on learners’ future learning behavior. He states: the reason such affective variables as students’ attitudes, interests, and values are important to us is that those variables typically influence future behavior. The reason we want to promote positive attitudes towards learning is because students who have positive attitudes towards learning today will be inclined to pursue learning in the future. The affective status of students lets us see how students are predisposed to behave