Autonomy, Competence, Relatedness, and Beneficence: Exploring the Interdependence of Basic Needs Satisfaction in Postsecondary World Language Education

Abstract

Self-determination theory (SDT) provides a cross-cultural, empirical framework for exploring what world (i.e., “foreign”) language educators can do to support the satisfaction of their learners’ basic psychological needs and, in turn, their autonomous motivation and well-being. Despite this, the identification of approaches to world language pedagogy and curriculum development that are supportive of learners’ simultaneous and interdependent—rather than individual and isolated—basic needs satisfaction has been limited. To this end, this study sought to examine the characteristics of postsecondary world language learning environments that were supportive of the balanced, simultaneous satisfactions of autonomy, competence, and relatedness, as well as beneficence, a candidate need. Participants in the study included thirteen undergraduate world language learners at a large public university in the United States. Semi-structured interviews were analyzed through a qualitative approach involving multiple rounds of deductive coding and two stages of inductive thematic analysis. Results of the analysis identified six themes representing the characteristics of world language learning environments that students perceived to support their autonomy, competence, relatedness, and beneficence. Further, the analysis identified textual evidence for the interdependent satisfaction of students’ basic psychological needs via the multidirectional influences of each need on the others. Recommendations for world language teachers and implications for theory and methodology are discussed.