Growth Language Mindset and Engagement in Foreign Language Classes: An Associational Perspective Integrating Self-Efficacy for Self-Regulated Learning

The present study investigated the relationships between growth language mindset and behavioral, emotional, agentic, and cognitive engagement in foreign language learning. Additionally, it examined the role of self-efficacy for self-regulated learning in accounting for the connections between growth language mindset and the four dimensions of engagement. We collected data from 354 undergraduate students at a large foreign language institution in Vietnam. Data were analyzed using Structural Equation Modeling and interpreted within an Associational Variable Analysis framework, with bootstrapping for assessing indirect associations. The results indicated that a growth language mindset was significantly associated with behavioral, emotional, and agentic engagement with small effect sizes, and with cognitive engagement with a moderate effect size. Self-efficacy for self-regulated learning fully accounted for the associations between growth language mindset and behavioral, emotional, and agentic engagement, and partially accounted for the association with cognitive engagement. The study unraveled the shared and unique relationships among the two self-beliefs and the four dimensions of engagement, highlighting a potential avenue for formal exploration of mediational hypotheses that examine self-efficacy in taking control of learning as a mechanism linking language-related self-beliefs and investment in foreign language learning.