Fulfillment of Basic Psychological Needs of English for Specific Purpose Learners during Online Learning: Lecturers and Learners Perspectives

Investigating learners’ motivational factors from Basic Psychological Needs (BPN) has been prevalent in a foreign/second language domain, but there is a dearth of well-documented research on ESP instruction. This study addressed the void by scrutinizing ESP learners’ BPN of relatedness, competence, and autonomy using a validated and reliable BPN instrument to assess online ESP practices and challenges within unideal EFL situations. A total of 617 ESP students and 94 ESP lecturers from 14 universities across provincial areas of Indonesia participated in the study. A mixed-method design administering questionnaire and interview was applied to draw ESP students’ BPN from the perspective of lecturers and students. The results revealed significant differences between lecturers’ and learners’ perceptions regarding several indicators of relatedness, competence, and autonomy categories. While the lecturers’ questionnaire and interviews reported that the ESP students had an acceptable level of engagement with wider ESP communities, the students mentioned their low engagement with content lecturers, stakeholders/experts, and communities. These differences are then utilized as a stepping stone to design a more ’ideal’ ESP program using a specific BPN framework to enhance ESP lecturers’ and students’ specific English and content knowledge under the online learning platforms. The study implies that to help ESP students learn English, online ESP programs should be collaboratively designed by involving English lecturers, content lecturers, ESP stakeholders from relevant fields, and technology-related materials that meet English and specific content knowledge needs.