The number of international students seeking employment with Japanese companies or advancing to postgraduate school has been increasing in recent years. This paper considers how students who intend to pursue careers in Japan are motivated to learn Japanese from the perspective of their future self-images. The purpose of this study was to investigate the changing process of international students’ motivation for learning Japanese and factors affecting their motivation during adolescence. The participants were 11 Chinese students who are planning to work or advance to postgraduate school in Japan after graduating from university. Semi-structured interviews were conducted where students were asked about motivational change and impact factors which changed their motivation. Then, Modified Grounded Theory Approach was used to analyze this qualitative data. The results showed that motivation changed in the process of career development in Japan. Students’ motivation was also affected by social circumstances in China such as the pressure to enter higher education and the difficulty of finding work there, in addition to cross-cultural contact in Japan with Japanese people. In particular, experiences where students were recognized as having the same responsibility and role as Japanese nationals contributed to their future self-images as workers or postgraduate students in Japan, and led to students creating a future-oriented motivation toward developing their careers both in Japan and China.
