Abstract
The study concentrates on the multiple factors that make learners face the risks of becoming amotivated, demotivated, experimenting resistance to language learning (Trang & Baldauf Jr. 2007), resenting and even refusing to learn a foreign language. Our research revealed that both internal/learner-related factors and external demotivating factors may hinder the process of learning a foreign language and this requires awareness and a special attention from the teachers` part, as well as appropriate measures to counteract them. The study used the qualitative analysis of the data provided by narrative accounts. We started from the material gathered during an international project that worked on language autobiographies of (young) adults, more precisely on their reflections upon their own experience with foreign language learning and use. The participants to our study were young teachers of English, who were asked to write their linguistic autobiographies; we assumed that if teachers become aware of the factors that demotivated them during the process of language learning, they could, in their turn, understand their students` demotivating factors and thus, counteract them through their attitude, teaching style and teaching methods, strategies and techniques that they use in the classroom.
Key words: motivation, demotivation, amotivation, risk, language autobiography