The main objective of this study is to investigate the motivation patterns of the two groups of Hong Kong students with different cultural backgrounds and examine the relationship between their motivation to learn English and English attainment. This study adopted the motivation framework of Dorneyi (2001) to investigate to what extent each social specific motivation component affects respective group of students' motivation to learn English. Results found that peer is the most influential factor in affecting students' motivation to learn while parents play the least significant role. Attempts were also made to see how specific motivational components relate to English attainment. Results showed that both groups of students' English attainment are positively correlated to course-specific motivation while teacher-specific motivation holds contrastive correlations with the two groups of students. With the results of this study, lights can be shed on helping educators to understand the fundamental differences between the two groups of students in terms of motivation and learning needs. (Contains 15 tables and 2 figures.)