THE RELATIONSHIP AMONG STATE-TRAIT ANXIETY, FOREIGN LANGUAGE ANXIETY AND TEST ANXIETY IN AN EFL SETTING

Dil Dergisi ◽  
2010 ◽  
pp. 017-036
Author(s):  
Evrim ÖNEM
2010 ◽  
Vol 55 (3) ◽  
pp. 589-601 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yung-Nan Chiang

Although anxiety has been documented as an important variable in both interpretation performance and second language acquisition, there has been virtually no research on the interconnections between the anxiety reactions induced by these two cross-linguistic / cultural endeavors. A review of the literature on anxiety and interpretation performance finds that most of the existing studies have treated the anxiety induced by interpretation as a transfer of other general types of anxieties, such as trait anxiety, without considering the probable role of second language anxiety in interpretation performance. In order to determine the role of foreign language anxiety in 213 Chinese-English interpretation students’ learning outcomes, which were indexed by the participants’ mid-term exam scores and semester grades, this study employed Spielberger’s (1983)Trait Anxiety Inventoryto measure the students’ trait anxiety, while utilizing Horwitz, Horwitzet al.’s (1986)Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety Scale(FLCAS) to measure the participants’ foreign language anxiety. Results of correlation analyses showed that a) trait anxiety was not related to either mid-term exam scores or semester grades, b) foreign language anxiety was significantly and negatively associated with both outcome measures, c) after controlling for the effect of trait anxiety, the relationship between foreign language anxiety and interpretation learning outcomes remained significant, and d) a vast majority of theFLCASitems had significant and negative associations with both outcome measures. Implications for developing a theory of and a measurement instrument for interpretation learning anxiety are suggested.


2016 ◽  
Vol 9 (8) ◽  
pp. 190 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dilek Cakici

<p class="Default">The main aim of this study was to investigate the correlation among test anxiety (TA), foreign language anxiety (FLA) and language achievement of university preparatory students learning English as a foreign language. The sample of the research consisted of 301 (211 females, 90 males) attending a one-year EFL preparatory school at Ondokuz Mayıs University, School of Foreign Languages. The TAI (Test Anxiety Inventory) developed by Spielberger (1980), FLCAS (Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety Scale) developed by Horwitz (1986) and the students’ language achievement scores were used to collect data. In addition, this study aimed to determine the effect of gender on both TA and FLA. The findings of the study revealed that there was no relation between students’ TA and their language achievement. It was also found a significant positive correlation between students’ TA and FLA. Besides, the result demonstrated that there was a significant reverse correlation between students’ FLA and their language achievement. Following t-test results, it was found out that females exhibited higher mean scores than males in both TAI and FLCAS. Finally, certain suggestions were set for EFL teachers to reduce text anxiety and language learning anxiety in foreign language classroom settings.</p>


2010 ◽  
Vol 43 (2) ◽  
pp. 154-167 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elaine K. Horwitz

The possibility that anxiety interferes with language learning has long interested scholars, language teachers, and language learners themselves. It is intuitive that anxiety would inhibit the learning and/or production of a second language (L2). The important term in the last sentence is ‘anxiety’. The concept of anxiety is itself multi-faceted, and psychologists have differentiated a number of types of anxiety including trait anxiety, state anxiety, achievement anxiety, and facilitative-debilitative anxiety. With such a wide variety of anxiety-types, it is not surprising that early studies on the relationship between ‘anxiety’ and achievement provided mixed and confusing results, and Scovel (1978 – this timeline) rightly noted that anxiety is ‘not a simple, unitary construct that can be comfortably quantified into ‘high’ or ‘low’ amounts’ (p. 137). Scovel did not, however, anticipate the identification in the mid-1980s of a unique form of anxiety that some people experience in response to learning and/or using an L2. Typically referred to as language anxiety or foreign language anxiety (FLA), this anxiety is categorized as a situation-specific anxiety, similar in type to other familiar manifestations of anxiety such as stage fright or test anxiety.


2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 31
Author(s):  
Hualan Tan ◽  
Zhilong Xie

English serves as a bridge of communication for the people from all over the world as it plays an increasingly crucial role in the process of globalization. In accordance with English curriculum standards issued by the Ministry of Education in 2011, the ultimate goal of English language discipline is to communicate. But over these years, China&rsquo;s English education has been difficult to get out of the dilemma of &ldquo;Dumb English&rdquo;. When facing the real oral communication situations, students are still too nervous to speak with a great deal of fluency and accuracy. Therefore, the present study aims to explore the relationship between English language anxiety, gender, years of English learning and final oral English achievement by inviting 41 English major freshmen of foreign language departments of Nanchang Business College. For this purpose, this study adopts a reliable Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety Scale developed by Horwitz and Cope (1986) to measure students&rsquo; anxiety. The results reveal that anxiety levels between males and females are similar; there is also no significant difference among years of learning English; however, a significantly negative correlation between college students&rsquo; foreign language anxiety and their oral English learning achievement was found.


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