留学生教育学dissertationResearch on Non-English Majors’ English Reading Anxiety
留学生教育学dissertationResearch on Non-English Majors’ English Reading Anxiety
Abstract: Learning anxiety, belonging to an emotional category, is a psychological concept, which refers to a kind of nervous and fearful emotional state that formed by the frustration of self-esteem and self-confidence and the increasing feeling of failure or guilt due to individuals’ fail to achieve their expected goals. In recent years, the researches both at home and abroad have done many researchers on this emotional element that influences language study. They have proposed various definitions and classification to it, and to be more important, they have studied the relationship between anxiety and language learning, pointed out the reasons of language learning anxiety and ways to avoid it.
This study is based on a questionnaire survey about the non-English majors’ reading anxiety in which100 non-English major sophomores of Heze University were randomly selected as the subjects. Through the analysis of SPSS11.5, the thesis tried to investigate that whether there is anxiety in English reading, whether there is gender difference in English reading anxiety and the correlation between English reading anxiety and academic performance. The findings indicate that there is surely reading anxiety among non-English majors to some extent, there is significant gender difference in English reading anxiety. What’s more, there is negative relationship between English reading anxiety and the academic performance; That is to say, the more serious the readers’ sense of anxiety the worse their academic performance.
Key words: non-English majors; English reading anxiety; gender difference; academic performance
CONTENTS
Abstract……………………………………………………………………..…………………ii
Introduction……...………..………………………….……………...…………………..……..1
1 Literature Review……………………………………………………………....……............2 1.1 Language Anxiety……...………..………………………….……………...……………2
1.1.1 Definition of Language Anxiety…………………………………………………....3#p#分页标题#e#
1.1.2 Classification of Language Anxiety…………………………………………...........4
1.2 Relationship between Language Anxiety and Academic Performance..........……..........6
1.3 An Overview of Specific Anxiety Types.......................................................................... 6
1.3.1 Language Listening Anxiety.....................................................................................7
1.3.2 Language Speaking Anxiety......................................................................................7
1.3.3 Language Writing Anxiety........................................................................................ 8
1.3.4 Language Reading Anxiety.......................................................................................8
1.4 Research Gaps and Questions..........................................................................................9
2 Research Methodology…....................................………………………...…………............9
2.1 Subjects………………………………………………………….........…………...........9
2.2 Instrument………………………………………………………..........………….........10
2.3 Data Collection……………………………………………………........………..........10
2.4 Data Analysis………………………………………………………...…………...........11
3 Results and Discussion.......……………………………………………...…………............11
3.1 General Situation of Non-English Major’s FLRAS.......………………………….........12
3.1.1 Situation of Overall FLRAS………………………………………………………13
3.1.2 Situation of Dimensions of FLRAS ………………………………………………14
3.2 Gender Difference in Non-English Major’s FLRAS……….…………………………15#p#分页标题#e#
3.2.1 Gender Difference in Overall FLRAS....................................................................15
3.2.2 Gender Difference in Each Item of FLRAS................................................... …17
3.3 Relationship between Non-English Major’s FLRAS and Academic Performance……18
3.4 Implications……………………………………………………………………………19
3.4.1 Implications for College English Teaching………………………………………20
3.4.2 Implications for College English Learning………………………………………21
Conclusion……………….…………………………………………........................…...........21
Bibliography…………………………………………………………….................….............22
Introduction
Since the 1970s, research focus on second language acquisition has shifted from teachers’ teaching to students’ learning (Johns, 1991：85). One of the important research areas is about the individual difference that causes learning outcome different (Ellis, 1985: 22). In China, some educational researchers have done many researches on anxiety. All in all, they tried to recognize and know Chinese students’ situation of anxiety, the reason that caused anxiety and the countermeasures of the problem.
The present thesis aims at drawing a clear picture about the non-English majors’ English reading anxiety. By analyzing data collected, the author describes the students’ general English reading anxiety by calculating the mean and standard deviation of each item; then the author tries to explore the gender difference and the correlation between the students' reading anxiety and their academic performance.
At the same time, this study has a certain theoretical and practical significance. First, it combines the emotional factor of learning anxiety to students’ English reading learning in order to effectively reduce and overcome anxiety phenomenon, which supplies a new research direction for the study of anxiety in theory; Second, the study regards the individual difference of students’ foreign language learning study and makes the research focus to the aspect of English reading learning. On one hand, students can realize the importance of anxious emotional factor to foreign language learning and then pay attention to it; On the other hand, it has some implications to teachers’ foreign language teaching especially to the reading teaching with the help of scientific instrument.#p#分页标题#e#
This thesis is made up of four parts. Part 1 reviews the literature on definition and classification of language anxiety and the correlation between language anxiety and academic performance. Part 2 describes the methodology adopted in the study, which includes the participants of the study, the research method, procedure for data collection and data analysis. Part 3 presents the results and discussions of non-English majors’ reading anxiety in the present study. Part 4 gives a conclusion, which consists of the main findings of present study, the limitations of the present study and also the suggestions for the future development.
1 Literature Review
In foreign language learning, numerous learner variables are generally said to influence the success or failure of language learning (e. g: L2 motivation, learning strategies, language aptitude, etc.). Among these, foreign language anxiety has often been cited as one of the most important affective variables. Most of us will have had the experience that in an anxiety-provoking climate our L2knowledge often deteriorates: We forget things that we otherwise know and also make silly mistakes. The past two decades has witnessed a virtual explosion of research into the topic of foreign language anxiety, which will be detailed explained in this chapter.
1.1 Language Anxiety
1.1.1 Definition of language Anxiety
1.1.1.1 Definition of Anxiety
As a special psychological phenomenon, many scholars make definitions to anxiety. The man who proposed the theory of anxiety earlier is Soren Aabye Kierkegaard. He thinks anxiety is the psychological experience that consequentially existed when people face choices. Once they form their own consciousness, children will have the tendency of independence and the willingness of choosing their living road. Anxiety will come along too. Young thinks it is a kind of psychological state or extrinsic manifested form of people’s psychological activity, or the psychological exhibition that people cannot reach or achieve their expected goals. Arnold pointed out anxiety is a nervous and fearful emotional state that formed by the frustration of self-esteem and self-confidence and the increasing feeling of failure or guilt due to individuals’ fail to achieve their expected goals. Ellis thinks anxiety is an unreasonable think and stresses the experience of anxiety is closely connected with individuals’ false cognitive value.
Most scholars would agree with Arnold and Brown's (1999: 8) conclusion that ''Anxiety is quite possibly the affective factor that most pervasively obstructs the learning process.'' For this reason anxiety has been in the limelight of L2 research for decades (Macintyre, 1999: 65; Arnold, 1996: 53)."Not only is it intuitive to many people that anxiety negatively influences language learning, it is logical because anxiety has been found to interfere with many types of learning and has been one of the most highly examined variables in all of psychology and education" (Horwitz, 1986: 103). However, up to now, no definition is so satisfactory that no one can contest. #p#分页标题#e#
1.1.1.2 Definition of Language Anxiety
Language Anxiety is the influences of anxiety to Second Language (SL) or Foreign Language (FL). Gardner & Macintyre regard language anxiety as an experienced fearful feeling when the individual learner is required to use the SL or FL that is not commanded completely in certain circumstances. The next year they redescribe language anxiety as a nervous and fearful feeling that individual learners have special relationship with second language situation, especially the second language behavior. Ellis. R defined language anxiety as a fearful or nervous mentality that causes when students realize they will have to use the language they learned to have a “performance”. That is to say, it is a restless or nervous mind that forms when using second language to have a communication.
Oxford pointed out clearly, in formal and informal learning circumstances; language anxiety is always in the first place as to the influence to foreign language study. She pointed out that the reasons for anxiety are language course score, level testing score, oral and writing expression tasks, self-confidence and self- esteem in language learning. As Horwitz (2001: 87) summarized, language anxiety turned out to be a relatively independent factor, displaying only low correlations with general trait-anxiety. This indicates that this factor is not merely a transfer of anxiety from another domain such as test anxiety or communication apprehension but is a uniquely L2-related variable; as Macintyre (1999: 27) defines it, language anxiety involves the ''worry and negative emotional reaction aroused when learning or using a second language''. Horwitz provided a review of an impressive amount of literature that consistently evidenced the negative impact of language anxiety on language criterion measures. She acknowledged, however, that one particular line of research, by Sparks, and their colleagues on the 'Linguistic Coding Difference Hypothesis, regarded language anxiety merely as a consequence of the student' cognitive deficits, suggesting therefore that anxiety was not a core construct worthy of research but a mere byproduct. This view has been strongly contested by Macintyre (1995a: 303) and Horwitz (2000: 201).
1.1.2 Classification of Language Anxiety
Given the importance and the high profile of anxiety, it is surprising how ambiguous the conceptualization of the concept becomes when we go beyond the surface, as mentioned above; there is an overall uncertainty about the basic category: Is it a motivational component? A personality trait? Or an emotion? Furthermore, anxiety is usually not seen as a unitary factor but a complex made up of constituents that have different characteristics. Two important anxiety distinctions are usually mentioned:
Beneficial/facilitating vs. inhibitory/debilitating anxiety: It has been observed that anxiety does not necessarily inhibit performance but in some cases can actually promote it 'Worry,' which is considered the cognitive component of anxiety has been shown to have a negative impact on performance, whereas the affective component, emotionality, does not necessarily have detrimental effects.#p#分页标题#e#
Trait vs. state anxiety: Trait anxiety refers to a stable predisposition to become anxious in a cross-section of situations; state anxiety is the transient, moment-to-moment experience of anxiety as an emotional reaction to the current situation.
Thus, anxiety is a complex construct with several different facets. However, as Scovel and his friends describes, in contrast to this multifaceted view, non-specialists tend to equate anxiety simply with fear or phobia, and in language teaching methodological texts the variable is considered to be an arch enemy that needs to be eliminated at all cost.
1.2 Relationship between Language Anxiety and Academic Performance
Numerous research studies have consistently yielded moderate negative correlations between foreign language anxiety and foreign language performance, and the pervasive effects that anxiety has on the language-learning process has frequently reported.
In an important experimental study investigating the casual relationship between anxiety and academic performance, Macintyre and Gardner (1994: 212) intentionally aroused anxiety in language learners by introducing a video camera at various points in a vocabulary learning task. Seventy-one students of French were randomly assigned to one of four groups, the first three experiencing the 'camera condition' at different phases of task completion (input，processing, and output stages), while the fourth control group was not exposed to the camera. Significant increases in state anxiety were reported in three groups when the video camera was introduced, and concomitant deficits in vocabulary acquisition were observed. This demonstrated conclusively that anxiety arousal can play a casual role and lead to performance deficit which implies that language anxiety is not merely a function of poor performance due to insufficient cognitive skills and abilities.
It is clear from the reviews of relevant empirical studies on Second Language Acquisition (陈素红, 2005: 31; Gardner & Clement, 1999: 58) that when anxiety is conceptualized as a situated L2-specific construct, it has a consistently negative bearing on L2 performance. As Gardner and Macintyre (1993: 6) concluded, ‘The result of these studies of language anxiety suggest that anxious students will have lower levels of verbal production... and will be reluctant to express personally relevant information in a second-language conversation’. However, the actual amount of impact the variable exerts also depends on the interplay between anxiety and other factors. Gregersen and Horwitz, for example，established a link between language anxiety and students’ academic perfectionism, and in a study already mentioned briefly, Dewaele discussed the combined effects of anxiety varies according to the social milieu，with multicultural settings possibly enhancing the correlates of language anxiety and generating a complex construct that combines language anxiety, self-perceptions of L2 proficiency, and attitudinal/motivational components. Clement's construct of self-confidence is in accordance with this conception.#p#分页标题#e#
Macintyre and Gardner (1991a: 103), in a comprehensive review of these studies, conclude: Covering several measures of proficiency, in several different samples, and even in somewhat different conceptual frameworks, it has been shown that anxiety negatively affects academic performance in the second language. In some cases, anxiety provides some of the highest simple correlations of attitudes with achievement.
It should be noted, however, that not all the studies in their review produced significant correlations between anxiety and achievement. In fact, studies of learner anxiety have often produced even more mixed results. What is needed to account for the role that anxiety plays in language learning, such as that proposed by Macintyre and Gardner (1991a: 335) and summarized in Table1.1 According to this model, the relationship between anxiety and learning is moderated by the learners' stage of development and by situation-specific learning experiences. The model also recognizes that poor performance can be the cause as well as the results of the anxiety, a point also made by Skehan.
Table1.1 A model of the role of anxiety in language learning (based on Macintyre and Gardner 1989a)
Stage Type of anxiety Effects of learning
Beginner Very little—restricted to state anxiety None
Post-beginner Situation anxiety develops if learner develops negative expectations based on bad learning experiences Learner expects to be nervous and performs poorly
Later Poor performance and continued bad learning experiences results in increasing anxiety Continued poor performance anxiety
1.3 An Overview of Specific Anxiety Types
Since 1986, a lot of researchers have been involved in the field of foreign language learning anxiety and the various study reached an almost unanimous conclusion: effects of foreign language learning anxiety is widespread, showing moderate negative correlation. Study further found that in the process of listening, speaking, writing and reading, anxiety exists. The researchers noted that foreign language learning anxiety is in different manifestations in different language skills.
1.3.1 Language Listening Anxiety
A great number of students feel worried or frustrated when the listening task turns out to be above their ability. When some students miss one word in a sentence they may get uneasy and can’t follow the tape any more. And also when they hear unfamiliar topics or different dialects and accents, they may feel uncertain about what they are going to hear. These things all arouse a feeling of anxiety in listening comprehension and the results of it will turn out to be a disaster. The message in listening course is provided through sound. When learners hear a word, they usually have three steps to understand the meaning of the word. They firstly hear the pronunciation of the word, and then try to recall the spelling of the word, and finally they can get the meaning of the word. If some information is missed, which brings language anxiety to them, for they can not catch some necessary information. Speakers should modestly slower the speech speed and speak with clear pronunciation until learners have reached higher level of listening skill. #p#分页标题#e#
1.3.2 Language Speaking Anxiety
Among the four skills of language learning----reading, writing, listening and speaking, reading is perhaps the easiest, while speaking the most difficult to acquire(Gardener & Clement, 1999: 287-307). That is because speaking is an active skill, requiring students to combine the words into sentences without preparation, and no time to revise. During this process, learners show their differences, some can draw and organize the information in their mind flexibly, and then speak it out fluently; others can’t organize the words they want to express in a reasonable and logical way, even though they have mastered much knowledge and are eager to express. One of the important reasons is due to their psychological characteristics. People who suffer from communication apprehension are more reluctant to converse or interact with others; therefore, they tend to avoid communication or withdraw from it as soon as possible. Koch and Terrell found that more than half of their subjects reported oral skits and oral presentations in front of the class as the most anxiety-producing activities and that oral quizzes and being called on to respond orally were also anxiety-producing. Students also report feeling overwhelmed and anxious when speaking perhaps due to a limited vocabulary or limited grammatical knowledge. One frequently cited anxiety-provoking factor in the interviews with students was simply being called on in class, whether prepared or not.
1.3.3 Language Writing Anxiety
Most learners have enough vocabulary to express their ideas, feeling or others, but while writing, it will take them a long time to choose which words are most suitable. It is mainly because they only know the general meanings of words but they don't know the exact meanings of words in different contexts. For example, synonyms have similar meaning, but usages of them may different in particular situation. Using not exactly correct word sometimes results in different senses, which will also cause anxiety.
1.3.4 Language Reading Anxiety
Reading has been playing an important role in learning a foreign language all the time. Reading is a sort of active thought process through the use of the readers’ linguistic knowledge and background knowledge on reading materials. Anxious learners feel nervous when they are not familiar with the topic they are reading, or when encounter unknown grammar items or words. It's said that two aspects of language reading would seem to have great potential for eliciting anxiety: "unfamiliar scripts and writing systems and unfamiliar cultural material".
As to the first aspect, few of learners have good habit of reading sentence by sentence. Most of them read one paragraph word by word. They expect to know every word. So when encountering unfamiliar words, they feel anxious. Even though they know every word and can catch every word's meaning, unfamiliar grammar items will usually block them to get sense and true tone of the paragraph. If students do this way, they are prone to experience anxiety. #p#分页标题#e#
To sum up, language anxiety plays an important role in language learning. Effects of language anxiety mentioned here are all negative effects, because language anxiety causes much more negative effects than positive ones. All learners should pay more attention to language anxiety on language learning, realize its sources and disadvantages and adopt certain strategies to reduce language anxiety in order to make high quality of language achievement.
1.4 Research Gaps and Research Questions
It is obvious that the results and findings got from the research on foreign language learning anxiety are fruitful and enlightening, Horwitz (2001: 405) pointed out that the specific source of anxiety and anxiety of different levels have become the 21st century, new trends in foreign language anxiety research. Recalling the various researches in the past, it is easy to find that the specific anxiety types are greatly ignored. Since English learning is a rather complex process, it is necessary to explore the learning anxiety in the specific aspects (listening anxiety, writing anxiety and speaking anxiety, etc.). As we all know, in the present CET, reading comprehension takes up a large proportion, which displays the comparative importance of the reading skill. Under this background, the present study intends to do some research about the foreign language reading anxiety with the purpose to explore the questions below:
1) Whether there is anxiety phenomenon among non-English majors?
2) Whether there is gender difference between non-English majors in reading anxiety?
3) Whether there is correlation between non-English majors’ reading anxiety and students’ academic performance?
2 Research Methodologies
In this part, the methodology used in this research is elaborated. After introducing subjects, instrument used in this study is described. Eventually, research procedures, data collection and analysis will be explained in details.
2.1 Subjects
By using random cluster sampling, a total of 100 sophomores, who are learners of English as foreign language from Heze University were selected to participate in the questionnaire survey of present study. Among them, 41 were males and 59 were females, and all of them were non-English majors.
2.2 Instrument
The instrument of the present study is a questionnaire that includes two parts. The first part is about personal information, which involves the participants' gender and academic performance. Part two is the Chinese version of Foreign Language Reading Anxiety Scale. This scale was adopted from Saito’s scale of Foreign Language Reading Anxiety (Horwitz, 1999: 336). In Saito’s scale, a total of 20 items were presented, all of which referred to the students’ feelings in English reading. Students were asked to indicate on a 5-point Likert scale, ranging from “totally disagree” to “totally agree” with theoretical range from 20 to 100. The higher score the subject got the more serious his reading anxiety is. The scale shows an internal consistency coefficient of .85, which indicates that the scale is reliable to survey non-English majors’ reading anxiety.#p#分页标题#e#
2.3 Data Collection
One week before formal administration, the author had got in touch with the English teachers of the participants, explaining the research purpose, significance, requirements, specific steps and so on. The questionnaire was distributed to the participants on March 27 with the assistance of their English teachers during their English classes. All participants received uniform instructions as to how to fill out the questionnaire in order to minimize confusion and they were told that the questionnaire were used only to investigate their true situation of reading anxiety and there is no right or wrong response, so they were supposed to complete the questionnaire as carefully and honestly as possible. Generally speaking, there were no problems of understanding and all the 79 questionnaires were collected within 20 minutes.
2.4 Data Analysis
Although there are 100 participants, some of their questionnaires are invalid. By eliminating incomplete answered questionnaires, there are 79 valid subjects finally. Then all the data obtained were entered into computer and handed with SPSS11.5. Finally, the value for overall FLRAS was obtained by adding each item up. The higher the total value is, the more serious the reading anxiety is. In the process of data analysis, first, descriptive statistics was used to learn the real situation of the non-English majors’ reading anxiety. And then Pearson Correlation analysis and independent-samples T-test were performed to explore the correlation between reading anxiety and the academic performance and the gender difference.
3 Results and Discussion
This chapter presents the results and discussion of three research questions in the present study by analyzing the data collected from questionnaire survey, In Section 3.1, the general situation of non-English major’s foreign language reading anxiety will be shown. Next, Section 3.2 will explore the gender difference in non-English major’s foreign language reading anxiety and last but not least, Section 3.3 analyses the results and discussion on the relationship between non-English major’s foreign language reading anxiety and academic performance.
3.1 General Situation of Non-English Major’s FLRAS
In order to deal with the first research question of present study that what is the general situation about the non-English major’s anxiety in English reading, descriptive analysis was performed in this section.
3.1.1 Situation of Overall FLRAS
The results got from descriptive analysis of overall FLRAS was reported in Table 3.1, from which we can learn the general situation of non-English major’s anxiety in English reading.
Table 3.1 Descriptive Data of Overall FLRAS
N Mean Std. Deviation Minimum Maximum#p#分页标题#e#
79 59.24 11.718 22 88
As stated in Chapter three a higher score on the FLRAS signifies a higher anxiety in English reading. As shown in the Table 4.1, in the present study, the FLRAS scores for the whole samples range from 22 to 88with a mean of 74.71, which indicates that most of the Non-English majors have great anxiety in English reading. In addition, the std.Deviation of11.718 shows that there is significant individual difference in Non-English majors’ English reading anxiety. It is easy to explain for to different language learners, their learning motivation, language aptitude and personality are totally different, which results in the natural variety in reading anxiety.
3.1.2 Situation of Dimensions of FLRAS
Obviously, the statistics above gave us a brief overview of non-English major’s anxiety in English reading. However, in order to get more specific information each item of the scale should be explored next. The related descriptive data are shown in Table 3.2.
Table 3.2 Descriptive Data of Each Item
Item Mean Std. Deviation Item Mean Std. Deviation
1 3.37 1.100 11 2.84 1. 818
2 3.48 1.108 12 2.99 1.115
3 3.15 1.178 13 3.12 1.032
4 2.75 1.214 14 1.99 1.019
5 2.80 1.042 15 2.78 1.117 #p#分页标题#e#
6 2.72 1.132 16 2.66 1.310
7 2.65 1.121 17 2.92 1.318
8 2.56 1.071 18 3.84 .993
9 2.43 1.094 19 3.10 1.069
10 3.35 1.110 20 3.80 1.018
As shown in Table 3.2, the five items in which the samples got the comparatively high score are item 18, 20, 2, 1, and 10, and the five comparatively low scores come from item 14, 9, 8, 7, and 16.And to be more specific, among these items, the highest one is item 18(M=3.84) and the lowest one is item 14(M=1.99). As to the Item 18, the results shows that students are quite agree with the expression that “I am not satisfied with my current English reading ability”. From this expression, we can find that most students still lack of confidence in their English reading abilities and maybe their reading skill has not been qualified. Therefore, insufficient reading ability and learning confidence maybe the important source of reading anxiety. On the other hand, students do not support the view of item 14 that “I feel it is not so difficult once reading English articles becomes a habit ” very much. The response to the item 14 shows that even if the learners have got into the habit of daily English reading, they still find that reading is far more difficult to overcome. The results imply that most of the English learners have no effective reading skills or strategies which can relieve their reading anxiety to some extent.
We can conclude several basic elements in a good reading from the research. One with a small vocabulary will find it very difficult in reading comprehension. Some students say they just can’t remember so many words. So vocabulary is a big problem. A good reader should develop a correct method of reading. That is, to train himself to read attentively (not to read back) and silently (not to read aloud), sentence by sentence, not word by word. Whenever meeting a new word, try to guess the meaning from the context. Consulting the dictionary from time to time not only affects one’s reading speed and the comprehension of the reading material, but also will get the reader frustrated. #p#分页标题#e#
3.2 Gender Difference in Non-English Major’s FLRAS
For the sake of exploring the second question in the present study that whether there is gender difference in non-English major’s FLRAS, both descriptive analysis and independent samples T-Test are used in this part.
3.2.1 Gender Difference in Overall FLRAS
The result got from descriptive analysis and Independent Sample T-Test of overall FLRAS were reported in Table 3.3, from which we can learn whether there is gender difference in English reading anxiety.
As shown in Table 3.3, the mean score of overall FLRAS, male samples got is a little higher than that of female ones. It indicates that male non-English major’s anxiety in reading is comparatively higher than their counterparts. However, since the p value got in the independent Sample T-Test is .464 (>.05), it suggests that there’s no significant gender difference in non-English major’s anxiety in English reading.
Table 3.3 Descriptive Statistics and Independent Sample T-Test for Gender in FLRAS
Item Gender Mean Std. Deviation df. t p
1-20 Male 60.45 2.389 77 .736 .464
Female 58.46 1.536
8 Male 2.87 1.118 77 2.142 .035
Female -2.35 1.000
9 Male 2.74 1.094 77 2.077 .041
Female 2.23 1.057
3.2.2 Gender Difference in Each Item of FLRAS
Although the findings in Table 3.3 suggests that there is no gender difference in non-English major’s reading anxiety, it doesn’t equal to there being no gender difference in each item of FLRAS.#p#分页标题#e#
The results in Table 3.3 also show that among the 20 items of FLRAS, two items (item 8 and 9) show significant gender difference between male and female non-English majors. Firstly Item 8 (t=2.142, p=.035<0.05) is that “ I feel puzzled if I encounter unknown words when reading English materials ”. As we all know, vocabulary is the basic and also essential part in English learning, while the countless amount and the long learning process are also painful. In the reading practice, finding out new words are very common. In order to cope with this kind of situation, reading skill, like guessing the new words from various clues n the text, becomes more important. The results received in the present study suggest that female learners do much better than their counterparts in this aspect.
Secondly, Item 9was described that when reading English articles, I translate the text one word by one word at last”. The results(t=2.077,p=.041<0.05) reflects that to some English learners, their low reading ability is partly due to their poor understanding of the English text. They cut down the relationship among the words and believe that the simple connection of the single word meaning can constitute the main idea of complex paragraph. But when they find that doesn’t work, reading anxiety comes to them quickly. To the male learners, the issue talked about above is much more serious. Therefore, the development of foreign language understanding ability is important to relieve reading anxiety.
3.3 Relationship between Non-English Major’s FLRAS and Academic Performance
The third research question in the present study aims to explore the relationship between non-English major’s FLRAS and academic performance. In order to deal with this issue, Pearson Correlation Analysis was used in this part, the results of which were displayed in Table 3.4.
As is shown in Table 3.4, there’s significant negative correlation between FLRAS and academic performance. That is to say, the higher the anxiety in reading English materials non-English majors have, the poorer their academic performance is. In other words, learner’s reading anxiety has negative impact on their achievement.
Therefore, reading anxiety is very important to students to have a good performance in their English reading process. Only those who can deal reading anxiety well or even with no anxiety can do well in their reading performance in future.
Table 3.4 Correlation between FLRAS and Academic Performance
Total 3 4 7 12 17 18
Pearson Correlation -.269* -.291* -3.55** -.294* -.325* -.290* -.269*#p#分页标题#e#
Academic
Performance Sig.(2-tailed) .041 .027 .006 .025 .013 .027 .041
Note: * Correlation is significant at the 0.05 level (2-tailed)
** Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed)
Item 3, 4, and7 indicate that students are not confident to their English reading. When they face a long piece of article or when they encounter new words they feel puzzled and do not know what to do. Item 12, 17, 18 reflect students have no proper reading techniques. They usually use improper methods to read.
Reading has been playing an important role in learning a foreign language all the time. Reading is a sort of active thought process through the use of the readers’ linguistic knowledge and background knowledge on reading materials. Anxious learners feel nervous when they are not familiar with the topic they are reading, or when encounter unknown grammar items or words. It's said that two aspects of language reading would seem to have great potential for eliciting anxiety: "unfamiliar scripts and writing systems and unfamiliar cultural material".
As to the first aspect, few of learners have good habit of reading sentence by sentence. Most of them read one paragraph word by word. They expect to know every word. So when encountering unfamiliar words, they feel anxious. Even though they know every word and can catch every word's meaning, unfamiliar grammar items will usually block them to get sense and true tone of the paragraph. If students do this way, they are prone to experience anxiety.
Some students have no self-confidence in reading. Before reading, they fear that they cannot understand the passage. When they meet with new words, they will feel so nervous as to lose the courage to go on reading it. These students are defeated not by their weakness in English but by their lack of confidence.
We know that people read to get information or to learn and absorb or to enjoy themselves. So, when you are reading, there is no need to feel any pressure. Just try to get the information you need or enjoy yourself. But this is not enough. A good reader should also try to communicate with the author actively. Try to guess the author’s real meaning between the lines and don’t force your own thoughts upon the author’s. Even if there are some new words, that doesn’t matter much. You don’t have to know the exact meaning of every new word, just try to guess the word’s meaning from the context.
To sum up, language anxiety plays an important role in language learning. Effects of language anxiety mentioned here are all negative effects, because language anxiety causes much more negative effects than positive ones. All learners should pay more attention to language anxiety on language learning, realize its sources and disadvantages and adopt certain strategies to reduce language anxiety in order to make high quality of language achievement.#p#分页标题#e#
3.4 Implications
The findings of this study may contribute to providing some useful and practical implications for both college English teachers and learners, which will be summarized as below.
3.4.1 Implications for College English Teaching
Based on the findings obtained in the present study，some pieces of advice can be taken to improve college English teaching.
1) Enhancing students’ sense of belonging
From the psychological point of view, everyone has the basic demand of belonging to a particular group. Lacking a sense of belonging, it is easy for students to have a sense of inferiority, and then language anxiety and the loss of enthusiasm in learning will come along. In the language learning classroom, teachers should propose students to join in the appropriate mode of group interaction learning according to the actual learning content, e.g. the whole class group activities, peer activities, group activities (group work). At the same time, students should be encouraged to participate in the group interaction activities to actively not to listen passively. In teaching arrangement, as an organizer, teacher should meet students’ psychological demands that they were recognized and accepted as far as possible. For example, teacher can design some mutual activities that are close to students so as to develop students’ spirits of cooperation and positive interdependence. What’s more, in activities, it is necessary to guide them to have consciousness of respect to members of their own as well as the others’, to learn to listen to others carefully and then give respond to them so that each student to feel Encouragement and attention from others, thus a more positive attitude towards integration To group activities, to promote second language acquisition.
2) Creating a democratic and harmonious teaching situation
Pursuing happiness and avoiding suffering is a normal psychological response of each person. The traditional cramming and examination-based teaching made pupils bored easily. Psychological research also shows that when the human brain is in a positive state, learning is most effective. Therefore, when arranging teaching activities, teacher should follow the "principle of music school" to create a happy and positive circumstances for students. For example, humorous stories, interesting anecdotes can be brought into teaching so students’ interest to design activities can be aroused accordingly. In addition, teachers should first make clear their position and come off their perch and then participate in classroom activities in an equal role to students. Teachers ought to try their best to become a member of student activities. During interactive discussion with students, teachers can use the multi-use "valid questions" to encourage students to divergent style of thinking, if necessary, personal experience may be integrated into teaching so as to reduce students’ sense of fear to teachers and narrow the distance between teachers and students. But teachers should also encourage students to ask questions from time to time. Only in a harmonious atmosphere of teaching students can feel relaxed and learn English in a cheerful state of mind.#p#分页标题#e#
3) Focusing on creativity and innovative thinking
Everyone has the will of self-realization, it is this desire that makes them to work with perseverance and ultimately prove their value of life in the creation of the exhibition Current style. In the teaching activities, teachers can establish a task that is flexible enough for students, or simply for students to have a self- OK proposition; and try to create a free space and safe environment as far as possible so as to carry out interaction between teachers and students and students themselves. Therefore they can maximize their knowledge and complete the conversion from outside to inside; at the same time, teachers must keep in mind that they should assess and evaluate students’ Innovative in an encouraging and appreciating attitude.
3.4.2 Implications for College English Learning
Since language anxiety plays an important role in language learning and effects of language anxiety are negative, all learners should pay more attention to language anxiety on language learning, realize its sources and disadvantages and adopt certain strategies as follows to reduce language anxiety in order to make high quality of language achievement.
1) Building up your vocabulary
One with a small vocabulary will find it very difficult in reading comprehension. Some students say they just can’t remember so many words. So some methods to remember words is also necessary to know. First, learn about word formation. You can enlarge your vocabulary by using the rules of word formation, such as prefix, suffix, conversion, and so on. For example, when you know the word “courage”, “encourage, discourage, courageous” will not be new to you. Second, collect the new words you often meet in reading. This doesn’t mean encouraging you to consult the dictionary whenever you met a new word in reading. The appropriate way is to try to guess the word’s meaning from context clues, from the words around it, and then you will gradually know the clear meaning of the word after meeting it often. And now, if you look it up in the dictionary, you will have a good memory of it. Third, learn a certain number of new words by heart every day. Young students have good memories. It is possible for you to memorize some words every day without much difficulty. You can ask your teacher to choose some words for you. This is very helpful. When you meet these words in your reading, you will feel easy, “Aha, I’ve known their meanings.” You will feel confident and more interested in reading.
2) Cultivating a good habit of reading
If you are reading for meaning, try to read fast. Some students read very slowly. They think that reading slowly helps them understand better. That is not right. As a matter of fact, the faster you read, the better you understand. The expression “haste makes waste” does not apply to reading. Remember, nothing hurts concentration more than reading too slowly. Your mind will keep up with your reading speed if you ask it to. By always reading at your top speed, you challenge your understanding and make it easier for your mind to concentrate on the material. On the other hand, in order to improve your reading accuracy, you should also adopt various reading skills, such as scanning, skimming summarizing main idea and so on, which is also helpful to build up your reading confidence.#p#分页标题#e#
3) Being confident and active in reading
Some students have no self-confidence in reading. Before reading, they fear that they cannot understand the passage. When they meet with new words, they will feel so nervous as to lose the courage to go on reading it. These students are defeated not by their weakness in English but by their lack of confidence. So in order to relieve the reading anxiety, the learners should believe their language ability first, in which the self-encouragement is greatly needed.
Conclusion
Based on research results and discussions, conclusions are drown as follows:
1) The non-English majors have comparatively high language anxiety in their English reading and the great individual difference cannot be ignored.
2) There's significant gender difference in English reading anxiety among non-English majors, and male readers have more reading anxiety than their counterparts.
3) There is significant negative correlation between reading anxiety and academic performance, to be more specific, the stronger the sense of reading anxiety, the worse the academic performance is.
Though a lot of findings about English reading anxiety were got in the present study, it has some limitations. Firstly, the participants in this questionnaire survey comes from only one university and that could not cover different levels of students in China, which may have some negative effects on the investigation results. Secondly, problem exists in the validity of the questionnaire. Thirdly, the method used to investigate FLRAS involves structured questionnaire only. If it were combined with structured interviews, the study would be more comprehensive.
All in all, the present research has shed some lights on English reading, which can be helpful to both English reading’s teaching and learning. English reading teaching and learning is an ongoing process and English reading anxiety deserves more attention and further research in the future.
Bibliography
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[6] MacIntyre, P. ＆ Gardner, R. The Subtle Effects of Language Anxiety on Cognitive Processing in the Second Language [J]. 1970 (2): 125-132.
