Predictors of Foreign-Language Anxiety: Examining the ...

More documents

Recommendations

Info

As for the other significant predictor of first year English majors’ FLA, competitiveness,the results of the present study are of importance, because to date therelationship between the two learner variables has not been investigated quantitatively,involving a relatively large number of subjects. Consequently, the only evidencefor a potential link between this personal characteristic and languagelearner anxiety comes from a qualitative investigation with ten participants (Bailey,1983). The moderate positive correlation revealed between the 107 first yearEnglish majors’ competitiveness – and FLA scores in this study confirms the predictedrelationship between the two individual variables in question. What appearsas a result of particular interest is that competitiveness was found to be thesecond best predictor of participants’ anxiety level when the effect of all six learnervariables was assessed simultaneously (see Table 2), whereas it seemed to be a lesspowerful predictor in isolation, showing a weaker association with FLA than proficiency(see Table 1). The inclusion of this personality characteristic in the final,two-variable model seems to indicate that knowing how competitive learners areadds important information to our understanding of FLA, as it accounts for differencesin learners’ anxiety level, not attributable to negative L2-self-concept.The results suggest that the two learner characteristics have a better predictivepower together than by themselves, which is especially true for competitiveness.This is probably because competitiveness, in itself, does not necessarily have to berelated to experiencing anxiety, which may explain the moderate association correlationalanalysis indicated between the two variables (r = .347, p < .0005). Ifcompetitiveness is combined with positive L2-related self-perceptions, in otherwords, when the learner feels capable to compete with others – as he believes hehas good target language skills with which he is satisfied, feels no less competent/talented than his peers, has no difficulty with the language or the courses, andfeels in control of his learning, etc., – he will not feel anxious. Similarly, learnerswith a negative L2-self-concept, though more likely, will not necessarily experiencehigh levels of anxiety in the classroom, provided they do not care about howothers are doing and do not want to do better than them, i.e. if they are not competitive.However, if learners with negative L2-related self-perceptions are competitiveat the same time, they are more than likely to develop anxiety. This finding supportsthe self-presentational theory of the causes of social anxieties, according towhich anxiety in interpersonal encounters is produced by the interaction of twosets of factors: (1) motivation to make a desired impression on others, and (2)doubt that one will be successful in doing so (Leary & Kowalski, 1995; Leary &Schlenker, 1981; Schlenker & Leary, 1985). This appears to apply to the anxious FLlearner in the present study, as predicted by the final, two-component multipleregression model of FLA, with competitiveness and L2-self-concept as predictors.Anxious learners would like to make a positive impression on peers, teachers, orconversation partners in general, that is, they want to excel in comparison to othersor live up to their own personal expectations, while their rather negative L2-related self-perceptions make them feel uncertain about being able to do so (cf.Bailey, 1983).138 UPRT 2007: Empirical studies in English applied linguistics
While L2-self-concept and competitiveness were found to be significant predictorsof first year English majors’ FLA both in isolation and in the presence ofother potential predictors, one of the examined cognitive variables: proficiency,and the other personality characteristic: perfectionism were indicated as usefulpredictors only in isolation. As for proficiency level, correlational and multipleregression findings may appear as inconsistent at first glance. While the formershowed proficiency as the second best predictor of FLA, multiple regression findingsindicated competitiveness as the most useful predictor after L2-self-concept,what is more, proficiency was not even included in the final regression model.However, the discrepancy between the two sets of findings is only an apparentone. The results of multivariate analyses are not to suggest that L2 proficiencyplays no part in language learning anxiety.The explanation for the seemingly inconsistent results is that proficiency wassignificantly related not only to the dependent variable, FLA, but the strongestpredictor, L2-self-concept as well, as evidenced by the relatively high correlationsbetween the two constructs (r = .600, p < .0005). This is only logical, as objectiveproficiency can be assumed to affect learners’ L2-related self-perceptions. The sizeof the correlation between proficiency and L2-self-concept indicates a considerableoverlap (36%) between the variables, and the regression analysis showed that L2-self-concept dominated proficiency with respect to the prediction of FLA. That is,by itself, proficiency level was an important predictor of how much anxiety firstyear English majors experienced in English classes and L2 communication in general,as evidenced by the more than moderate correlation (r = -.529, p < .0005) withstudents’ anxiety scores, in line with previous findings (for overviews see Horwitz,2001; MacIntyre, 1999; Young, 1994). Once, however, L2-self-concept was inthe regression model, the predictive power of proficiency was diminished. Thissuggests that knowledge of learners’ L2-related self-perceptions (how they feelabout their L2 competence and language learning ability, whether they are satisfiedwith their skills and abilities, how much control they perceive to have overtheir learning, and whether they experience difficulty or learn their TL with ease)is more informative in terms of FLA than knowledge of their actual proficiency.This is supported by the finding that measured (objective) proficiency – operationalisedby TOEFL scores – was found to be a weaker predictor of participants’anxiety level than self-rated (subjective) proficiency, as in previous studies (e.g.,Cheng, 1999; 2002; Clément et al., 1994; Gardner & MacIntyre, 1993b; Gardner etal., 1983). This was evidenced by (1) lower Pearson correlations with FLA (r toefl = -.529 vs. r self-rated = -.629, p < .0005), as well as (2) considerably smaller t, β, andsquared partial coefficient values yielded by regression analysis when they wereentered as competing predictors of FLA (t toefl = -3.115 vs. t self-rated = -5.626, β toefl = -.269 vs. β self-rated = -.485, r 2 toefl = 8.52% vs. r 2 self-rated = 23.32%). These results show thathow students perceived their own competence in English explained a much largervariance in their anxiety than how competent they really were. The importance ofsubjective feelings in predicting FLA is all the more worthy of attention, as perceptionsmay or may not be accurate. The size of the correlation between participants’self-rated and objective proficiency (r = 0.535, p < .0005) revealed that first yearTóth, Zs. Predictors of foreign-language anxiety 139
Page 2 and 3: have been investigated, no previous
Page 4 and 5: Pohlman, & Bishop-Marbury, 1991; Ga
Page 6 and 7: Besides self-perceptions of TL comp
Page 8 and 9: InstrumentsSelf-report instruments
Page 10 and 11: CompetitivenessTo assess how compet
Page 12 and 13: Table 1: Correlations between cogni
Page 14 and 15: large effect size. The estimated co
Page 18 and 19: English majors’ self-appraisal of
Page 20 and 21: The findings concerning the non-sig
Page 22 and 23: ReferencesAida, Y. (1994). Examinat
Page 24 and 25: Horwitz, E. K. (1996). Even teacher
Page 26: Wine, J. D. (1982). Evaluation anxi

Predictors of Foreign-Language Anxiety: Examining the ...

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template?