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

More documents

Recommendations

Info

Besides self-perceptions of TL competence, other L2-related beliefs have alsobeen suggested as potential contributors to FLA (Horwitz, 1988, 1990, 1995;Young, 1991). In a preliminary investigation Horwitz and Sadow (in preparation)found that learners with high levels of FLA tended to believe they lacked FL aptitude,expressed doubts about their ability to achieve complete mastery of a foreignlanguage, and had a greater tendency to consider language learning a difficulttask than their less anxious peers (in Horwitz, 1990), which findings are in linewith those reported in a later study by Horwitz (1995). Other investigations havealso indicated a link between learners’ level of perceived difficulty with FL studyand language anxiety (e.g., Ganschow et al., 1994).Personality and FLAThe learner’s personality has also been considered as a potential contributing factorto L2-related anxiety (MacIntyre, 1999; Young, 1991, 1994), though relativelyfew empirical studies have been conducted to enquire into the relationship betweenFLA and personality characteristics.PerfectionismIt was an interview study with highly-anxious language learners which first suggestedthat perfectionism may be related to FLA, as most interviewees reportedbeing overly perfectionistic: aiming at a perfect accent and native-speaker fluency(Price, 1991). Another interview study, designed to clarify the interaction of perfectionismand anxiety, obtained evidence for the link between the two constructsin that anxious vs. non-anxious participants were found to differ in terms of theirself-reports and display of perfectionist tendencies (Gregersen & Horwitz, 2002).The anxious group seemed to be characterized (1) by setting excessively high personalstandards for performance, such as speaking flawlessly, without grammaticaland pronunciation errors, and as easily as native speakers, and (2) by overlycritical self-evaluations, manifest in overreaction to errors and dissatisfaction withless than perfect performance. These findings suggest that perfectionist languagelearners, who pursue an idealized rather than a realistic level of proficiency andwho are unable to take L2 imperfections in stride, are more likely candidates forexperiencing language learning anxiety (see also Foss & Reitzel, 1991; Horwitz,1990, 1996; Phillips, 1992).128 UPRT 2007: Empirical studies in English applied linguistics
CompetitivenessThe idea that language anxiety may also stem from another personal trait, competitiveness,comes from an oft-cited diary study (Bailey, 1983). Bailey (1983, p. 96)defines competitiveness as a learner’s “desire to excel in comparison to others”,which may manifest itself in learner characteristics such as: (1) overtly comparingoneself to classmates and personal expectations, (2) a feeling of having to outdoother learners, (3) and a preoccupation with tests and grades, especially with referenceto other students. According to Bailey’s hypothesis, anxiety results whencompetitive learners perceive themselves as less competent compared to others,that is, when they feel unable to compete.Since evidence for the relationship between anxiety and both perfectionismand competitiveness has been cited from qualitative studies involving a smallnumber of learners (eight in Gregersen & Horwitz, 2002, and ten in Price, 1991 andBailey, 1983), quantitative inquiries, using larger samples of language learners areneeded to verify the findings of these small-scale investigations.Statement of purposeAs the review shows, current assumptions about how FLA is related to the selectedlearner variables are based on the results of studies investigating the relationshipof a given variable to FLA in isolation (as in the case of proficiency, FLaptitude, motivation, L2-related self-perceptions), or on the findings of qualitativeinquiries with a small number of participants (competitiveness and perfectionism).The aim of this study is to test these assumptions, examining all these learner variablesas potential predictors of FLA together in the same sample of learners: firstyear English majors from the same university. The research questions of the studyare as follows:What is the strength and direction of the relationship between each of the selectedlearner variables – proficiency level, FL aptitude, strength of motivation, L2self-concept, perfectionism, and competitiveness – and participants’ feelings ofFLA? What relative contribution do the same variables make to the prediction ofFLA?MethodParticipantsThe study was conducted at the School of English Studies of Pázmány PéterCatholic University (PPCU). The participants were English major students in theirfirst year of study (N = 107). The majority of these students were women, with amale-female ratio of 24: 83. Their ages ranged from 18 to 24, with an average ageof 19.37 (SD = 1.17). They had studied English for an average of 8.41 years (SD =2.66), with a minimum of 3 and a maximum of 14 years.Tóth, Zs. Predictors of foreign-language anxiety 129
Page 2 and 3: have been investigated, no previous
Page 4 and 5: Pohlman, & Bishop-Marbury, 1991; Ga
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 16 and 17: As for the other significant predic
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 ...

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

Delete template?

Save as template?