A Study on FLA Differences of High―score and Low―score Group Students

【Abstract】FLA is a complex psychological state which influences English learners. This paper is concerned with an empirical study on FLA differences of high-score and low-score group students in College.

【Key words】A study on differences； FLA； High-score and low-score group

1. Background of the study

With the second language acquisition research advancing， the focuses of foreign language teaching have been shifted from teaching to learning. The affective factors belong to one of the factors which lead to variation in language learning，among which FLA （foreign language anxiety） is one of the affective factors that most pervasively obstruct the learning process. FLA is the feeling of tension， uneasiness， frustration， self-doubt and apprehension specifically associated with learning foreign language. Horwitz et al. presents the three major components of foreign language anxiety： communication apprehension， test anxiety， and fear of negative evaluation.

2. Methodology of the study

2.1 Research questions

1） What are differences in foreign language anxiety between high-score group and low-score group？

2） What kind of implications can be drawn from the study？

2.2 research subjects

162 students are chosen in Liaoning University of Technology. They were divided into high-score group （the mean is 125.97） and low-score group （the mean is 54.33） respectively

2.3 instruments

The first instrument is questionnaires （Horwitz’s foreign language classroom anxiety scale）. The second one is English Scores of the college entrance examination

3. Differences between high-score group and low-score group in FLA

To testify difference statistically and make the question more precise， an independent sample T-tests is applied again to get the differences between two groups in Table 1.

4. Discussion on differences of four categories of FLA between high-score group and low-score group

Firstly， there exit little difference between high-score group and low-score group in communication apprehension with the mean score M=3.375 and M=3.661， Sig=.102>.05. Two groups’ communication apprehension is close， saying that both groups nearly bear high communication apprehension， which took this author completely by surprise. Why does the high-score group also have high communication apprehension？ The reason may attribute to the following phenomena：For one hand， college students lack self-confidence. Main factors that hold them back are some self-doubt caused by getting low marks in the College Entrance Examination， and lack of solid foundation of English. For the other hand， this result is attributable to examination-oriented education and traditional English teaching method. Students do not have enough chances to practice oral English as is expected， which may lead to their lower oral communication ability.

Secondly， there are significant differences between two groups in their test anxiety and general anxiety （M=2.842， M=4.07， Sig=.000）. Perhaps some characteristics of Chinese test system can offer some reasons for such a result. Schools， family or society have to continually evaluate the students through consequence of test， so students in particular low-score students may fear their performance in the test. Moreover， some students might suffer unpleasant test experience from either language class or other subjects， and they transplanted the unhappy image to the present English class unconsciously. A shocking finding is that a few high achieving students also have high test anxiety. Due to their false beliefs in test， these students habitually put extreme high demands on themselves and feel that anything less than a perfect test performance is a failure.

5. Implications

According to the survey， the low-score students’ test anxiety is at the high level， so it is necessary to reduce their test anxiety. Not only should the teacher encourage the students study from the beginning of the term in case they would cram for their final exams， but also provide a supportive and understanding environment and employ non-threatening teaching methods to raise their self-confidence and interests in the study.

作者简介：毕冉（1980-），女，辽宁朝阳人，硕士，讲师，研究方向：翻译理论与实践。