Impact Of Personality On English Learning

With the great leap in economic development in China, opportunities for intercultural communication have been greatly growing. As a result, persons who are able to communicate with others in English will be an increasing demand in the society. Thus, there appears vital importance for Chinese to learn English. It is true that language learners vary enormously in what they actually succeed in learning. It is also true that some learners may be good at speaking while some may be good at written work. Apart from other factors, what can be focused upon most is the difference in the personalities of learners.The purpose of this research is to investigate the correlation between Chinese learners' personalities and their performance in English learning at the university level. The final purpose is to apply the findings to the English teaching and learning for Chinese teachers and students.To be specific, the thesis is integrated by six chapters, each of which is relatively independent but concentrates on a specific topic with the cores of personality and English learning.Chapter One describes the purpose, origin and the questions of the research. Before embarking on the origin of the research, the author clarifies the research purpose. Then the author identifies the Chinese English learning context which is quite different from that of the other countries, so the paper is throwing new light upon assumptions about language learners and language learning derived from the former research conducted in the west.Chapter Two states explicitly the relative theories of personality and Englishlearning. Firstly, the author discusses the fundamental concept — personality.Secondly, the author presents some theories about personality among which Eysenck's theory deserves the prime concern for his questionnaires are used in the research. Lastly, the author explains the relationship between personality and English learning, especially the extroversion/introversion and English learning.Chapter Three introduces the methods which were used in the research, including questionnaires (Eysenck Personality Questionnaire-Revised, Short Scale for Chineseand Extroversion and Introversion Questionnaire, interviews, and observations, etc.)Chapter Four is concerned with a detailed description of the design of the whole experiment, which makes up the bulk of the thesis. In order to gain some authentic result, the collected data was disposed with the aid of the Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS10.0/PC). What's more, quantitative analysis and qualitative analysis were used during the research.Chapter Five mentions the analysis and discussion of the study of the relationship between participants with different personalities and English learning from the aspects of the participants' performance in TEM4, and the differences relating to different personality traits (especially extroversion/introversion) among relative excellent learners, good learners, qualified learners and poor learners.Chapter Six ends the whole study with findings (fruits and limitations) and recommendations. The major conclusions obtained from the present investigations are that: (1) the unstable introverts benefit most from their personality types. This contradicts the intuitively appealing hypothesis that extroverted learners learn more rapidly and are more successful than introverted learners;(2) the excellent learners and poor learners vary in two of the seven extroversion/introversion traits: risk-taking and impulsiveness. The excellent learners were graded much lower than the poor learners in these two traits. And due to this kind of situation, the teacher should try and get to know their students as individuals so as to develop the kind of classroom atmosphere and motivate input that will enable both introverted and extroverted students. At the same time, the introvert's students should realize their advantages and the extroverts should know their disadvantages in foreign language learning and therefore develop a more objective and scientific viewpoint towards their personality traits of introversion and extroversion in foreign language learning.