Study On Thai Ethnic Chinese Secondary School Students’ Affective Factors In Learning Chinese

According to Krashen’s Affective Filter Hypothesis, affective factors play an important role in Second Language Acquisition. Under the circumstances of the prevalence of Chinese language education in Thailand, this paper chose Secondary school students, the main body of the Chinese language learner in Thailand, as its object to study the impact of affective factors in learning Chinese. According to Affective Filter Hypothesis and considering the particularity of ethnic Chinese, this article selects learning motivation, attitude, and Thai-Chinese cultural identity three aspects of affective factors to study their impact on Thailand’s ethnic Chinese in learning Chinese.The approaches used in this study include literature, questionnaires, practical observations and interviews.Based on the data gathered from over a thousand secondary school students at Bangkok’s Traimit high school at Chinatown in the questionnaire, I draw the following conclusions:(1) Though ethnic Chinese’s mean value is slightly higher than the local secondary school students. No significant difference is found between Thailand’s ethnic Chinese secondary school students and local secondary school students in the three aspects of emotional factor in learning Chinese.(2) The strongest learning motivation of ethnic Chinese in learning Chinese is aroused by teaching factors; the weakest is the integrative motivation.(3) The best part of ethnic Chinese’s learning attitude is the strong inquisitiveness, the weakest is the initiative.(4) Thailand’s ethnic Chinese secondary school students are highly assimilated; their national identity has been completely naturalized in Thailand. They follow their families to celebrate Chinese festivals, sweep their ancestral grave and worship them without understanding the cultural connotations of these acts.