A Correlative Study On The Senior High School Students’ Tolerance Of Ambiguity And English Reading Anxiety

Reading is the main source of acquiring information.In the process of English reading,middle school students will encounter different ambiguity.Middle school students will feel confused about ambiguity,which leads to the increase of English reading anxiety and English reading difficulties.Tolerance of ambiguity,a cognitive factor,and English reading anxiety,an affective factor,both are considered important in affecting language learning.Scholars have made a lot of researches on tolerance of ambiguity and English reading anxiety respectively,but there are few researches on the relationship between them.This study probes into the correlation between senior high school students’ tolerance of ambiguity and English reading anxiety,and provides some enlightenment for senior high school English teachers.Based on Affective Filter Hypothesis,Humanistic Psychology and Schema Theory,this study selects 198 students in Grade 11 of a senior high school in Huaibei City as the subjects,and adopts The Tolerance of Ambiguity Scale(Ely,1995)and Foreign Language Reading Anxiety Scale(Saito,1999).Through questionnaires and interviews,this study aims to understand the current situation of ambiguity tolerance and English reading anxiety of senior high school students,to discuss the relationship between them and analyze their correlation,so as to improve senior high school students’ reading ability and efficiency.Three research questions are proposed:(1)What is the situation of senior high school students’ English reading anxiety?(2)What is the situation of senior high school students’ tolerance of ambiguity?(3)Is there any correlation between senior high school students’ English reading anxiety and tolerance of ambiguity? If they are related,how are they related with each other?Based on the results of data analysis and interviews,this study draws the following conclusions:(1)senior high school students’ tolerance of ambiguity is at a medium level;(2)senior high school students’ English reading anxiety is at a medium level;(3)there is a medium negative correlation between tolerance of ambiguity and English reading anxiety.There is also a negative correlation between the tolerance of ambiguity and each dimension of English reading anxiety.Among them,senior high school students’ tolerance of ambiguity has the highest correlation with anxiety caused by reading text comprehension.This study proposes some suggestions on how to raise the tolerance of ambiguity and reduce the English reading anxiety,which aims to help teachers pay more attention to these problems and adjust teaching modes,so as to improve the students’ English learning effect.