A Positive Psychology Perspective On Chinese Students' Emotional Intelligence,Classroom Emotions,and EFL Learning Achievement

Positive Psychology has taken off in the field of Second Language Acquisition(SLA)since 2012 and created a strong wave of interest in emotions with its key tenet of improving learners' foreign/second language achievement and well-being(MacIntyre,2016).However,in the present Chinese English-as-a-foreign-language(EFL)context,where Positive Psychology is just starting,emotions remain a marginalized topic,with the only exception of anxiety(Jiang&Li,2017).The present study was designed to investigate Chinese EFL students' emotional well-being(i.e.,emotional intelligence and classroom emotions)and EFL learning achievement,and the complex relationships of their interactions.This investigation is based upon three theories within a Positive Psychology perspective,namely the well-being theory(Seligman,2011;Oxford,2016a,2016b),the broaden-and-build theory(Fredrickson,1998,2001),and the control-value theory(Pekrun,2006;Pekrun,Frenzel,Goetz,&Perry,2007).Specifically,the present study was guided by the following five research questions in Chinese senior high school EFL context:(1)What are the general profiles of students' emotional intelligence(EI),Foreign Language Enjoyment(FLE),and Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety(FLCA)?(2)What are the antecedents of FLE and FLCA?(3)What are the direct relationships between EI,FLE,FLCA,self-perceived English achievement(SPEA),and actual English achievement(AEA)?(4)Do FLE and FLCA work in parallel to mediate the relationship between EI and SPEA?(5)Do FLE and FLCA work in parallel to mediate the relationship between EI and AEA?A mixed-method approach with three stages of data collection was employed in the study.In the first stage(from early May to mid-June 2017),a total of 1718 second-year senior high school EFL students from three schools at different academic levels in China's mainland provided their demographical information and responded to questionnaires measuring EI,FLE,FLCA and SPEA.One thousand three hundred and seven out of the 1718 participants also took a monthly official English test for June using the retired version of Matriculation English Test(RMET)of China(2016)-Uniform Version.In the second stage(from June to July 2017),another group of 360 students were recruited to respond to the modified Chinese version of Foreign Language Enjoyment Scale(CFLES).In the last stage(October 2017),122 participants out of the 1718 participants in Stage 1 provided their qualitative narratives on two open questions concerning antecedents and outcomes of classroom emotions(FLE and FLCA)in foreign language(FL)learning.The instruments were validated before any data analyses,with a series of validity and reliability tests performed with M-PLUS 7.4,SPSS 22.0,and Exps.exe to confirm the psychometric properties of the instruments for each variable and make necessary modifications to the instruments.For Research Question 1,descriptive analyses were performed with SPSS 22.0 to depict the levels of participants' El and classroom emotions(FLE and FLCA).For Research Question 2,qualitative data obtained in Stage 3 were analyzed by using Nvivo10 to identify the sources for both classroom emotions,namely FLE and FLCA.For Research Question 3,a series of Pearson correlation tests and ANOVA were performed with SPSS 22.0 to investigate the associations between EI,FLE,FLCA,SPEA and AEA.Qualitative analyses were conducted by using Nvivo10 to reveal the potential mutual effects between classroom emotions and EFL learning achievement,and the interacting patterns between the two classroom emotions of FLE and FLCA.For Research Questions 4 and 5,two hypothesized parallel multiple mediator models were tested by using PROCESS v2.16.3(Model 4),whereby FLE and FLCA co-mediate the relationship between El and EFL learning achievement.The present study explored the psychometric properties of the modified CFLES and of instruments measuring FLCA and El.Besides,it provided general profiles of Chinese senior high school EFL students' El and classroom emotions.Moreover,it identified the intra-and inter-personal sources for FLE and FLCA.Furthermore,it uncovered the significant interrelationships between EI,FLE,FLCA,SPEA,and AEA,pointing to the reciprocal relationships between classroom emotions and EFL learning achievement.Finally,it revealed the parallel multiple mediator models whereby FLE and FLCA mediate the relationships between El and SPEA,and between EI and AEA.The present study is innovative in taking a Positive Psychology perspective,investigating Chinese EFL students' emotional well-being(including emotion-related ability of EI as well as both positive and negative emotions),and the complex relationships between emotional well-being and EFL learning achievement.More specifically,Positive Psychology is just starting in the SLA field of China and the topic of positive emotions remains marginalized.In this study,a holistic view on FL classroom emotions is adopted,with a focus on both positive and negative emotions.Second,this study looks into the antecedents and outcomes of classroom emotions based upon the control-value theory and the broaden-and-build theory.Third,this study investigates another important topic of Positive Psychology,namely EI,and inovatively examines the correlation between EI and a positive emotion in FL classrooms.Fourth,the present study not only investigates the direct relationships among EI,classroom emotions,and EFL learning achievement,but also takes a control-value approach to reveal the reciprocal relationships between classroom emotions and EFL learning achievement.Moreover,it also reveals the complex relationship model whereby EI is mediated by classroom emotions(FLE and FLCA)to influence EFL learning achievement.The quantitative and qualitative findings underline the complex relationships between EI,FLE,FLCA,and EFL achievement,providing pedagogical implications that FL educators may perform positive interventions on these emotion-relation variables from a Positive Psychology perspective,and thus exert an influence on learners' FL learning achievement.The findings also help to advance SLA research with a broadened scope of emotion-related topics and methods by providing a novel interactive approach,namely the control-value approach within Positive Psychology perspective.