Washback Of The National Matriculation English Test On High School Graduating Students' Learning Motivation And Test Anxiety In Shandong Province

This dissertation aims to investigate washback of the National Matriculation English Test (NMET) on individual factors of high school students in Shandong province. Specifically, it aims to find out whether the test has effects on high school graduating students'learning motivation and test anxiety, and the extent to which the test influences these two variables, which is to give instructive suggestions on how to improve NMET and high school students'English teaching and learning in our province.In order to do this investigation, two sub-research questions should be answered:1) To what extent does NMET influence learning motivation of graduating students in high schools of Shandong province?2) To what extent does NMET influence test anxiety of graduating students in high schools of Shandong province?The study employed both quantitative and qualitative analyses. Data were provided by the questionnaire responded by 1063 graduating students selected from 6 representative high schools of Shandong province, their scores in NMET of 2007, and the interviews conducted to 60 representative students among them who were randomly selected for retrospective interviews after they had finished the questionnaire. SPSS was used to conduct descriptive statistics, correlation analysis and regression analysis.The general research findings are as below:1) NMET exerts a relatively strong washback effect on high school graduating students'learning motivation; but whether NMET exerts the same strong washback effect on high school graduating students'test anxiety or not isn't so certain.2) There is a positive correlation between NMET and high school graduating students'learning motivation; but the one between NMET and students'test anxiety is negative. And both the positive correlation between NMET and graduating students'intrinsic learning motivation as well as the negative correlation between NMET and students'test anxiety are statistically significant (p< .05).3) NMET exerts positive washback effects on high school graduating students'learning motivation, but exerts negative ones on high school graduating students'test anxiety. And NMET's washback effects on students'both intrinsic learning motivation and test anxiety are statistically significant (p< .05).On the basis of research findings of the present study, we can get a conclusion that both positive washback effects of NMET on intrinsic learning motivation and negative washback effects of NMET on test anxiety of graduating students in high schools of Shandong province are statistically significant. Based on the above results, suggestive discussions have been made on the reform of NMET and high school students'English teaching and learning in our province.