The Effects Of EFL Writing Anxiety And EFL Writing Strategies On Second Language Writing Performance

Although some informative findings have been obtained from a great deal of research concerning cognitive factors such as learning strategies in second language learning, few studies have been conducted to detect the connections between affective factors and cognitive factors in second language learning. Considering the important role that second language writing plays in second language education, the present study is to explore the relationship between second language writing anxiety and second language writing strategies, and their effects on the writing performance of Chinese English majors. The research questions in the study are mainly as the following:1) What’s the relationship between EFL writing anxiety and EFL writing performance?2) What’s the relationship between choices of EFL writing strategies and EFL writing performance?3)What is the interrelationship between EFL writing anxiety and choices of EFL writing strategies? What kind of effects on EFL writing performance does this interrelationship cause?The data in this study are gathered from148sophomore English major students of one university in Beijing, by means of two questionnaires--Second Language Writing Anxiety Scale (SLWAS) and Second Language Writing Strategy Questionnaire (SLWSQ) and one writing task. Through the statistical analysis of the two questionnaires, the study draws the following conclusion. Firstly, second language writing anxiety has significant debilitative effects on EFL writing performance, especially on the fluency of their writings. Secondly, the use of revising strategies and the pre-writing strategies has the facilitative impact on English writing performance, while the use of while-writing strategies doesn’t have significant positive effect on EFL writing performance. Thirdly, students with different writing anxiety levels make use of EFL writing strategies in different ways. The high anxiety students employ writing strategies less frequently while writing, whereas, the low anxiety students adopt more writing strategies. Fourthly, the interaction between EFL writing anxiety and revising writing strategies has significant effects on writing scores. The use of revising strategies is beneficial in the case of low writing anxiety writers. In addition, one point should be mentioned that the benefit of employing pre-writing strategies appears more conspicuous for high anxiety writers than that for low anxiety writers. Grounded on the above results and findings, the present thesis points out the limitations of this study and proposes some beneficial suggestions on English writing.