English Listening Classroom Anxiety Of Non-English Majors And Coping Strategies

With further research on humanism educational psychology and second language acquisition theory in1960s, the affective factor in language teaching is gaining more attention. Anxiety is considered to be one of the most crucial emotional factors, and language anxiety is the important factor to predict whether language learner succeeds or fails. It is a common view of many researchers. However, most researchers currently only study the anxiety in the process of language learning broadly instead of in the process of learning different language skills; especially the study on the anxiety which is generated in listening class is relatively less. Therefore, on the basis of the theory of humanism psychology and Krashen’s affective filter hypothesis, the present study is to answer the two research questions as follows:1.What factors cause the anxiety of non-English major students in English listening class?2. What measures could possibly reduce the anxiety of non-English major students in English listening class?The interview, classroom observation and questionnaire were conducted to investigate learners’anxiety in English listening class. The subjects were132students from3non-English class of2011in Tongren University. The research results show that students have experienced higher level of anxiety in English listening class. The reasons that cause anxiety are:lack of confidence, learner and instructor beliefs, peer competitiveness, ambiguity tolerance, worrying about making mistakes, negative evaluation, testing and so on. The present study analyzes and explores the reasons that cause listening anxiety of students through interview and result of anxiety questionnaires, and proposes some coping strategies from students’psychology and teaching methods to ease the anxiety, and try to create a low anxiety class atmosphere to improve student’s listening ability.This present study on English listening classroom anxiety has certain practical guiding significance to listening teaching. Finally, this thesis indicates the limitations of the research, and makes some suggestions for further research.