An Investigation On English Learning Anxiety Of Chinese Non-English Major Postgraduates

In a very long period of time, language learning anxiety is treated as one of themost crucial affective variables in foreign language learning. And the topic oflanguage learning anxiety has also been explored for a long time. The researchesshow that anxiety is a very common phenomenon among those foreign languagelearners. Of all the studies on language learning anxiety, however, few studies areconducted to investigate the language learning anxiety of the Chinese non-Englishmajor post graduates students.For this reason, the present research selected non-English major post graduatesstudents as the subjects, and examined the foreign language learning anxiety of thisgroup of students. It utilizes the theoretical foundation introduced by Horwitz (1986)and Krashen (1986). The aim of the research is to explore the anxiety state of Chinesenon-English major post graduate students from four aspects:(1) the general state ofEnglish learning anxiety among Chinese non-English major postgraduates;(2) therelationship between language learning anxiety and language achievement;(3)whether foreign language learning anxiety differs with students’ gender;(4) thedifferences between the high proficiency group and the low proficiency group inlanguage learning anxiety. Ultimately, this study is expected to help both foreignlanguage teachers and learners to deal with their difficulties on language learninganxiety during teaching and learning.The research subjects are145non-English post graduate students from JiangxiNormal University. In order to get a proper result of the study, both quantitative andqualitative methods were used. The quantitative part includes a questionnaire of basicinformation of the students, and the FLCAS which was designed by Horwitz(1986).And in the qualitative part,10volunteers were chosen to have the interview tocomplement and confirm the results and findings of the quantitative study. Theresearch data was analyzed by SPSS17.0, Descriptive analysis, correlation analysis and independent samples t-test were used to analyze all of the research data.The research has revealed a number of findings as follows:(1) all the Chinesenon-English major postgraduates are affected by language learning anxiety indifferent level during their English learning, and language learning anxiety of Chinesenon-English major postgraduates is rather significant;(2) there is a negativecorrelation between language learning anxiety and the English achievement, that is,the higher one’s English proficiency, the lower one’s learning anxiety is;(3) the meanof language learning anxiety of male students is104.0357, which is higher than thefemale students’ anxiety level (95.6230). That means that male students suffer higherforeign language learning anxiety level than female students;(4) the students in thelow proficiency group have more language anxiety than students in the highproficiency group. In another word, students with low language proficiency aregenerally more anxious than students with high language proficiency.Considering the research results above, the author offered some implications forEnglish teaching and learning. In order to deal with the English learning anxiety inEnglish learning, teachers should try to build up proper self-confidence for theirstudents; they should strengthen the communication with the students, helping themwith their correct cognition of foreign language learning anxiety. In addition, teachersshould provide their students with a proper learning environment, and help thestudents reduce the English learning anxiety by establishing a relatively relaxedclassroom atmosphere.