An Empirical Study On Interpretation Classroom Anxiety And Metacognitive Strategies Of English Major Undergraduates

Since the 1970s, with the development of psychology, more and more attention has been paid to learners’ affective variables. Foreign language anxiety is agreed to be one of the most important factors in this aspect. As a very important affective variable, foreign language anxiety has shed light on the foreign language education. It is widely agreed that anxiety is an important factor in interpretation performance, but only a few researchers focus on the learning anxiety of interpretation students. Considering the immediacy, complexity, difficulty of interpretation, differences between source language and target language and complicated psychological factors, it is common for interpretation learners to experience anxiety, which affects interpretation performance greatly. Metacognitive strategies, considered to be an advanced and crucial component of learning strategies, are significant for the successful language learning, which greatly have drawn the attention of researchers in the fields of education and psychology. Though ample researches have been conducted regarding foreign language anxiety and metacognitive strategies, only a few researches results have been reported at this point concerning the relationship of interpretation anxiety and metacognitive strategies.Based on the theories of interpretation classroom anxiety and metacognitive strategies, this dissertation intends to explore efficient ways for improving English major students’ interpretation proficiency by studying the relation among interpretation classroom anxiety, metacognitive strategy use and interpretation achievement of 125 English majors from Hefei University of Technology, trying to examine the following three questions:(1) What is the current situation of interpretation classroom anxiety? (2) What metacognitive strategies are used? (3) What’s the relation among interpretation classroom anxiety, metacognitive strategies and achievement? The findings show that most interpretation students experience interpretation anxiety, and the correlation between interpretation classroom anxiety and metacognitive strategies is significantly negative which proves that metacognitive strategies contribute on reducing interpretation classroom anxiety. With the help of descriptive statistics, correlation analysis method, and interview method, the aim of the study is to provide further objective support for interpretation anxiety and metacognitive strategies research, as well as implications for English major students and teachers. Therefore, the present writer advocates for metacognitive strategies training to promote the interpreting learning.