A Study Of Negative Affects Of College Students In English Learning And Their Causes

Affect is a peculiar psychological phenomenon of mankind. It plays a significant role in college students'English learning and teaching. Lu Jiamei (2000), a famous educational psychologist, divided affective factors into two kinds:positive affects and negative affects, and negative affects mainly includes:higher anxiety, lower motivation, incorrect attitude, nervousness, fear, anger and doubt, etc. This thesis attempts to investigate negative affects of college students in English learning, and based on the results to provide some suggestions for the improvement of college English teaching and learning.On the basis of the previous studies, guided by the theories of Krashen's Affective Filter Hypothesis and Arnold's Second Language Acquisition, and combined with Lu Jiamei's classification of the affective factors, the author designed a questionnaire of negative affects in college English learning, trying to answer the following questions through an analysis of the questionnaire results:(1) What are the main negative affects that are unfavorable to college students in English learning? (2) What are the main causes of those negative affects? (3) How to weaken the influence of negative affects and strengthen positive affects in college English learning?This research adopts literature research, classroom observation, questionnaire investigation and statistical analysis as the research methods. Through analyzing the results of a questionnaire to 162 freshmen of Chengdu University of Technology by using SPSS software, the author has drawn the following conclusions:(1) The main negative affects of college students in English learning are:incorrect attitude, higher anxiety, lower motivation, fear of failure and unhealthy interpersonal relationships; (2) The causes of the above negative affects are mainly relevant to three factors:personal factors, family factors and environmental factors. The author holds that language learners should develop their positive attitude toward English learning, build up self-confidence, reduce learning anxiety and stimulate learning motivations. In addition, English teachers are expected to renovate teaching philosophy, enrich teaching styles and value students' affect state.Based on the results, analysis and discussion of the present research, the author proposes some implications and suggestions related to affective teaching in college education, specifically in college English teaching. It is sincerely hoped that this research could help college students overcome their affective problems, eliminate their negative affects and cultivate positive affects in English learning, build up their self-confidence, form their interest in English learning and improve their English.