A Study On The Correlations Between English Reading Anxiety And English Reading Strategies Employed By Senior High School Students

The cultivation of English learners' reading ability is one of the important teaching tasks among senior high schools.Many sources hinder the improvement of reading ability,among which anxiety,an affective source,cannot be ignored.Besides,adopting strategies appropriately is vital for the improvement of reading ability.Moreover,the National English Curriculum Standards for General High School(2017)claims that it is necessary to improve learners' language quality,which focuses on learners' affection needs and language improvement.Therefore,it is vital for us to explore the relationship between two variables.With the basis of Krashen's input hypothesis and affective filter hypothesis as well as the instrument of Foreign Language Reading Anxiety Scale(FLRAS)and English Reading strategies Scale(ERSS),the author investigated 267 Grade Two senior high school students of Heng Yang City,Hunan Province,and interviewed 6 participants and 3 teachers based on the results of SPSS20.0 for deeper analysis.FLRAS contains 5 dimensions which are reading attitudes,learning habits,culture understanding,self-assessment and comprehension ability.ERSS contains three major dimensions which are meta-cognitive strategies,cognitive strategies and social/affective strategies,and sub-dimensions are involved in three major dimensions.This study mainly solves the following questions,(1)What is the current situation of English reading anxiety experienced by the investigated Grade Two senior high school students?(2)What is the current situation of English reading strategies employed by the investigated Grade Two senior high school students?(3)What is the relationship between English reading anxiety and the employment of English reading strategies?The gathered statistics demonstrate that(1)the investigated Grade Two senior high school learners have experienced reading anxiety commonly,and the main sources are related to culture,confidence,interest and ability.(2)Compared to other strategies,investigated Grade Two senior high school learners tend to employ cognitive strategies and they adopt social/affective strategies in a low frequency.(3)There is a negative correlation between the two variables,in other words,reading anxiety casts influence on the employment of reading strategies,moreover,there is a significant difference in reading strategies employed by different anxiety levels.Basing on the analysis of the research questions,the author provides suggestions for educators and learners of senior high schools from the aspects of how to reduce reading anxiety and enhance the employment of reading strategies.However,the sample number of this research is comparatively not enough and the gender difference is not mentioned in this paper,which is the limitation of this study,and following researchers can continue this topic from those aspects.