A Study On The Differences In Foreign Language Pleasure And Anxiety Among High School Students Of Different Grade

Since the 1970s,emotion has been a hot research topic in the field of second language acquisition.But the vast majority of research has focused on negative emotions in foreign language learning,with Foreign Language Anxiety being the most studied emotion in over four decades.It was not until Mac Intyre and Mercer(2014)explicitly introduced positive psychology into the field of second language acquisition that positive emotions such as foreign language enjoyment began to attract the attention of researchers.Studies have shown that foreign language enjoyment can alleviate or even eliminate foreign language anxiety and its adverse effects,which indicates that students’ foreign language anxiety can be further studied from the dimension of foreign language enjoyment.For this reason,in recent years,the related research on foreign language enjoyment(FLE)and foreign language anxiety(FLA)has appeared in the public eye as a new research direction.Compared with foreign studies on learners’ foreign language enjoyment and anxiety,there is a lack of domestic attention,especially in the combination of foreign language enjoyment and anxiety.Therefore,to further explore the impact of emotions on learners,this study selected a total of 321 students in the first,second and third grades of a middle school in Shandong Province to conduct a survey,aiming to answer the following research questions:(1)What ’ s the current situation of high school students’ foreign language enjoyment and anxiety? How correlated are the two?(2)What are the differences in foreign language enjoyment and anxiety levels of students of different grades in high school? How related are the two?(3)What are the factors that affect students’ foreign language enjoyment and anxiety?The results of the study show that:(1)The levels of foreign language enjoyment and anxiety in high school students are at a moderate level,but the foreign language anxiety level is significantly higher than that of foreign language enjoyment,and the two have a significant negative correlation.(2)There is no significant difference in the foreign language enjoyment level of high school students of different grades,but there are differences in different grades in the dimension of teacher support;there are significant differences in foreign language anxiety between different grades,and the foreign language anxiety level in the third grade is significantly higher,there was no significant difference between the first and second grades of senior high school;there is a significant negative correlation between foreign language enjoyment and anxiety among high school students of different grades.(3)Specific teaching activities,teachers’ support and recognition,and learners’ progress and excellent language performance are important factors affecting learners;among the factors affecting foreign language anxiety,personal learning difficulties、exams、fearing of negative evaluation as well as teachers’ questions and challenging classroom activities will create the feeling of anxiety.In conclusion,foreign language enjoyment is mainly affected by teachers’ factors,and most of the influencing factors of foreign language anxiety originate from itself.At the same time,academic anxiety and classroom anxiety have been proved to be the main reasons for the differences in foreign language anxiety among different grades.However,due to some restrictive conditions,this study also has some limitations.For example,the sample size selected in this study is too small,and it discusses the students’ static foreign language enjoyment and anxiety,and does not consider the impact of dynamic changes of the two.But on the whole,the sample has achieved the expected goal to a large extent,fully investigated the current situation of foreign language enjoyment and anxiety of students in different grades,and found the factors that affect students’ foreign language enjoyment and anxiety,as well as the reasons for the differences in anxiety in different grades.The research results fully demonstrate the important role of emotion in students’ English learning process,and provide important teaching suggestions for high school English teachers to further identify students’ classroom emotions and improve students’ foreign language enjoyment.