The Causes and the Solutions to Language Anxiety in SLA

【Abstract】 Anxiety， as an affective variable， has been thought to be one of the most important factors influencing the success and failure in Second Language Acquisition(SLA). It is proved that language anxiety is caused not only by the environment but also by the learner himself. In this paper， causes of language anxiety are put forward and some suggested solutions are proposed.

【Key words】 Second Language Acquisition(SLA) language anxiety causes solutions

1. Introduction

It’s a common sense that language anxiety， as an affective factor， is an important factor that influences Second Language Acquisition (SLA). Especially these years， a number of language researchers and educationalists have found that language anxiety greatly affects the process of acquisition of language in the learner’s study， so language anxiety has been attached more attention in the SLA. Language anxiety is not only caused by the learning environment， but also caused by the learner himself. However， more studies stress on the macro analysis of all the factors that cause language anxiety， fewer researches lay on the specific causes from learners. So this paper wants to improve the learner’s process of language acquisition through finding out the causes of language anxiety and puts forwards some solutions to avoiding heavy language anxiety from learner’s aspects.

2. Theory background

Since 1970s， foreign researchers have done a lot of researches on language anxiety. Krashen is one of the first such researchers and made great contribution to this field. One of his SLA hypothesis ， Affective Filter Hypothesis (Krashan 1982)，mentioned that various “affective” factors like motivation， anxiety， can “block” comprehensible input and keep it from effectively producing acquisition. They are called the affective filter. When the affective filter is high， learners maybe understand the input， but the input can’t reach the Language Acquisition Device(LAD). High anxiety can bring such high affective filter， and relates to poor second language acquisition success.

Later， Stern(1983)， in his book Fundamental Concepts of Language Teaching， said that the outcome of learning is positively correlated with the attitude of learners to the study of language. The extraverted learners can get success more easily than introverted ones.

Then some researchers classified the anxiety.

Scovel， with other experts， divided anxiety into two forms. One is facilitating anxiety， the other is debilitating anxiety. The former can encourage learners to make more effort to complete studying task， and the latter may lead them to avoid learning which bringS them anxiety.

In 1994， Ellis further illustrated that the discrepancies of learners’ physiology， affection， cognition and learning strategies have great influence on SLA. He divided anxiety into three types， that is， trait anxiety， state anxiety and situation-specific anxiety. Trait anxiety is a kind of permanent trend that anxiety will be generated once intension comes， belonging to one’s character; state anxiety is the combined product of trait anxiety and situation anxiety， pointing to one moment’s state of tension; situation-specific anxiety refers to the anxious mood in specific situation. Language anxiety is usually seen as a kind of situation-specific anxiety.

In 1980s， with the development of SLA， there is a common agreement among the researchers that anxiety is regarded as one of the key mental variables and one of the most important factors leading to learning diversities among learners. E. Horwitz et al. (1986) is the first researcher who takes language anxiety as an independent problem， distinct from other anxieties in SLA. He gave a definition to the language anxiety， that is， an obvious self-conscious， self-belief complex which is produced during the process of the language studying in classroom. Moreover， in order to understand and measure language anxiety，E. Horwitz et al. designed Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety Scale–FLCAS， according to students’ self-reports， teaching practices and a series of related measures. It’s widely used and seen as the most comprehensive measure form of language anxiety.

3. Factors contributing to anxiety

After looking back and thoughtfully analyzing the researches of language anxiety， Young made a conclusion of six factors that lead to the language anxiety. They are the personal communication anxiety， the students’ concepts of language studying， the teachers’ concepts of language teaching， the interaction between students and teachers， classroom activity and language tests.

Jane Arnold(2000) mentioned several factors leading to anxiety in his book Affect In Language Study. That is self-esteem， tolerance to vagueness of language， teachers’ evaluation methods， competition and students’ different cognition of learning Chinese expert， Zhen Peiyun， have made an investigation on relation between teachers’ questions in class and students’ anxiety control among the freshmen majored in logistics in Shanghai Industry University in 2003. She found that in classroom activities， 46% of the students took speaking as the top terror task， the second was “listening”. And 78% of the students agreed that they were afraid of answering questions in the class， the reason is that they are lack of capability or less preparation.

From the above findings， we can pick out the causes to language anxiety from learners’ aspect. It can be concluded as follows.

3.1 Learners’ character

Learner’s character is the physiological elements that may bring language anxiety. It’s believed that extraverted learners have less language anxiety than introverted learners; optimistic learners can handle the anxiety more easily than pessimistic learners; open-minded learners can alleviate the sense of anxiety more easily than shy learners.

3.2 Self-esteem

Self-esteem is a self-evaluation to one’s own value in a certain condition. It’s an effective interaction between people and environment. When the learner is exposed to a language environment which he isn’t familiar with， a strong contrast will be formed between mother tongue and the second or foreign language. He will try his best to prevent himself from losing face. Consequently， it’ll lead himself to a high state of anxiety， with all day’s worrying about being laughed at because of his incorrect pronunciation， incorrect sentence or incorrect writing.

Just as Scarcella and Oxford saying， perhaps everyone has self-satisfied moments. However， he does go through the moments of low self-esteem in some specific periods. The low self-esteem will directly affect the learners’ enthusiasm in the classroom， leading them to low achievement and disgust of the target language even giving up the effort.

3.3 The expectation from competition

Through the research on language learners’ diary， Bailey(1983) found that competition can bring anxiety. But the root reason should contribute to learners’ expectation from the competition. People like to compare with others. Once they find others are better than them， they will trigger the sense of inferiority. Before learning a language， learners all have expectations. They are afraid of falling behind， because it doesn’t match their expectation. The higher the expectation is， the higher the anxiety will be.

3.4 Language Aptitude

Several specific personal characteristics are necessary to a good second language learner， such as a good memory， sensibility to language， the ability to imitate， and good listening and verbal abilities. Importantly， many of the learners feel pressure because they believe that their peers are more talented in these areas than they are.

3.5 External influences

External influence can also bring anxiety to the learners， such as parents’ high expectation， the requirement from work， the requirement of graduation and so on. In China， it’s more common to see that parents’ high expectation to their children will give heavy burden to the students. And all kinds of requirements are also the elements to bring anxiety to the learners that can’t be neglected.

3.6 Lack of language learning strategies

Many of the learners are lack of ability to find effective language learning strategies. They can’t find a right way to study， so they feel that they have no interest in learning. In many cases， some students feel that they have studied so much， but they are still the last one.

Some students reported that they had tried many learning strategies， but that their search was “like fighting a guerrilla war，” as one student put it， “attacking here and there.” Many felt that they could have been more successful in English if they had found an effective learning approach early and used it consistently.

4. Suggested solutions

According to the above causes of language anxiety， there’ are some suggestive solutions to these causes.

4.1 Make full use of multi-media and teaching on line

Internet has been a communication platform among the learners. Multi-media and teaching on line can provide a chance to alleviate language anxiety. The learners can self-study through internet according to their own studying situation. It can also cultivate learners’ good habit of independent study.

4.2 Initiate corporate learning

Since 20-30 years ago， language teaching approach has transmitted from teacher-centered to student-centered. During the transition process， language teaching begins to focus on group corporation and task-based learning model. Corporate learning can create relaxing， lively and pleasant learning environment which can greatly alleviate learners’ sense of anxiety. In corporate learning， before the presentation before the classmates， the learner has enough time to think about the problem， and has chance to communicate with team members to get timely feedback and necessary corrections. Therefore， there will be lower rate to make mistake and definitely lower sense of anxiety. Corporate learning can enhance learners’ motivation， help them to set up self-confidence and self-esteem. Especially for those introverted， shy and timid learners， corporate learning can provide them more opportunities for communication

4.3 Improve the awareness of learning strategies

Cognitive and metacognitive strategy use was proved to produce a significantly positive effect on the students’ performance in SLA ， it is worth trying to help students become more aware of the existence and importance of strategies to improve their use of the strategies. As Yang discovered， the students were able to “to improve the use of their learning strategies through awareness-raising in group interviews and informal strategy instruction” (1996， P. 204). Hence， it is beneficial to enhance learners’ awareness of strategy use through formal and informal instruction， since good awareness of metacognitive strategies is the characteristic of good learners.

4.4 Learn from the failure

Just as the old saying， “Failure is the mother of success”. Learners who neglect the importance of failure do not learn from them because they are unaware of their existence; or the students are aware of them， but have no idea how to go about using them. It is important for them to understand that they can learn much through their mistakes， and that their fear of making a mistake may be because they wrongly assume that it gives others a bad impression. Consequently， when they use the strategy of learning from our mistakes， it should be taught that it instead gives others a good impression. This will lead to a better learning outcome， as well as being able to recognize the benefits of failure.

5. Conclusion

Language anxiety is a complex phenomenon. It involves many factors including learning environment and learners themselves. There is no denying that it does influence SLA. The causes and solutions from this paper can’t cover all in this field， and it lacks evidence from reality. However， I do hope that more researches can be done in this field to have more improvement of SLA.

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[1] Jane Arnold. Affect in Language Learning[M]. Cambridge University Press， 1999.

[2] Ellis， R. Understanding Second Language Acquisition[M]. Oxford University Press，1985．

[3] Krashen， S. The Input Hypothesis[M]. Longman：Issues and Implications， l985.

[4] Scovel， T. The Effect of Affect on Foreign Language Learning; A Review of the Anxiety Research[J]． Language Learning．(28)129-142．

[5] 鄭佩蕓． 課堂提問與焦慮控制[J]． 外語界， 2003(3)．