Foreign Language Anxiety: A Systematic Review

Abstract

Research in foreign language learning has notably revealed that foreign language anxiety has been a crucial area in applied linguistics. Therefore, this study tends to give a comprehensive review of literature on foreign language anxiety. This review also tries to add an additional explanation to the earlier studies of this issue. It clarifies the concept of foreign language anxiety and how it is different from other related types of anxiety. Finally, it shows the main causes and effects of foreign language anxiety that influence language learners.

The Interrelation Between Language Anxiety and Self-Determined Motivation; A Mixed Methods Approach

“…A recent systematic review of language anxiety considers anxiety a challenging issue in language learning and suggests that researchers should aim for its complete understanding (Oteir and Al-Otaibi, 2019). The review also identifies the effects of language anxiety on language learning and groups them into five broad categories based on how they affect the students: academically, socially, cognitively, affectively, and personally.…”

“…Furthermore, because anxiety is an affective construct its impact on other affective variables (such as attitudes and self-confidence) can be observed. Finally, language anxiety affects learners' personality by making anxious learners more miserable, worried, forgetful (Oteir and Al-Otaibi, 2019).…”

“…It can also be postulated that the combination of language anxiety and controlled motivation will prevent students from acquiring the language smoothly (Zhou, 2016;Oteir and Al-Otaibi, 2019). This is a clear opportunity for teachers to minimise the endorsement of controlled motivation among their students.…”

“…Such feelings are challenging because they negatively affect learners' engagement and involvement in language learning (Horwitz, 2001). Indeed, research shows that language anxiety is associated with English as a foreign language (EFL) learning and has academic as well as psychological implications (MacIntyre and Gardner, 1989;Alrabai, 2014;Oteir and Al-Otaibi, 2019). Thus, emphasis is placed on the relationship between language anxiety and L2 motivation.…”

“…Thus, emphasis is placed on the relationship between language anxiety and L2 motivation. Within the framework of Self-determination Theory (SDT) the relationship between motivation and language anxiety tend to disagree (e.g., Noels et al, 2000;McEown et al, 2014;Alamer et al, 2017;Oteir and Al-Otaibi, 2019;McEown and Sugita-McEown, 2020). Such mixed results warrant further exploration of the relationship between these two key L2 psychological constructs.…”