Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety of Arab learners of English: The effect of personality, linguistic and sociobiographical variables

Dewaele, Jean‐Marc; Al-Saraj, Taghreed M.

doi:10.14746/ssllt.2015.5.2.2

Cited by 91 publications

(84 citation statements)

References 37 publications

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“…A partial explanation lies in the fact that "the word 'emotion' itself was generally absent in the SLA literature up to the start of the current century, although there had been interest in one specific emotion: foreign language anxiety," as pointed out by Dewaele (2015, p. 13). Launched by the seminal work of Horwitz, Horwitz and Cope (1986) and the scale they developed, foreign language classroom anxiety (FLCA) has been extensively studied in SLA research and has been identified to have a debilitating effect on L2 learning and achievement (Aida, 1994;Dewaele & Al-Saraj, 2015;Pérez-Paredes & Martinez-Sanchez, 2000;Thompson & Sylvén, 2015). However, until recently, few other emotions have been looked into regarding their possible impact on language learning.…”

Section: Emotions In Language Learningmentioning

confidence: 99%

Classroom anxiety and enjoyment in CLIL and non-CLIL: Does the target language matter?

Smet

Mettewie

Galand

et al. 2018

SSLLT

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This study investigates pupils' anxiety and enjoyment in the classroom when learning a second or foreign language. The particularity of this study lies in the comparison of two target languages (English and Dutch) in two educational contexts (CLIL and non-CLIL) at different instruction levels (primary and secondary education). While most research on content and language integrated learning (CLIL) focuses on English as a target language, the Belgian context calls for a comparison with the language of the "other" community, in this case Dutch.Audrey De Smet, Laurence Mettewie, Benoit Galand, Philippe Hiligsmann, Luk Van Mensel 48 Data were collected from 896 pupils in French-speaking Belgium through a selfreport questionnaire measuring pupils' anxiety and enjoyment in the classroom, along with background characteristics. Results indicate that while CLIL pupils experience significantly less anxiety than their non-CLIL counterparts, English learners report significantly less anxiety and more enjoyment than Dutch learners. This suggests an important role of the target language for emotional engagement in the classroom and calls for further investigation into the role of target language perceptions. Finally, the interactions with instruction level reveal that while primary school pupils report stronger emotions, the effects of CLIL and English are much larger at secondary level.

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Section: Emotions In Language Learningmentioning

confidence: 99%

Classroom anxiety and enjoyment in CLIL and non-CLIL: Does the target language matter?

Smet

Mettewie

Galand

et al. 2018

SSLLT

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show abstract

“…Hence, this study focused on EFL Saudi students. Dewaele and Al-Saraj (2013) found that one of the main problems that Saudi students faced was related to anxiety. In their study on Arab women studying in English preparatory program at a college in Saudi Arabia they found that teacher-student interactions and teacher behavior contributed to anxiety among the learners.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This was obvious with the students who attended listening classes. Studies have been carried out in Saudi Arabia which focus on foreign language anxiety and listening comprehension problems such as Alrabai (2014); Dewaele and Al-Saraj (2013);Javid (2014). Very few studies have been conducted specifically on listening comprehension anxiety.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Exploring the Causes of Listening Comprehension Anxiety from EFL Saudi Learners’ Perspectives: A Pilot Study

Otair

Aziz

2017

ALLS

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Anxiety is an important factor in foreign language learning. Very few studies have been done on English as a Foreign Language (EFL) Saudi students in listening classes. Therefore, this pilot study was aimed at exploring the causes of listening comprehension anxiety from EFL Saudi learners' perspectives at Majmaah University, Saudi Arabia. The pilot study involved two students who were selected based on the following criteria: 1) Only Saudi male undergraduate students who enrolled in Preparatory Year Program (PYP) at Majmaah University would be involved in this study, 2) The students who had studied or lived in native English speaking countries would be excluded. The researcher used pseudonyms to refer to the participants as Mohammad and Ismail. This study employed a qualitative case study research design. The data were collected through Semi-structured interviews with the participants. The interview sessions were audiotaped and transcribed. The results show that the participants experienced a high level of anxiety when doing the listening comprehension tasks. Three main causes of listening comprehension anxiety emerged from this study: 1) the problematic nature of listening comprehension, 2) the classroom atmosphere, and 3) the low English proficiency of the students.

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“…However, some studies examine the drawbacks of feedback on writing performance of students and its various negative consequences, such as, writing apprehension (Hassan, 2001;Cheng, 2002;Asmari, 2013;Pimsarn, 2013;Troia, Harbaugh, Shankland, Wolbers, & Lawrence, 2013;Alrabai, 2014Alrabai, , 2015Dewaele & Al-Saraj, 2015). A study examined the types and sources of apprehension of EFL writers finds that most participants face the fear of teacher's negative comments on their writing tasks which directly causes the writing apprehension (Pimsarn, 2013).…”

Section: Feedback On L2 Students' Writingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Teachers and Students’ Perceptions on the Effectiveness of the Writing Task in the Foundation Year at the ELI

Alsanie¹,

Alrezqi²,

Al-Sayeud³

et al. 2018

SELT

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The current study investigated the perceptions of Saudi female teachers and their preparatory year students on the Writing Task (WT) used in the English Language Institute (ELI) at King Abdulaziz University (KAU) in Jeddah, KSA. To obtain a deeper insight, mixed methods were used through quantitative questionnaires and qualitative semi-structured interviews. While quantitative data were analysed using a descriptive SPSS analysis, qualitative data were analysed using a thematic analysis by NVivo. The sample consisted of 50 students (mean age: 19) and 6 teachers with different qualifications and years of experience. First, a questionnaire was distributed to elicit student’s perceptions on the WT then the 6 teachers were interviewed. The results indicated that the students had negative perceptions towards the effectiveness of the WT and that it was not beneficial in developing their writing skills, unlike some of the teachers who expressed positive views towards the WT. The findings offer future instructional implications that will help in enhancing the WT of the ELI. Some of these implications indicate that extensive writing classes must be given to students to improve their writing skills and that the writing topics must be contextualised and taken from the students’ daily life to keep them interested.

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Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety of Arab learners of English: The effect of personality, linguistic and sociobiographical variables

Cited by 91 publications

References 37 publications

Classroom anxiety and enjoyment in CLIL and non-CLIL: Does the target language matter?

Classroom anxiety and enjoyment in CLIL and non-CLIL: Does the target language matter?

Exploring the Causes of Listening Comprehension Anxiety from EFL Saudi Learners’ Perspectives: A Pilot Study

Teachers and Students’ Perceptions on the Effectiveness of the Writing Task in the Foundation Year at the ELI

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