Management of foreign language anxiety: Insiders’ awareness and experiences

Abstract

This study investigated EFL students’ and teachers’ perspectives and experiences of managing foreign language anxiety (FLA). Data were obtained from 49 student autobiographies, 18 student interviews, 8 teacher interviews and 351 student responses to an open-ended question. Content analysis was used to analyse the data with the use of NVivo. A dual-task approach to managing FLA (i.e. reducing its negative effects and taking advantage of its positive effects) with specific strategies for students, teachers and other stakeholders was identified. The analysis also revealed important findings related to key stakeholders in FLA management, tensions in managing FLA, the extent to which students’ and teachers’ perceptions of FLA management matched, how they managed student FLA at university and the factors affecting students’ success in managing FLA. The findings of the study indicate that one should not expect a one size fits all model for FLA management, and emphasise the need to focus on working with FLA instead of only focusing on reducing it.

Keywords:

• foreign language anxiety
• FLA
• FLA management
• perspectives
• autobiography
• NVivo
• university students
• Vietnam

Public Interest Statement

Many people seem surprised when hearing the term foreign language anxiety (FLA), and that students feel anxious when studying a foreign language. This study confirms that FLA does exist in some students learning a foreign language, and that although FLA usually implies something negative, it can also be facilitating. Therefore, this paper argues that FLA should be managed rather than reduced. By reducing FLA, the focus is on finding ways to minimise it; whereas by managing FLA, the focus is on both reducing its debilitating effects and making use of its facilitating effects. The study, on the basis of students’ and teachers’ perspectives, suggests a dual-task approach to managing FLA with specific strategies for students, teachers and other stakeholders. It also identifies the factors that affect anxious students’ success in managing FLA.

Additional information

Funding

Funding. The authors received no direct funding for this research.

Notes on contributors

Trang Thi Thu Tran

Trang Thi Thu Tran is an English lecturer and officer dealing with research management and international relations, College of Economics, Hue University, Vietnam. Her research interests include educational psychology, affective factors in language learning, and teaching and learning in higher education.

Karen Moni

Associate professor Karen Moni co-ordinates curriculum and literacy courses at the School of Education, the University of Queensland. Her research interests include literacy and young adults with intellectual disabilities and teaching, learning and assessment in higher education. She is the current Past President of the Australian Association for the Teaching of English.

These two researchers worked together in the project Foreign Language Anxiety in a Vietnamese Tertiary EFL Context: Understanding Its Status, Development, and Insiders’ Awareness and Attitudes, a project funded by Endeavour Awards. This paper is part of a series of papers published out of this project.