The primary goals of this study were to explore whether Taiwanese graduate students experienced language anxiety in classroom and social contexts, the underlying constructs of the FLCAS and the ECAS, and the relationships of language anxiety and learner characteristics. The first results suggested that EFL classroom situations are anxiety-provoking and most students had experienced language anxiety in their English classes in Taiwan. In contrast, most students did not experience ESL communication anxiety. The findings of the EFA analyses revealed that communication apprehension and fear of negative evaluation were important factors contributing to the language classroom anxiety yet test anxiety was not conceptually relevant to language classroom anxiety. In accord with MacIntyre and Gardner (1989) and Aida (1994), language anxiety is a unique construct independent of test anxiety, a state anxiety triggered by temporary reactions toward an evaluation
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situation or methods (Oh, 1992; Sarason, 1978; Shohamy, 1982) rather than foreign language learning.
In examining the constructs of the FLCAS and ECAS, the EFA analyses indicated that these two scales measure a similar construct:
the fear of negative evaluation, a factor that contributes to language anxiety found in both EFL classroom and ESL communication settings (Gregersen & Horwtiz, 2002; Horwitz et al., 1986; Koch &
Terrell, 1991; MacIntyre & Gardner, 1989, 1991b; Price, 1991;
Young, 1990). In English classes, students reported being afraid of making pronunciation or grammatical errors and being corrected by teachers in front of their peers. Outside of the classroom, anxious students were concerned about their inadequate oral and aural skills and were very sensitive about the evaluation and social impressions other may have of them.
Despite the similarity of these two types of language anxiety, the structures of the FLCAS and ECAS are different in two ways.
First, the EFA analyses of the ECAS revealed that social communication anxiety is an important factor associated with English communication anxiety. A closer examination of the items underlying these factors reflect participants’ perceptions of interlocutors (e.g., gender, social status, degree of acquaintance, number of speakers) and communication contexts (e.g., group or dyad communication) seemed to be pertinent to English communication anxiety. Consistent with the study by Peirce (1995), power relations in the social world are prevailing forces that affect interactions between learners and native target language speakers. It is possible that language learners’ inferior social identity or their belief of not being a legitimate speaker (Bourdieu, 1977, 1991) of English makes them become extremely
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self-conscious and anxious when speaking in English to strangers, a group of native speakers, or people high in power. In addition, interactions with strangers and people of the opposite sex and speaking in public were progressively more anxiety-inducing.
Participating in phone conversations is another anxiety-provoking context. This reflects a common notion that the absence of nonverbal cues such as facial expressions and body language can cause some levels of misinterpretation, and thus emotional resources such as intonation, prosody, and pausing need to be deployed for intended communicative purposes (Dewaele, 2007). One finding that has rarely been reported in previous FLA research is the language anxiety arising from opposite-sex encounters. Taiwanese students’
unfamiliarity with the communication styles of native English speakers of the opposite sex (e.g., direct/indirect, speaker-centered/listener-centered, personal/contextual) as well as insufficient knowledge in English pragmatics can elevate their levels of ECA.
Furthermore, the apprehension involved in cross-cultural interactions is another important factor that accounts for ECA. It is consistent with the correlation results that the exposure to English significantly correlated with ECA. For many freshly arrived Taiwanese graduate students, the distances between their native and the target language culture may result in increased communication anxiety when they find that their existing framework of culture and values is in conflict with those of the host community. The result highlights the critical role of language socialization (Bayley &
Schecter, 2003; Duranti, 2001) and how it serves as a dynamic negotiation, acquisition, and reconstruction process throughout the lifespan of language learners. That is, language acquisition entails not
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simply a mastery of a series of linguistic codes but a developmental process of social embodiment characterized by the models of interaction conveyed through verbal and nonverbal communication patterns within a particular community.
The present study also demonstrated a significant positive correlation between ECA and age. One possible interpretation could be the fact that more mature Taiwanese graduate students have learnt English in an educational environment where instructions are guided by a grammar-based teaching approach with a focus on the written language and error correction. Many of the younger generation, on the other hand, have learnt English through communicative approaches that highlight the importance of communicative competence over grammatical accuracy, and thus feel more relaxed toward communication in English even if they might not yet have achieved a full command of English.
The regression analyses revealed that self-perceived oral proficiency was the only significant predictor of FLCA and ECA, suggesting that self-perceived communicative competence plays a vital role in reducing anxiety both in EFL classroom and ESL communication contexts. The result is consistent with earlier findings (Bailey et al., 2000; MacIntyre, Noels, & Clément, 1997;
Onwuegbuzie et al., 1999) that students with higher self-perception about their language ability tend to have lower levels of language anxiety. This finding supports Horwitz et al.’s (1986) theory in that foreign language learning can be threatening to learners because they are deprived of the normal mode of communication; thus, learners with higher self-esteem are more likely to experience lower levels of anxiety. The finding also supports Greenberg et al.’s (1992) terror
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management theory that people having high self-esteem are less likely to be anxious because self-esteem protects them from anxiety.
Considering that students with higher self-perceived English competence are more likely to have a positive self-image and confidence in the content of their spoken English, it is important for instructors to help students overcome a negative self-image and build confidence in learning and using the target language.