高中生英語聽力表現與聽力焦慮以及模糊容忍度之關係研究

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(1)國立臺灣師範大學英語學系碩. 士. 論. 文. Master’s Thesis Department of English National Taiwan Normal University. 高中生英語聽力表現與聽力焦慮以及模糊容忍度之關係研究 A Study on the Relationships of High School EFL Learners’ Listening Performance to Listening Anxiety and Tolerance of Ambiguity. 指導教授：程玉秀 Advisor: Dr. Yuh-show Cheng 研究生：陳品璇. 中華民國一百零八年九月 September, 2019.

(2) 摘要高中英語聽力測驗自2015年起被納為大學入學檢定之一，近55所大專院校校系亦採計英語聽力測驗成績作為入學門檻，顯見強化英語聽力是教學現場一大重要目標。為了在有限的教學時數中以學習者為中心、有效提升學生英語聽力的學習成效，教師有其必要關注並了解不同學習者因素對英語聽力學習可能造成的影響。本研究旨在探討聽力焦慮以及模糊容忍度對於高中階段學習者英語聽力表現的影響，進而了解（一）高中生聽力表現與其聽力焦慮及模糊容忍度之關係。（二）聽力焦慮及模糊容忍度對高中生英語表現之預測力。本研究取樣對象為臺北某公立高中之223位高二學生。施測過程中，受試者先接受全民英檢中級聽力測驗，並於聽力測驗結束後填寫基本資料，且依據施測時的經驗，加以填寫英語聽力焦慮量表(SLLAS)和模糊容忍度量表(MSTAT-I)，以利研究者後續進行檢視與資料分析。研究者透過描述性數據、皮爾森相關積差相關係數，以及複迴歸分析統計檢視受試者的聽力焦慮及模糊容忍度的程度。研究顯示高中生的聽力表現與其聽力焦慮及模糊容忍度的程度皆有顯著相關，其中聽力焦慮與聽力表現的關係較高、呈現負相關，而模糊容忍度與聽力表現的關係較低、呈現正相關。研究結果亦發現，在此二學習者因素中，僅聽力焦慮對其聽力表現具有預測力。依據研究發現，本研究就高中英語聽力教學及未來的研究提供進一步的建議。. 關鍵字：聆聽焦慮、模糊容忍度、聽力學習成就. i.

(3) ABSTRACT Since 2015, listening comprehension test has been included as a part in the college entrance system, with around 55 departments setting a certain bar for their applicants, which highlights the importance of the instruction and training of English listening skills. With a view to effectively enhancing learners’ English listening ability within the limited class hours and under the learner-centered spirit, it is crucial that teachers understand the potential influences different learner variables may have on one’s listening performance. The present study investigated the relationship of high school learners’ English listening performance to two learner variables, listening anxiety and tolerance of ambiguity. In addition, the current study also explored which of the two learner variables can serve as a significant and better predictor of high school learners’ English listening performance. The participants of the current study were 223 eleventh graders recruited from a municipal high school in Taipei, Taiwan. An English listening comprehension test retrieved from the intermediate level of General English Proficiency Test (GEPT) was administered to assess the participants’ listening proficiency, which was followed by a background questionnaire, Second Language Listening Anxiety Scale (SLLAS), and Multiple Stimulus Types Ambiguity Tolerance Scale (MSTAT-I) so as to obtain their basic personal information and to evaluate their level of listening anxiety and tolerance of ambiguity. Descriptive statistics, Pearson product-moment correlation analysis, and multiple regression analyses were employed for data analysis. The results indicated that both listening anxiety and tolerance of ambiguity significantly correlated with high school learners’ listening performance, with listening anxiety having a higher correlation. While tolerance of ambiguity was positively correlated with listening performance, the correlation between listening anxiety and. ii.

(4) listening performance was negative. Furthermore, the results also unveiled that between the two learner variables, only listening anxiety could serve as a significant predictor for high school learners’ listening performance. Based on the findings, some suggestions for future studies and for instruction in high school English classes are provided.. Key words: listening anxiety, tolerance of ambiguity, listening performance. iii.

(5) ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I am indebted to a number of people whose wholehearted help, support, and encouragement make my dissertation possible. First, I would like to show my profound gratitude to my thesis advisor Dr. Yuhshow Cheng. A role model for me as a teacher, she always inspired me, giving me professional advice and guidance to help me overcome the obstacles encountered throughout the research. It was her eternal patience and warmth that lowered my anxiety and encouraged me to move on and complete the thesis. Second, I would like thank my committee members, Dr. Huei-Chun Teng and Dr. Hsi-nan Yeh, for their constructive suggestions and valuable comments during the oral defense that contributed to the refinement of my thesis. Third, I would like to express my appreciation to my colleagues, Jason Chen, Angela Wu, and all my partners back in the office of academic affairs for their assistance in the circulation of questionnaires and sharing my work so that I could concentrate more on my study. Finally, my deepest gratefulness goes to my parents, my sister and brother-in-law, and my husband, Shawn Chen. Their endless support and love gave me the strength to struggle through the process of research. Special thanks for my two baby boys, Ian and Eason, who were born during the years of my thesis writing. They actually brought considerable inconvenience to my thesis writing, but their mere existence is already my greatest motivation in the pursuit of a better self.. iv.

(6) TABLE OF CONTENTS CHINESE ABSTRACT ............................................................................................... i ENGLISH ABSTRACT .............................................................................................. ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ....................................................................................... iv TABLE OF CONTENTS ............................................................................................ v INTRODUCTION ....................................................................................................... 1 Background .......................................................................................................... 1 Research Questions ............................................................................................. 6 Significance of the Study ..................................................................................... 6 LITERATURE REVIEW ........................................................................................... 7 Listening Comprehension ................................................................................... 7 Notions of Listening ..................................................................................... 7 Processes of Listening Comprehension ...................................................... 8 Anxiety ................................................................................................................ 12 Notions of Anxiety...................................................................................... 12 Anxiety in Second/Foreign Language Learning ..................................... 13 Anxiety and Second/Foreign Listening Performance ............................ 15 Tolerance of Ambiguity .................................................................................... 19 An Overview of Tolerance of Ambiguity ................................................. 19 Tolerance of Ambiguity in Second/Foreign Language Learning .......... 21 RESEARCH METHOD ............................................................................................ 28 Participants ........................................................................................................ 28 Instruments ........................................................................................................ 28 Listening Comprehension Test ................................................................. 28 Background Questionnaire ....................................................................... 29 Listening Anxiety Questionnaire.............................................................. 29 v.

(7) Tolerance of Ambiguity Questionnaire ................................................... 30 Procedures .......................................................................................................... 31 Data Analysis ...................................................................................................... 32 RESULTS ................................................................................................................... 34 Results of Background Information Questionnaire ....................................... 34 Results of Listening Anxiety Questionnaire .................................................... 37 Relationships of English Listening Performance to Listening Anxiety and Tolerance of Ambiguity .................................................................................... 37 Predictors for English Listening Comprehension .......................................... 39 Summary of Chapter Four ............................................................................... 41 DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION ....................................................................... 43 English Listening Performance, English Listening Anxiety and Tolerance of Ambiguity ........................................................................................................... 43 Predictors of English Listening Performance ................................................. 47 Implications of the Study .................................................................................. 48 Limitations and Suggestions for Future Study ............................................... 50 Conclusions ........................................................................................................ 51 REFERENCES .......................................................................................................... 53 Appendix A Example Task Items of the Listening Comprehension Test ............ 63 Appendix B Background Information Questionnaire............................................ 64 Appendix C Second Language Listening Anxiety Scale ........................................ 65 Appendix D Multiple Stimulus Types Ambiguity Tolerance Scale ...................... 67. vi.

(8) LIST OF TABLES Table 1 Different Classification of Anxiety .................................................................... 13 Table 2 Studies on Foreign Language Anxiety and ESL/EFL Listening Performance .. 18 Table 3 Studies on Tolerance of Ambiguity and ESL/EFL Learning ............................. 24 Table 4 Research Questions and the Corresponding Instruments and Analysis ............ 33 Table 5 Participants’ Reported Years of English Learning ............................................ 34 Table 6 Participants’ Perception of the Most Difficult Skill .......................................... 35 Table 7 Reported Materials for English Listening Practice Outside of the Classroom .. 36 Table 8 The Time Allocated for English Listening on a Weekly Basis ......................... 36 Table 9 Descriptive Statistics of Listening Anxiety Questionnaire ................................ 37 Table 10 Descriptive Statistics of the Questionnaires .................................................... 38 Table 11 Correlation Matrix of the Variables ................................................................. 39 Table 12 Results of Stepwise Multiple Regressions of English Listening Ability on Listening Anxiety and Tolerance of Ambiguity ..................................................... 40 Table 13 Analysis of Coefficients of Stepwise Multiple Regressions of English Listening Ability on Listening Anxiety and Tolerance of Ambiguity .................... 40 Table 14 Results of Stepwise Multiple Regressions of English Listening Ability on Listening Cognitive, Behavioral, and Somatic Anxiety ......................................... 41 Table 15 Analysis of Coefficients of Stepwise Multiple Regressions of English Listening Ability on Listening Cognitive, Behavioral, and Somatic Anxiety ........ 41. vii.

(9) LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1. Brownell’s Model of HURIER Listening Process .......................................... 10 Figure 2. Flowerdew & Miller’s Model of Second Language Listening ....................... 11 Figure 3. The Procedure of Research Process ................................................................ 32. viii.

(10) CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION Background In Taiwan, foreign language (FL) learning, especially English learning, has long been a major draw of attention and emphasis. For instance, the Ministry of Education (MOE) has regulated in Grade 1-9 Curriculum Guidelines that English be taught from the third grade. In addition, a huge amount of money has been allocated to subsidize the building of simulated English speaking environments such as English villages and situated classrooms. Despite all the resources devoted to promoting success, the results attained still seem to be far from satisfactory. When it comes to English teaching and learning, while it is generally accepted that the four language skills, namely, listening, speaking, reading, and writing should be put equal amount of emphasis, due to the reduction of learning hours and the examination-oriented nature of English teaching in Taiwan, teachers often have difficulty incorporating the training of the four language skills holistically and with balance, and often the time allocated to the training of listening skills ends up being relatively scarce compared with the time allocated to reading and writing (Chang, 2006; Lee, 2012). However, in language learning classrooms, listening in fact plays such an essential role, providing input for the learner, without which any learning cannot begin (Rost, 1994). During the 1980s, with the advent of communicative language teaching (CLT) and the emphasis on comprehensible input, listening, being the most basic and most prevalent skill that is used in communication (Rivers & Temperley, 1978), has come into fashion and been considered a core element in second language (SL) or foreign language (FL) acquisition (Krashen, 1985). Feyten (1991) examined the literature on listening and found that on average, more than forty-five percent of our communication. 1.

(11) time is dedicated to listening, and the percentage increases even more for students, and that listening efficiency can be considered to be a predictor for the level of foreign language learning success. Vandergrift (1999; 2004) reinforces the importance of listening comprehension and claims that “learning to listen” helps language learners “listen to learn.” In other words, the mastery of listening skills can positively contribute to the development of the other language skills. With the increasing awareness of the importance of listening in FL classrooms, since 2015, the Ministry of Education, R. O. C. has further incorporated listening comprehension test into the Comprehensive Assessment Program (CAP) for junior high school students and included it as a part in the college entrance system, with around 55 departments setting a certain bar for their applicants. Yet apart from more listening tests being given in schools, instructions on listening skills are still limited as it is often mistaken that students can acquire listening skills simply through exposure. Contrary to such a false belief, recent research has suggested that listening, being the least explicit of the four language skills, is a rather complicated and active process which requires listeners to focus on the aural input, construct meanings as well as draw interpretations from what they hear by relating the heard content to their existing knowledge, making listening the most difficult skill for language learners to acquire (Vandergrift, 2004). Because of such nature and difficulty, there is indeed the need for paying more attention to the learning of listening and explicit listening instructions (Nunan, 2002; Vandergrift, 2004). Much research has been discussing instructions on listening skills, but as previously mentioned, most of the time in class is still given to grammar drills and reading rather than communicative skills, and even if listening is included, within the limited hours, instructions still tend to focus more on drills so as to cater to the need for. 2.

(12) exams. On top of that, in recent years, one crucial change in the educational reform is that the major concern has shifted from language teaching methodology to language learners and learner variables that make a difference in one’s language learning. Under such a circumstance, it is vital to probe into the influence different learner factors can have on listening proficiency. The learner factors discussed in the current study include listening anxiety and ambiguity tolerance. Foreign language anxiety has generally been recognized as a factor having substantial impact on one’s learning achievement in the target language, yet in comparison with past studies on general foreign language anxiety, research examining the role listening anxiety plays in SL/FL learning is relatively limited (Elkhafaifi, 2005; Zhang, 2013). Vogely (1998) circulated questionnaires on listening anxiety to the 140 participants registering for the first three semesters of university-level Spanish courses and found that listening anxiety may have to do with the characteristics of input, listening process such as the use of strategies and time, as well as instructional factors like tests. By applying quantitative as well as qualitative methods, in an Arabic as a FL context, Elkhafaifi (2005) recruited 233 students learning Arabic from 6 universities in America to assess FL listening anxiety and uncovered that FL learning anxiety and listening anxiety are two distinguishable yet related constructs, both of which have debilitating effects on students’ language learning achievement. Shifting the focus to ESL/EFL contexts, Kim (2002b) recruited 253 college EFL learners in Korea and discovered that FL listening anxiety was negatively correlated to FL listening performance, and that insufficiency of confidence in listening, among all the factors given in the Foreign Language Learning Anxiety Scale (FLLAS) and Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety Scale (FLCAS), was the best predictor for listening proficiency. Similarly, in a longitudinal study that investigated the experiences. 3.

(13) of listening comprehension anxiety of 23 EFL majors enrolling in a required English listening course throughout the semester in Taiwan, Cheng (2005) also found that anxiety was negatively linked to course grades and, particularly, self-perceived competence. Chang (2008) further concluded in a study with 160 college students taking a required listening course in Taiwan that regardless of the high intensity of anxiety shown in listening to spoken English, learners tended to be even more anxious in testing situations. Moreover, in a classroom context, low self-perceived listening competence, taking English listening courses as a requirement, and concerns regarding test difficulty could be the three major causes resulting in learners’ listening anxiety. While the previous research has shed some light on the relationship between listening comprehension anxiety and listening performance, the participants were all from colleges, and discussions for learners of high school level are rather scarce. As a consequence, the current study hopes to bridge the gap by examining the relationship between listening anxiety and listening comprehension performance for high school students and explore potential instructional applications in high school classrooms. Similar to anxiety, tolerance of ambiguity (TA), the other learner factor to be explored in the current research, could also negatively impact an individual’s language learning. Rubin (1975) described a good language learner as one that is willing to learn and communicate at the cost of making mistakes and being exposed to a certain amount of ambiguity. In language learning, ambiguous situations are prevalent. For instance, it is almost unlikely for ESL/EFL learners to know the exact meaning of a new word or an idiom encountered in a reading passage. Also, they often need to deal with phonological, syntactic, semantic and even cultural ambiguities in their learning materials. If a learner fails to be receptive of new situations and embrace the vagueness, difficulty in mastering a foreign language can thus occur (Ehrman, 1996).. 4.

(14) Since tolerance of ambiguity can inhibit or facilitate one’s language learning, researchers have been probing into its nature and the impact it has on language learning. Discussions and studies concerning tolerance of ambiguity usually aimed at the investigation of general language learning achievement, with few exceptions that explore TA in skill-specific domains (Basoz, 2015; El-Koumy, 2000; Erten & Topkaya, 2009; Kamran & Maftoon, 2012; Keshavarz & Assar, 2009). However, even for the studies focusing on specific skills, the target skill tended to stay with reading and vocabulary, and the research target was mostly adult or college students. Even though Naiman, Frohlich, Stern, and Todesco (1978) once carried out a study on the relationship between tolerance of ambiguity and listening performance in high school, the participants were English speakers learning French as the second language rather than EFL/ESL learners. In short, studies exploring ESL/EFL high school learners’ listening anxiety and tolerance of ambiguity are still far from sufficient in the world, not to mention the ones carried out in the context of Taiwan. Furthermore, for research that has probed into the relationships between listening comprehension performance and other learner factors, most focused on the participants’ listening self-efficacy (e.g., Graham, 2011; Mills, 2014), metacognitive awareness of listening (e.g., Cross, 2010; Vandergrift, 2005), and the use of strategies (Rubin, 1990), and little has been done to uncover whether listening anxiety and tolerance of ambiguity can serve as a significant predictor for SL/FL listening performance. Therefore, this study hopes to inquire into the role listening anxiety and tolerance of ambiguity plays respectively in learners’ proficiency of listening comprehension.. 5.

(15) Research Questions The current study aims to gain an understanding of the relationship of listening anxiety and tolerance of ambiguity to the listening performance among EFL high school learners by inquiring into and answering the following questions: 1.. What is the relationship of English (FL) listening performance to English (FL) listening anxiety and tolerance of ambiguity among high school learners?. 2.. Which of the two variables, listening anxiety and tolerance of ambiguity, can serve as a significant and better predictor of English (FL) listening performance for learners at high school levels? Significance of the Study As previously mentioned, past researchers seldom discussed the role tolerance of. ambiguity plays in EFL listening performance, and very few of them took both listening anxiety and tolerance of ambiguity into account while looking at learners’ listening attainment, especially that of learners in middle schools. Answering the research questions posed in the study will contribute to our understanding about English learning, listening in particular, from the learners’ perspective. Also, this research fills in the current gap in the literature on listening comprehension anxiety and tolerance of ambiguity in middle schools. Finally, it is hoped that this study will shed some light for high school English (FL) teachers on listening instructions regarding the methods and techniques to be applied so as to contribute to better learning outcomes.. 6.

(16) CHAPTER TWO LITERATURE REVIEW This chapter reviews literature concerning listening comprehension and the two learner variables discussed in the current study: listening anxiety and tolerance of ambiguity. In the first section, the concept and process of listening comprehension are reviewed, and in the following sections, the conceptualization of the target variable is first introduced, and the researcher discusses the role it plays in language learning, followed by a review of how the variable can influence learners’ performance in language learning. Listening Comprehension Notions of Listening As a fundamental skill that helps learners to receive information, listening is no doubt a crucial skill for language learners to master, but it had been taken as a way to teach grammar through model dialogues until the 1970s, with the rise of Communicative Language Teaching, when researchers began to highlight the importance and have more discussion on listening and listening comprehension (Field, 2010). Different from hearing, the reception of sounds, in recent decades, listening, which involves the interpretation and attaching meanings to sound (Kline, 1996), has been generally accepted and defined as an active and dynamic process of communication (Anderson & Lynch, 1988). Thomlison (1984) defined listening as the capability of understanding what one is saying, which involves the knowledge of sounds, grammar, vocabulary, and meaning. Wolvin and Coakley (1985) identified listening as “a process of receiving, attending to, and assigning meaning to aural stimuli” (p. 74). O’Malley, Chamot, and Kupper (1989) defined listening comprehension as “an active and. 7.

(17) conscious process in which the listener constructs meaning by using cues from contextual information and from existing knowledge, while relying upon multiple strategic resources to fulfill the task requirements” (p. 434). Scarcella and Oxford (1992) negated listening as an isolated skill since a listener has to interpret the spoken text based on their understanding of culture and linguistic knowledge of the target language. In the same light, Vandergrift (2002) considered listening to be a complex process of interpretation in which a great number of mental activities are involved, for listeners need to associate what they hear with their existing knowledge such as sounds, grammatical patterns, stress and intonation so as to make meanings of the utterances and negotiate meanings with the speaker. In short, the aforementioned definitions have all lent support to the concept that listening should be conceived as an active skill. In this sense, when one is taking part in active listening, his/her comprehension can also be influenced by various variables, such as his/her cognition, affection, and personal traits. Hence, there is a need to further probe into the process of listening comprehension. Processes of Listening Comprehension Listening being an active and dynamic skill, the process of listening comprehension is also complex. In this “active and conscious process” of listening comprehension (O’Malley & Chamot, 1990, p.133), listeners have to quickly decode the given information by identifying sounds, vocabulary, sentence structures, and make interpretations based on the context so as to comprehend the listening message. In the past decades, different types of listening comprehension process have been proposed. Among all the perspectives on the process of listening, the most widely-recognized mode can be the bottom-up and top-down models (Flowerdew & Miller, 2005). In the bottom-up model, a process of making interpretations of the listening text from lower levels to higher ones (Brown, 2000), listeners make meanings of the speech they hear. 8.

(18) from phonemes, the smallest units, to words, phrases, clauses, sentences, and discourse (Vandergrift & Goh, 2012). On the contrary, in the top-down model, the process in which meanings are constructed from the higher levels, listeners interpret the utterances by applying their previous knowledge, such as topic, context, culture, and schema knowledge (Vandergrift, 2004). While these two models seem to be on the two ends of the spectrum, it should be noted that most proficient listeners actually operate both processes simultaneously in real listening situations to comprehend the incoming speech (Vandergrift & Goh, 2012). Different from the bottom-up and top-down modes, Anderson’s (1995) three-stage model of comprehension suggests a sequential, inter-connected order of input. Anderson (1995) divides listening into three sequential stages: perception, parsing, and utilization. In the phase of perceptual processing, listeners first distinguish the sounds they hear and retain them in memory. For the parsing stage, the sounds retained in the memory are parsed and matched with potential words and phrases to form mental representations. In the final phase of utilization, the information previously processed in mind is related to the listener’s schemata to generate appropriate interpretations and comprehend the text. In addition to the cognitive aspect, the HURIER model of listening process proposed by Brownell (1996) and Flowerdew and Miller’s (2005) model of second language listening comprehension concern listeners’ affective domain. According to Brownell (1996), the process of listening comprehension is composed of six interrelated components: hearing, understanding, remembering, interpreting, evaluating, and responding. The HURIER model draws special attention to the role of listening filters, including organizational role, attitudes, previous experiences, values, and bias. As can be seen in Figure 1, these filters can have an impact on the selections of messages getting into listening process. As stated by Brownell (2008), stress and anxiety interfere. 9.

(19) with memory, which no doubt plays a key component in the aspect of remembering. In other words, in order to achieve successful listening comprehension, it is also essential to pay attention to the listeners’ affective qualities so that they can have sustained concentration on the incoming messages and better memory in the process of listening comprehension.. Figure 1. Brownell’s Model of HURIER Listening Process (1996, p.12) Similarly, in their pedagogical model of second language listening comprehension, Flowerdew and Miller (2005) suggested that eight dimensions that can “affect the way messages are perceived and processed” (p.28) should be put into consideration: individualized, cross-cultural, social, contextualized, affective, strategic, intertextual, and critical aspects (see Figure 2). Among the eight dimensions, by adapting Mathewson’s (1985) affective model for reading, Flowerdew and Miller (2005) proposed that the affective dimension comprises four variables, namely, attitude, affect, motivation, and physical feelings. The attitude variable encompasses learners’ general positive attitude toward listening as well as the. 10.

(20) source of the listening material. The affect variable has much to do with the learner’s feelings such as moods, sentiment, and emotion, and can have an impact on one’s decision whether to listen to a text. Motivation consists of learners’ curiosity, appreciation, esteem, competence, accomplishment, and the desire to know and understand. Physical feelings refer to external unfavorable sources during listening, such as background noise, and the text that is likely to generate positive or negative feelings, such as pleasure or sadness. As can be seen in the aforementioned models, the affective dimension can influence listeners’ willingness to understand the listening text and the time span the incoming message can stay in one’s memory, and this also justifies the necessity for the discussion on two affective learner variables, anxiety and tolerance of ambiguity.. Figure 2. Flowerdew & Miller’s Model of Second Language Listening (2005, p.86). 11.

(21) Anxiety Notions of Anxiety The word anxiety is derived from the Latin noun, anxieta, which in Latin can be traced to an even older verb, angere, meaning to torment (Frederick & McNeal, 2013). It is indeed a torment, for in the psychological domain, American Psychology Association has defined the term anxiety as “an emotion characterized by feelings of tension, worried thoughts and physical changes like increased blood pressure.” While this subjective emotional state of tension and apprehension can trigger affective and physical reactions, empirical research in the past decades has also proven anxiety to be an agent influencing our behaviors, cognition, and learning (Sarason, 1984; Spielberger, 1966). Spielberger (1966) classified anxiety into state anxiety and trait anxiety based on the time span of the occurrence. In contrast to trait anxiety, which is permanent for having a lot to do with one’s personality characteristics, state anxiety refers to the transitory unpleasant feeling when one is in certain situations or facing threatening demands and dangers. Aside from these two types, a third type stated as situationspecific anxiety was proposed, referring to the anxiety that occurs consistently overtime and is limited to a certain context such as public speaking (Horwitz et al., 1986; Macintyre & Gardner, 1989). Scovel (1978), from another perspective, distinguished anxiety as facilitating and debilitating anxiety based on their impact on learners’ motivation. Whereas debilitating anxiety deters a learner from taking new learning tasks, facilitating anxiety positively stimulates a learner to face new learning tasks. These two binary types of anxiety function and interplay simultaneously during one’s learning. In fact, this distinction may also be taken as an indicator of the intensity of anxiety, with a low-state anxiety having facilitating effects and a high-state anxiety. 12.

(22) debilitating functions (Williams, 1991). Table 1 presents a concise summary of the above studies on different classifications of anxiety. Table 1 Different Classifications of Anxiety Researcher Spielberger (1966). Basis of Classification The time span anxiety lasts. Classification Trait anxiety State anxiety. Horwitz et al. (1986). The time span anxiety lasts. Foreign Language Anxiety. and the situation in which anxiety occurs Scovel (1978). Anxiety’s impact on. Facilitating Anxiety. motivation. Debilitating Anxiety. Whichever discerning approach is adopted, anxiety is a rather complex construct which occurs across multiple situations. When this prevailing psychological reaction is discussed in the foreign language learning context, there is a need to pinpoint a situation-specific anxiety named Foreign Language Anxiety. Anxiety in Second/Foreign Language Learning Past studies on how anxiety influences learning abound, yet at the early stage, mixed results rather than consistent ones were found. By examining the past research, Scovel (1978) found the loophole and argued that it was logical to get contradictory results as past researchers were applying different anxiety measures. Scovel, therefore, highlighted the importance that researchers should identify the type of anxiety they are measuring. Following Scovel’s suggestion, Horwitz et al. (1986) specified a situationspecific anxiety named Foreign Language Anxiety (FLA) and developed Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety Scale (FLCAS). They defined FLA as “a distinct. 13.

(23) complex of self-perceptions, beliefs, feelings, and behaviors related to classroom language learning arising from the uniqueness of the language learning process” (p. 128). MacIntyre and Gardner (1994) conceptualized FLA as “the feeling of tension and apprehension specifically associated with second language contexts, including speaking, listening, and learning” (p. 284). FLA is distinct from other types of anxiety. Different from the time when communicating or learning other subjects in a native language, it takes complex mental processing for an individual to communicate so as to understand others and make himself/herself understood when learning a foreign language (Horwitz et al., 1986). With regard to the sources of foreign language learning, Horwitz et al. (1986) proposed that FLA was related to three performance anxieties: test anxiety, communication apprehension, and fear of negative evaluation. Communication apprehension refers to the fear and shyness one feels while communicating with other people; test anxiety is the anxiety derived from a fear of failure in test-taking situations; fear of negative evaluation is the apprehension of being evaluated negatively by others, yet it is broader in scope as it can occur in any social evaluative situation. Young (1991) further specified six potential sources of anxiety, including 1) personal and interpersonal anxieties; 2) learner beliefs about language learning; 3) instructor beliefs about language teaching; 4) instructor-learner interactions; 5) classroom procedures; and 6) language testing. Complicated as the sources and the construct of anxiety can be, it has been evident that anxiety is a crucial factor, despite the fact that the degree of influence varies from learner to learner, in L2 acquisition (Ellis, 1994). Apart from the various sources of FLA, the anxiety itself has also been differentiated. Cheng, Horwitz, and Schallert (1999) distinguished second language classroom anxiety and second language writing anxiety as two related yet independent. 14.

(24) constructs, with the former being more general about a second language learning context and the latter a more language-skill-specific anxiety. As research after the identification of FLA has shown consistent and negative correlations between the score of FLCAS and learners’ course performance (e.g., Gardner & MacIntyre, 1993; Horwitz et al., 1986; MacIntyre & Gardner, 1989; Phillips, 1992), it is worth inquiring into the role of different language-skill-specific anxiety. However, in the early discussion of foreign language anxiety, the emphasis was mainly laid on speaking skills, which is assumed to be the most anxiety-provoking among the four language skills (Horwitz et al., 1986; Philips, 1992; Young, 1992). Anxiety and Second/Foreign Listening Performance Krashen (in Young, 1992) agreed that while speaking anxiety is conceived to top the list among the four language skills, listening is also highly anxiety-producing if the input is not comprehensible. Listening is more than just about understanding and comprehension. According to Vogely (1995), listening comprehension is rather “a process of constructing meaning based on multidimensional relationships between the learner and all of the internal and external influences and the intrinsic and extrinsic elements involved in that learner’s reality” (p. 41). This complicated process is a key source of listening anxiety. Since a listener must first comprehend what is being said so as to have verbal interactions with others (Vogely, 1998), listening comprehension anxiety may have detrimental effects on speech production. There is indeed a need to delve into this skill-specific anxiety. To explore factors influencing EFL learners’ affective reactions to listening comprehension activities, Kim (2002b) carried out a quantitative study with the use of Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety Scale (FLCAS) and Foreign Language Listening Anxiety Scale (FLLAS). The two factors revealed in the results are tension and worry. 15.

(25) over English listening, and the lack of self-confidence in listening, with the latter serving as the best predictor among all the factors listed in FLCAS and FLLAS. With a view to further delving into EFL learners’ reactions, Kim (2002a) conducted another qualitative study by interviewing twenty Korean university students on their levels of anxiety after taking part in several English listening activities. Based on the interviewees’ retrospective report, it was found that students were afraid of failing in basic understanding and the subsequent failure, and they had the highest levels of listening anxiety at the initial stage of listening. In parallel with learners’ self-perception and self-confidence, learners’ language competence has also been distinguished as one of the major factors that are significantly associated with learners’ level of listening anxiety. With a sample of four hundred and fifty-one college students in Puerto Rico, Aneiro (1990) found that it was the learners’ level of listening proficiency, followed by the amount of exposure to the foreign language and their general language competence that influenced their level of apprehension the most. In Iran, Dalman (2016) examined the relationship between listening anxiety, listening comprehension strategies, and listening performance with the participation of 110 college students enrolling in a two-month preparation course for TOEFL test. The statistical results (r = -.35, p < .05) showed that the more proficient the students were, the lower listening anxiety they demonstrated. In an Arabic as a FL classroom context, Elkhafaifi (2005) also obtained evidence that students’ level of listening anxiety had a significant negative correlation to their final listening comprehension grade (r = -.70, p < .01). In addition to learners’ belief and their language competence, researchers have also made attempts to uncover other potential variables influencing EFL learners’ listening anxiety. Legac (2007) examined the listening anxiety level of 112 Croatian elementary. 16.

(26) school students divided into monolingual and bilingual groups. The research results suggested that compared with monolingual students, the intensity of listening anxiety bilingual students experienced was substantially lower. With a view to examining the types of listening materials, based on the self-reports from Spanish learners at an American university, Vogely (1998) found that the characteristics of the input, including nature of the speech, level of difficulty, lack of clarity, lack of visual support, and lack of repetition, should be taken as a main source of anxiety. Moreover, in the eye of the participants, level of difficulty was determined by unknown vocabulary, complicated syntax, and unfamiliar topics, which also confirmed the belief that listening anxiety often occurs when learners think the task they encounter is way beyond their ability, and this anxiety can even exacerbate when they falsely believe they need to understand every single word they hear (Oxford, 1993). In a classroom context in Taiwan, Yang (2012) investigated junior high school students’ level of anxiety and concluded that learners with lower listening anxiety made better use of listening strategies and had better English listening performance. By examining and comparing both junior high school students’ and senior high school students’ listening anxiety and English listening performance, Chou (2017) reported that listening anxiety negatively correlated to English listening performance at both educational levels and that learners’ listening anxiety could serve as a predictor to one’s English listening performance at high school level. At an even higher educational level, Chang (2008) carried out a study to look at 160 college students’ English listening anxiety and found the participants’ intensity of anxiety moderately high when listening to spoken English, and the level of anxiety even increased in testing situations. A brief summary of the above studies on the effects of FLA on second/foreign listening performance is presented in Table 2.. 17.

(27) Table 2 Studies on Foreign Language Anxiety and ESL/EFL Listening Performance Researcher Aneiro (1990). Findings Learners’ level of listening proficiency had a great impact on their level of apprehension.. Dalman (2016),. Learners’ level of listening anxiety negatively correlated to their. Elkhafaifi (2005). listening comprehension.. Chang (2008). Learners’ level of anxiety rose especially in testing situations.. Chou (2017). Learners’ listening anxiety negatively correlated to English listening performance. Learners’ listening anxiety predicted one’s English listening performance at high school level.. Kim (2002a). Learners were apprehensive about basic understanding and the subsequent failure and apprehended the most at the initial stage.. Kim (2002b). Learners’ level of confidence, among the other factors listed in FLLAS and FLCAS, best predicted their listening proficiency.. Legac (2007). Bilingual learners had a considerably lower intensity of listening anxiety.. Vogely (1998). The characteristics of input were a main source of anxiety.. Yang (2012). Listening anxiety negatively correlated to one’s English listening performance and learners with lower listening anxiety made better use of listening strategies.. With the factors affecting the level of listening anxiety uncovered, there has been an upsurge in discussions on strategies to alleviate listening anxiety. Starting from the classroom atmosphere, Oxford (1993) proposed that the climate of listening classrooms should be kept nonthreatening, and before or during a listening activity, devices such as. 18.

(28) deep breathing, listening to music, and positive affirmation should be applied so as to reduce learners’ anxiety. Based on students’ responses, Vogely (1998) suggested that instructors should provide comprehensible input by selecting familiar and meaningful topics, and using known vocabulary. In addition, it has been advised that instructors create a low-anxiety environment by providing learners with abundant opportunities for successful response to comprehensible input. (Nagle & Sanders, 1986). Chang (2008) inspected the effect of different forms of listening support, including pre-teaching of content and vocabulary, question preview, and repeated input, on the anxiety levels of college students taking a listening test and concluded that even if various types of supports may help alleviate test-takers’ listening anxiety, the key to reducing the negative effects of test anxiety still lies in the careful consideration of test design, which is under the control of test developers (Bachman & Palmer, 1996). On top of the aforementioned studies concerning classroom atmosphere, comprehensible input and test design, Oxford (1990) also highlighted the need to correct listeners’ false belief, also a source of anxiety, that word-for-word comprehension is indispensable, which in a sense also underscore the importance of learners’ tolerance of ambiguity. As past studies targeting listening anxiety were mostly conducted at university level and seldom incorporated learners’ tolerance of ambiguity in the discussion, the current study aims to probe into Taiwanese high school learners’ listening anxiety along with their level of tolerance of ambiguity in a hope of filling the gap and contribute to the related literature. Tolerance of Ambiguity An Overview of Tolerance of Ambiguity The concept of tolerance of ambiguity (TA) was first developed by FrenkelBrunswik (1949), who proposed that one’s ability to tolerate ambiguous situations. 19.

(29) should be taken as an emotional and affective personality variable. She referred to the intolerance of ambiguity as “a tendency to resort to black-white solutions, to arrive at premature closure as to evaluative aspects, often at the neglect of reality, and to seek for unqualified and unambiguous over-all acceptance and rejection of other people” (p.115). Budner (1962) further elaborated the concept of TA and defined it as “the tendency to perceive ambiguous situations as desirable,” whereas intolerance of ambiguity was defined as “ the tendency to perceive (i.e., interpret) ambiguous situations as sources of threat” (p.29), which was believed to be the reflection of one’s endeavor, due to anxiety or stress, to make the situation more familiar (Smock, 1955). According to Budner (1962), an ambiguous situation can occur when an individual cannot properly structure or categorize due to the lack of clues. In his study, three different types of ambiguous situations were characterized—situations of novelty (without sufficient cues), situations of complexity (with too many cues to deal with), and situations of insolubility (with contradictory cues). When an individual is intolerant of such ambiguous situations, he/she may feel threatened and thus have potential responses with expressions of dislike, depression, attending to avoiding the situation, or showing destructive behavior (Naiman et al., 1978). Giving a more comprehensive discussion, McLain (1993) argued for the need to separately define and integrate concepts of ambiguity and tolerance. As stated by McLain (1993), ambiguity refers to “the perception of inadequate information to clearly understand stimuli or their temporal or spatial interrelation,” and tolerance for ambiguity is rather “a range of reactions, from rejection to attraction, to stimuli perceived as unfamiliar, complex, dynamically uncertain, or subject to multiple conflicting interpretations” (p.184). In spite of the fact that Frenkel-Brunswik (1949) developed this concept from a sociological perspective so as to further illustrate why some people hold certain. 20.

(30) prejudice once an assumption is made, the concept of TA has been studied ever since in various fields such as clinical psychology (Lachance, Ladouceur & Dugas, 1999), medicine (Geller, Tambor, Chase & Holtzman, 1993) and organizational behavior (Judge, Thoresen, Pucik & Welbourne, 1999), for one’s degree of TA can have an effect on so many behavioral phenomena. It is hence not surprising to infer that TA may also have a role to play in learning interference. Tolerance of Ambiguity in Second/Foreign Language Learning The learning of a second/foreign language in fact can be considered ambiguous for the similarities it shared with the characterized ambiguous situations (Chapelle & Roberts, 1986; Erten & Topkaya, 2009; Grace, 1998). To SL/FL learners, the grammatical, lexical, and phonological cues are all so “novel” that they usually lack adequate linguistic knowledge to complete tasks of comprehension (Grabe & Stoller, 2002). Moreover, learners may also encounter great ambiguity when making sense of different cultural norms brought by other learners from different cultural backgrounds (Olebe & Koester, 1989). Meanwhile, these cues to language learners can be too enormous and complex to analyze, and if learners interpret the cues contradicting each other, the entire situation can become insoluble. In the context of SL/FL language learning, Chapelle and Roberts (1986) defined TA as one’s ability to function with ration and calmness in a situation where interpretation of all stimuli is vague. Ely (1994) referred to TA as “an ability to deal with ambiguous new stimuli without frustration or without appeals to authority. It allows for indeterminate rather than rigid categorization” (p.518). Furnham (1994) viewed TA as how an individual feels and deals with ambiguous situations with various unfamiliar, complicated, or inconsistent cues. Brown (2000) defined TA as “the degree to which you are cognitively willing to tolerate ideas and propositions that run counter. 21.

(31) to your own belief system or structure of knowledge” (p. 119). As anxiety, which, as previously discussed, can have detrimental effects on language learning and performance, is perceived as one of TA’s behavioral characteristics by some scholars (Bochner, 1965; Ehrman, 1999; Oxford, 1999), studies on tolerance of ambiguity as a learner factor have gained floor. In the academic field of language learning, Naiman et al. (1978), by using Budner’s (1962) 16-item ambiguity tolerance–intolerance scale, conducted the first research on TA. With high school learners of French from Grade 8, Grade 10, and Grade 12 as a foreign language in Toronto, Naiman et al. (1978) found that TA, identified as one of the characteristics of good language learners, was positively related to L2 success, with TA being a vital predictor for success in early stages of learning (Grade 8) rather than that in later stages (Grade 10 and Grade 12). Later, in a study targeting sixty-one adult learners in the University of Illinois, Chapelle and Roberts (1986) administered Norton’s (1975) MAT-50 scale and found tolerance of ambiguity to be positively correlated to end-of-term achievement in multiple choice grammar tests, dictation tests, and parts of speaking tests, which once again echoes with the notion that people with better tolerance of ambiguity will enjoy more, function better, and be more willing to take risks and open to change when being in an ambiguous, namely, an L2 environment (Naiman et al., 1978; Rubin, 1975). Since the instruments applied by Naiman et al. (1978) and Chapelle and Roberts (1986) were not designed particularly for FL/SL learning contexts, Ely (1989) developed a second/foreign language tolerance of ambiguity scale and found TA to be a significant negative predictor of strategies concerning individual language elements such as planning out beforehand exactly what to say. TA was also found a predictor of looking for overall meaning in reading rather than in listening. However, the 12-item scale fails to evenly cover the four language. 22.

(32) skills and focuses mostly on reading and writing. There is also a lack of sufficient evidence for the validity of the scale or further refinement of the instrument though the researcher claimed: “Further development and refinement of the instrument are planned.” (p. 442) Apart from research concerning general language achievement, studies on the relationship between TA and specific skills of language learning have also been conducted. In an attempt to relate different levels of TA to reading comprehension, ElKoumy (2000) randomly had 150 EFL learners from university level in Egypt as his subject and adopted measures including the MAT-50 (Norton, 1975) and a reading comprehension subtest of the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL), and the results indicated that learners with moderate tolerance of ambiguity level outscored significantly both the low and high tolerance groups in the reading comprehension test. Moving the context to a state university in Turkey with 188 Turkish EFL learners of tertiary level in reading classes involved, Erten and Topkaya (2009) once again affirmed the direct correlation between tolerance of ambiguity and language learners’ reading success. Such a result, as the researchers interpreted, could stem from the factor that the more linguistic knowledge a learner has, the less important the need to control the details in language learning, which in turn raises one’s tolerance of ambiguity. The research carried out by Kamran and Maftoon (2012) and Keshavarz and Assar (2009) also showed consistent statistically significant results regarding the positive relationship between EFL learners’ TA and their reading comprehension scores. Interestingly, while these studies showed the positive correlation between TA and EFL learners’ language performance, when the focus was shifted to learners’ receptive vocabulary knowledge, the research results indicated that whatever level of TA learners were at, there was no statistically significant difference in terms of their receptive vocabulary knowledge. 23.

(33) (Basoz, 2015). Regarding the skills of listening, past studies have also indicated TA to be an influential factor. By examining the listening scores of EFL learners that had different levels of TA, Soleimani (2009) concluded that learners displaying a moderate level of TA were inclined to have better performance in listening comprehension tasks (as cited in Basoz, 2015). Along the same lines, by reviewing relevant research on the influence tolerance of ambiguity could have on Chinese learners’ English listening comprehension, Liu (2015) reported that high level of TA also significantly and positively influenced learners’ performance in the sub-skills of listening for retrospective tasks, inference and main ideas. Aside from the positive relationship between TA and listening comprehension performance, Ba (2012) circulated questionnaires among 96 Chinese non-English majors and concluded that the learners’ level of TA is also positively related to their use of listening strategies. Compared with students of low TA, students with high tolerance of ambiguity tended to selectively choose strategies of listening comprehension and take advantage of different skills to complete relevant tasks in listening comprehension. A brief summary of the above studies on the effects of tolerance of ambiguity on second/foreign listening performance is presented in Table 3. Table 3 Studies on Tolerance of Ambiguity and ESL/EFL Learning Researcher Ba (2012). Findings Learners’ level of TA positively correlates to their use of listening strategies.. Basoz 2015. Learners’ level of TA does not correlate to their receptive vocabulary knowledge.. 24.

(34) Table 4 Studies on Tolerance of Ambiguity and ESL/EFL Learning (continued) Researcher. Findings. Chapelle and Roberts (1986). Learners’ level of TA positively correlates to their end-of-term achievement in grammar tests, dictation tests, and parts of speaking tests.. Ely (1989). By developing a second/foreign language tolerance of ambiguity scale, TA was found to be a significant negative predictor of certain strategies involving focusing on individual language elements. TA was also found to be a positive predictor of looking for overall meaning in reading rather than in listening.. Erten and Topkaya (2009),. Learners’ level of TA positively correlates to their. Kamran and Maftoon (2012),. reading success.. Keshavarz and Assar (2009) El-Koumy (2003). Compared with the low and high tolerance groups, learners with moderate TA have better scores in the reading comprehension test.. Liu (2015). Learners’ level of TA significantly and positively influence their listening performance.. Naiman et al. (1978). Tolerance of ambiguity positively correlates to L2 success.. Soleimani (2009). Learners with a moderate level of TA display better performance in listening comprehension tasks.. While the aforementioned studies have revealed the positive impact TA can have 25.

(35) on foreign language learning, it should also be noted that the level of TA should be moderate, and that, contrary to what might be expected, being highly tolerant of ambiguity does not always guarantee positive learning outcome in the language learning process (Ely, 1995). High TA can cause learners to blindly accept everything given in the learning process without questioning, and can prevent them from having the curiosity to further explore the meaning of the linguistic elements they are unfamiliar with. According to Ely (1995), having the curiosity so as to be willing to make guesses and take risks is usually characteristic of having a moderate level of TA, and having high TA can lead to “early and permanent pidginization or fossilization of incorrect pronunciation, grammar, vocabulary, and pragmatic use. (p. 93)” Such a notion is supported by the pilot study, targeting 45 young-adult university students in Poland, conducted by Baran-Lucarz (2009). With an aim to probe into the relationship between TA and pronunciation, the study results surprisingly uncovered that it was rather being intolerant of ambiguity that aided learners in improving their pronunciation. That is to say, students with lower level of TA were more sensitive and could notice the gap between L1 and target language sounds, which would in turn help them exert more effort on pronouncing the new sounds correctly. Still, as Ely (1995) put it, an ideal language learner should be “neither inhibited by low tolerance of ambiguity nor oblivious to linguistic subtleties (p.93),” and it is when one can recognize linguistic differences and embrace it as a learning opportunity instead of feeling threatened can one benefit from TA. To date, whereas research concerning the relationship between tolerance of ambiguity and foreign language learning achievement in general abounds, there are still inadequate studies targeting high school learners, and the role TA plays in their language learning, listening in particular, seems to be underexplored. In this sense, the. 26.

(36) present study aims to contribute to the related literature with respect to the relationship among TA, listening performance and listening anxiety and serves to fill a gap in the literature.. 27.

(37) CHAPTER THREE RESEARCH METHOD The present study adopted a quantitative method to explore firstly the correlation among listening performance, listening anxiety, and tolerance of ambiguity and secondly whether listening anxiety or tolerance of ambiguity could be a significant predictor for one’s listening comprehension performance for students at high school level. In this study, a correlational design was adopted. Elaborations of participants, instruments, procedures, and data analysis of the study are detailed in this chapter. Participants In the current study, a total of 234 eleventh grade students, coming from three social science major classes and four science and engineering major classes in a municipal high school in Taipei, Taiwan were recruited, for they were considered to have enough learning experiences to represent students at high school level and assumed to have more willingness to fill out the questionnaires compared with their senior counterparts. All the participants were given the chance to choose whether to voluntarily participate in the study, and they were further assured that their response in the questionnaires as well as results of their listening test for the current study would not influence their final grades for the English course. Instruments The instruments employed in the study include a listening comprehension test, a background questionnaire, a listening anxiety questionnaire, and a tolerance of ambiguity questionnaire. Listening Comprehension Test In the current study, a published listening test on the intermediate level of General English Proficiency Test (GEPT) was employed to assess the participants’ listening. 28.

(38) performance. The difficulty of the GEPT is divided into four levels—elementary, intermediate, high-intermediate, and advanced. According to the test developer and publisher, Language Training and Testing Center (LTTC), the wording in the intermediate test is based on a word list designed for senior high school students, in which approximately 5,000 words are listed. The listening test (see Appendix A) contains 45 questions in multiple choice format, and the test is divided into three types of tasks: Picture Description (15 questions), Answering Questions (15 questions), and Conversations (15 questions). The entire test lasts for approximately 30 minutes. In Part One, Picture Description, test takers are required to listen to four descriptions and choose the best one that corresponds to the given picture. In Part Two, Answering Questions, test takers are asked to choose the best response after listening to a statement or a question. In Part Three, Conversations, test takers need to choose from four written options to answer a question based on the conversation they hear. In a formal intermediate listening test, based on the number of questions that are correctly answered, the score is converted with the use of a measuring scale, whose maximum score is 120. Yet as the measuring scale is left unpublicized, in the current study, the maximum score of the test was decided to be 45 (one point for each question). Background Questionnaire The background questionnaire (see Appendix B) consists of five questions. In addition to basic personal information and gender, the questionnaire also includes questions to understand the participants’ years of English-learning experience, the most difficult skill they considered to be among the four English language skills, their use of supplementary listening materials, and the hours they spent weekly practicing English listening. Listening Anxiety Questionnaire. 29.

(39) The current study adopts Cheng’s (2017) Second Language Listening Anxiety Scale (SLLAS) for measuring participants’ listening anxiety (see Appendix C). The SLLAS is composed of nine questions, covering three aspects of learners’ listening anxiety (i.e., cognitive anxiety, somatic anxiety, and avoidance behavior). The participants were asked to respond to each statement in the format of ﬁve-point Likertscale, from Strongly Disagree (1 point) to Strongly Agree (5 points). Participants’ scores achieved in this scale can range between 9 and 45. A higher score indicates a higher level of listening anxiety. According to Cheng (2017), the construct validity of the SLLAS was verified with the use of confirmatory factor analysis, which yielded fit indexes that met the recommended criteria (χ2/df = 2.47; SRMR=.08; RMSEA = .09; CFI = .96; GFI = .93). The reliability of the SLLAS was also satisfactory (Cronbach’s alpha = .84; CRs of the three dimensions of SLLAS = .80 to .86). The original Chinese version of the SLLAS was used to collect data. Tolerance of Ambiguity Questionnaire In the present study, the Multiple Stimulus Types Ambiguity Tolerance scale (MSTAT-I) by McLain (1993) was used to measure the participants’ tolerance of ambiguity (see Appendix D). MSTAT-I contains 22 items that comprehensively examine features of stimuli and an individual’s reaction to perceived ambiguity. According to McLain (1993), while the validity of the scale was pursued by relating MSTAT-I scores to measures of willingness to take risks, cognitive complexity, dogmatism, and receptivity to change, the factor analysis of the scale supported a single-dimensional solution, namely, general tolerance of ambiguity. A five-point response format, from Strongly Disagree (1 point) to Strongly Agree (5 points), was adopted. This scale yields scores ranging between 22 and 110, with higher scores indicating a higher level of tolerance of ambiguity. As stated by McLain (1993), the. 30.

(40) convergent validity of MSTAT-I was established with its significant positive correlations with other TA scales, including Budner’s (1962) 16-item scale, Storey and Aldag’s (1983) 8-item scale, and MacDonald’s (1970) 20-item scale. The coefficient alpha (α = .86) also lent support to the internal consistency of MSTAT-I. To facilitate students’ understanding of the items, the MSTAT-I was translated into Chinese by the researcher. Two senior high school English teachers were invited to confirm the accuracy and adequacy of the translation. Procedures As shown in Figure 3, which presents the flow chart of the research process, the listening test and all the questionnaires, including the background questionnaire, the SLLAS, and the MSTAT-I were given within one class session. In the fifty-minute class session, thirty-five minutes were first distributed for the GEPT intermediate listening test, and the rest of the fifteen minutes were allocated for the questionnaires. Before filling out the questionnaires, the participants were ensured that their responses would be kept confidential and that there would be no particular answers to the questions and statements given in the questionnaires. All of the questionnaires were collected and typed into the computer by the researcher for statistical analyses.. 31.

(41) GEPT Listening Test (Intermediate Level) <35 minutes>. Data Collection.  Questionnaires  <15 minutes> . Background Questionnaire Listening Anxiety Questionnaire Tolerance of Ambiguity. Questionnaire. Data Analysis. 1.. Descriptive Statistics. 2.. Pearson Product-moment Correlation. 3.. Stepwise Multiple Regression. Figure 3. The Procedure of Research Process Data Analysis To answer the first research question, Pearson product-moment correlation was used to examine the correlation between learners’ listening comprehension ability and the two learner factors, namely, listening anxiety and tolerance of ambiguity. For the second research question, multiple regression analysis was applied to explore the relative contributions among the two learner factors to the listening comprehension test score. The correspondence of research questions and the instruments as well as analysis is indicated in Table 4.. 32.

(42) Table 5 Research Questions and the Corresponding Instruments and Analysis Research Instruments Analysis Questions Q1. 1.. GEPT intermediate level. Pearson product-moment correlation. listening test Q2. 2.. Questionnaires. multiple regression analysis. Note. Q1=What is the relationship of English (FL) listening performance to English (FL) listening anxiety and tolerance of ambiguity among high school learners? Q2=Which of the two variables, listening anxiety and tolerance of ambiguity, can serve as a significant and better predictor of one’s English (FL) listening performance for learners at high school levels?. 33.

(43) CHAPTER FOUR RESULTS This chapter presents analyses of the data collected through the GEPT listening comprehension tests, background information questionnaire, English listening anxiety questionnaire, and Multiple Stimulus Tolerance of Ambiguity Test questionnaire. The findings are illustrated in the following four sections. The first section presents the background information of the participants. The second section reports the relationships of English listening performance to listening anxiety and tolerance of ambiguity. The third section reveals the predictors for high school students’ English listening comprehension. With the summary of the results of the present study, the last section demonstrates the conclusion of this chapter. Results of Background Information Questionnaire The number of valid questionnaires collected from the participants was 223. According to the background information questionnaires, the participants in the current study included 104 (46.6%) male students and 119 (53.4%) female students. As shown in Table 5, over half of the participants had learned English for eleven to fifteen years (58.7%) or for six to ten years (39.4%). Only one participant had learned English for more than fifteen years (0.4%), and three within five years (1.3%). Table 6 Participants’ Reported Years of English Learning Items. n. %. No more than five years. 3. 1.3. Six to ten years. 88. 39.4. Eleven to fifteen years. 131. 58.7. More than fifteen years. 1. 0.4. 34.

(44) Note. N = 223 Table 6 reveals the participants’ perception of the most difficult English skill. Based on the participants’ self-report, English writing (38%) was considered the most difficult skill among the four skills, followed by speaking (35%), listening (18%), and reading (9%). Table 7 Participants’ Perception of the Most Difficult Skill Items. n. %. Listening. 41. 18. Speaking. 78. 35. Reading. 19. 9. Writing. 85. 38. Note. N = 223 In terms of the materials participants adopted for their English listening practice outside of the classroom, as can be seen in Table 7, 59 participants (26%) tended to choose English online resources such as Voice of America and VoiceTube as their English listening material, 49 participants (22%) listened to programs that went with English magazines, 18 participants (8%) took English radio broadcast as the source of listening practice, and 19 participants trained their listening ability through other materials such as English songs or having conversations with their foreign friends or teachers. However, it is worth noticing that 121 participants (54%) reported that they had no extra listening practice outside of the classroom.. 35.

(45) Table 8 Reported Materials for English Listening Practice Outside of the Classroom Items. Frequency. %. No extra practice. 121. 54. English magazines. 49. 22. English radio broadcast. 18. 8. English online resources. 59. 26. Others. 19. 9. Note. The materials that each participant reported might be more than one. Therefore, the sum of items chosen by each group may exceed the number of participants (N = 223). With regard to the time spent weekly on English listening outside the classroom, as presented in Table 8, almost half of the participants (47%) practiced listening for less than half an hour, and only 19 participants (8%) practiced English listening for more than one hour per week on average. Table 9 The Time Allocated for English Listening on a Weekly Basis Outside the Classroom Items. n. %. Less than an hour. 104. 47. One to two hours. 50. 22. Two to four hours. 35. 16. Four to six hours. 15. 7. Six to eight hours. 16. 7. More than eight hours. 3. 1. Note. N = 223. 36.

(46) Results of Listening Anxiety Questionnaire As mentioned in the previous chapter, the potential score of the listening anxiety questionnaire, SLLAS, adopted in the current study ranges from 9 to 45, with 3 to 15 points from each of the three dimensions, namely, cognitive anxiety, somatic anxiety, and avoidance behavior. As can be seen from Table 9, the mean score of the scale was 23.87. While the score indicates that the high school students did not seem to have a high level of listening anxiety, it should be noted that the mean score of cognitive aspect of listening anxiety (7.49) greatly outscored that of somatic (4.45) and behavioral (4.02) aspects. Table 10 Descriptive Statistics of Listening Anxiety Questionnaire Variable. Min. Max. Mean Score. SD. LAS. 11. 45. 23.87. 6.23. Cognitive. 2. 10. 7.49. 1.90. Somatic. 2. 10. 4.45. 1.89. Behavioral. 2. 10. 4.02. 2.00. Note. LAS = listening anxiety total; N = 223. Relationships of English Listening Performance to Listening Anxiety and Tolerance of Ambiguity Table 10 reports the descriptive statistics of the participants’ listening performance on the GEPT listening comprehension test and their responses to the whole listening anxiety questionnaire as well as tolerance of ambiguity questionnaire. As shown in Table 10, the mean score of the GEPT listening comprehension test was about 32 (out of 45), and the mean scores of their listening anxiety and tolerance of ambiguity were. 37.