Foreign Language Anxiety: Its Situation, And Insiders’’ Awareness And Attitudes-Taking XI’’ Finance And Economics College As An Example

The development of humanistic psychology and the teaching theory make contributions to the change of teaching center from teacher to students. The students-centered teaching method is widely accepted by researchers and educationists. The researchers begin to explore the individual factors that affect learning, among which affective factor receives a large amount of attention. Anxiety, one of the most important affective variables, is a hot point in SLA research.Based on Krashen’s Affective Fiflter Hypothesis, the current research is to investigate anxiety in Xi’ an Finance and Economics College. The participants include non-English major students and teachers. The researcher aims to investigate the following issues:(1) The existence of Foreign Language Anxiety(FLA);(2) The students and teachers’ awareness of FLA;(3) The students and teachers’ attitudes towards FLA;(4) The possible reasons for FLA. Based on adjusted Foreign Language Classroom Scale(FLCAS), Generalized Attitude Measurement(GAM) and Generalized Belief Measurement(GBM), 147 questionnaires are issued to 147 students, followed up by interviews with twelve students and eight teachers. SPSS 19.0 is used to analyze the data.The findings of the research are listed as follows:(1) The level of anxiety among the students in this college is relative high.(2) Most of the students and teachers have been aware that FLA does exist, but some of the teachers do not perceive it as a problem.(3) Most of the students hold a negative attitude toward FLA while the majority of the teachers hold a mixed attitude toward FLA, positive and negative.(4) Other factors like teachers’ teaching style and personalities also contribute to FLA. Finally, based on the findings of the research, the researchers offer some suggestions to relieve FLA.