Pre-Adolescent Learners’ Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety Profiles and Correlates: Insights From Chinese Primary School Students of English

This paper reports on a study investigating the level and correlates of foreign language classroom anxiety among pre-adolescent students. The participants were 385 L1 Chinese primary school students of L2 English, aged between 8 and 13 (with a mean age of 10.73), who completed a validated English Classroom Anxiety Scale and a questionnaire tapping: (1) three learner-centered predictor variables (i.e., gender; attitudes towards English, and perceived relative standing among peers in English proficiency; The participants’ age was provided by their parents or caregivers) and (2) six teacher-centered predictors (i.e., attitudes towards the English teacher; teacher strictness, friendliness, joking, and predictability; and the frequency of the teacher’s English usage in class). Data analysis showed that the participants generally experienced a moderately low level of English classroom anxiety. English classroom anxiety showed no significant difference among Years 3 to 5 participants but significantly decreased in Year 6. Girls and boys did not differ significantly in their English classroom anxiety levels. Attitudes towards English, attitudes towards the English teacher, perceived relative standing among peers in English proficiency, and age significantly negatively predicted English classroom anxiety, in descending order of magnitude. Teacher friendliness and the teacher’s frequency of English usage in class significantly and negatively predicted English classroom anxiety but only marginally so. Three variables under consideration, teacher joking, strictness, and predictability, were not significant predictors of English classroom anxiety. The results and their (pedagogical) implications are discussed and the limitations of this study are put forward.