Иноязычная тревожность в овладении русским языком как иностранным

Abstract

The aim of the paper is to measure and define the causes of foreign language anxiety in learning RFL, as one of the most important affective factors in foreign language teaching. The causes of difficulties in foreign language learning, as well as the development of language anxiety, can be different. The study examines the sample of 80 Croatian undergraduate students majoring in Russian language and literature at the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences of the University of Zagreb. In order to measure language anxiety, the questionnaire that included Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety Scale, developed by E. Horwitz et al. [1991] was used. The hypotheses were that the level of anxiety would decline at advanced levels of language learning; with the students who were learning another foreign language at the university; those who had learned Russian before entering the university; as well as those who had integrative and instrumental type of motivation in learning the language, and those who had visited Russian speaking country before.In the area of moderate level of anxiety, certain categories in which students showed high level of anxiety were allocated. The main causes of anxiety were communication apprehension and fear of negative evaluation. Future studies need to take into consideration foreign language anxiety in different contexts of foreign language learning and psycholinguistic perspective of the issue.