A Review of Research on Foreign Language Speaking Anxiety of Chinese College Students: Causes, Consequences and Strategies

Abstract

As English has become a compulsory course for all of the students in China, that is to say, English is becoming more and more important in China. However, due to a lack of English environment, a large proportion of students have foreign language anxiety especially speaking anxiety. Therefore, this study focuses on foreign language speaking anxiety among college students to figure out the causes, and consequences of it and further explore some effective strategies to solve these problems. The data all come from literature from previous studies. After composing and analyzing those data, it can be concluded that there are three causes: fear of committing grammatical errors, low English proficiency and fear of receiving a negative evaluation, and three consequences: onset of physical symptoms, resistance to speaking English and less self-confidence among Chinese college students. Furthermore, some strategies can be applied to solve it from the perspective of instructors and students respectively.