Foreign Language Anxiety and Advanced EFL Learners: An Interview Study

Abstract

Is anxiety about learning and using a foreign language mainly apparent at lower levels of language competence, or is anxiety also relevant at higher levels of proficiency? While considerable research has been conducted on the various sources of foreign language anxiety at the beginning stages of language learning, relatively little is known about anxiety at more advanced levels. To fill this gap this small scale qualitative inquiry examines the construct of foreign language anxiety in the case of advanced-level language students: English majors. It aims to provide an insight into the nature and sources of L2-related anxiety from the advanced learner’s perspective: through the personal accounts of anxious learners themselves. The participants were students with high levels of foreign language anxiety, selected from a larger group of English majors based on their scores on the Hungarian version of the Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety Scale. They took part in a one-on-one in-depth interview concerning their learning and communication experience in EFL. The findings show that foreign language anxiety is not restricted to the early, beginning stages of language learning. Implications for teachers of foreign languages who teach advanced-level classes are discussed.