Recognising interdisciplinary implications of the affective filter

Abstract

Linguistic education, like practically any other form of education, is strongly determined by affect. Although the entire “story” is far more complex, we might summarise it by saying that if students and teachers find themselves in emotionally convenient circumstances, linguistic progress is easily noticeable, whereas in situations when either of them are experiencing negative feelings or emotions, linguistic efforts are likely to prove simply futile. As implied by the well-known concept of the affective filter, negative emotions – be it fear, anxiety, discomfort and such – act an invisible wall blocking cognition and disable linguistic education. Hence, the teachers’ and – predominantly – the students’ affect either aids or hinders education and it does so in a less or more concealed fashion. On the level of terminology, too, the presence and salience of affect is either explicit or implicit. The former is the case with the said notion of affective filter and others such as speech anxiety, emotional intelligence, willingness to communicate, everyday stressors, etc. The latter is even more extensive, although it tends to be overlooked or disregarded, which can be exemplified by such linguistic concepts as, for example, (a) fossilization, which is mostly defined in cognitive terms and relates to that part of language users’ competence which has become fixed and may fall subject to stagnation – but which results from our natural need of comfort and of social recognition; or even such a traditional term as (b) language performance, which is contrasted against language competence and also viewed through a predominantly cognitive prism – but which, too, is subject to our emotional stance and individual invariably-unstable and internally influential feelings.