The Relationship between Irrational Beliefs and Foreign Language Anxiety among Jordanian EFL Learners

Abdel-Rahman Abu-Melhim ,Mohammad H Abood ,Hamzeh M Al-Zghoul ,Rula M Zughoul

doi:10.7575/aiac.ijalel.v.4n.6p.130

Abstract

This study aimed at investigating the relationship between irrational beliefs and foreign language anxiety among a sample of (118) undergraduate students at Ajloun National University in Jordan. To achieve the purpose of the study, two scales were used: An irrational scale and an Arabic version of Horwitz and Cope's foreign language anxiety scale. The correlation descriptive method was used for data analysis. The results showed that there is statistically significant correlation between irrational beliefs and foreign language anxiety. Significant differences were found in the strength of relationship between irrational beliefs and foreign language anxiety according to gender in favor of meals. No Significant differences were found in the strength of relationship between irrational beliefs and foreign language anxiety due to academic level.

Highlights

Thinking is considered as a means for humans to acquire knowledge and experiences that help them through selfrealization, completion of goals and control the course of life, thinking is a cognitive aspect that has received considerable attention in the field of counseling and psychotherapy, where many theoretical trends appeared of interest in the way people think and the impact on the emotional and behavioral side
Many studies dealing with irrational beliefs and their relationship with some variables among students were conducted, in contrast few studies shows that foreign language anxiety, especially in the Arab environments, and here a number of studies that have addressed all of the irrational beliefs and foreign language anxiety: Farah, et al (1993) conducted a study aimed to identify the relationship between the test anxiety and irrational ideas, the sample consisted of (292) students from high school students in Irbid, Jordan and the researchers used irrational beliefs measure in addition to Swain measurement for test anxiety
The results indicated the prevalence of irrational ideas among university students the results indicated that there is a relationship between irrational beliefs and emotional disorders and the lack of gender effect on the spread of these ideas

Summary

Introduction

Thinking is considered as a means for humans to acquire knowledge and experiences that help them through selfrealization, completion of goals and control the course of life, thinking is a cognitive aspect that has received considerable attention in the field of counseling and psychotherapy, where many theoretical trends appeared of interest in the way people think and the impact on the emotional and behavioral side. Ellis has identified eleven ideas considered irrational and responsible for mental disorders and lead to distortion and deviation in thinking and lack of compatibility between the self and the others, one of the irrational beliefs referred to Ellis "the individual should be on a level of competence and achievement to deserve appreciation". This idea and other irrational beliefs exist to a certain extent in all societies (Alrihani, 1985). There are many reasons behind these irrational beliefs like ignorance, sclerosis, intellectual stagnation, defensive methods and indifference (Shaheen & Hamdi, 2007)

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Results

Discussion

Conclusion