What Does it Feel Like to Use English? Empirical Evidence from EFL Students

Abstract

Recent studies concerning foreign language learning and teaching do not focus exclusively on the cognitive processes of the parties involved, but also on their emotional states, which are intricately interwoven with language learning and use. To date, many researchers have focused on the effects of language anxiety on the learners’ development of communicative competence. However, apart from anxiety, humans experience a wide range of other emotions that foreign/second language use evokes across many learning and communicative contexts. Research on affect in foreign language learning has been growing steadily and has been concerned not only with foreign language anxiety, but also with positive emotional states that foreign language learners experience. The use of such research tools as interviews and autobiographic narratives within the case study framework allow us to get a deeper insight into language learners’ affectivity. Relations between cognition and emotion are complex and multifaced. Some of the intricacies of these relations are discussed in this chapter, and the results of the study on emotions in the foreign language learning context are reported. They imply that positive emotions are associated with high evaluation of the participants’ performance, their successful communication, and a sense of achievement. Negative feelings accompany the situations of failure (test anxiety), low grades and poor language performance, whereas positive feelings boost motivation and help sustain a positive self-image. Suggestions concerning teaching an L2 in order to encourage positive feelings and reduce negative feelings are also included.