Important Affective Factors in SLAWord文件下载.docx

1、4.1.1 DefinitionAccording to Howard Gardner, the attitude is the ready for psychological and neural state and it organized by experience. The attitude has effect on personal goals. Attitude includes the cognitive component, affective component, conative component. In the second language acquisition,

2、 attitudes can be explained by three approaches. That are the learners attitude to the target population and culture; the learning behavior of their own views.4.1.2 The Role of Attitude in SLAStevick emphasizes the importance of self-security, an important facet of the attitude toward self. “Am I wh

3、at I would like to be an intellectual being and also as a social being? Do I have an adequate mind, and am I the kind of person that other people are willing to spend time with? If the answer to all these questions is affirmative, then the individual is better able to engage in the often humbling pr

4、ocess of acquiring a second language. The attitudes that the learner has toward the target language and the second language community seem to have a very significant effect on motivation in particular. According to Gardner and Lambert: The learners ethnocentric tendencies and his attitudes toward th

5、e members of the other group are believed to determine how successful he will be, relatively, in learning the new language .Here stereotyping often plays a large role. The in-group often values characteristics that the out-group supposedly lacks. A major effect of stereotyping is to create or perpet

6、uate social distance and social boundaries. Saville-Troike argues that stereotypes build “a social barrier which inhibits communication and learning and they affect the self-image of those who are typed.”Spolsky （1969） argues strongly that One of the most important attitudinal factors is the attitud

7、e of the learner to the language and to its speakers. In an investigation of 315 foreign students from 80 different countries living in the USA, he found significant associations between the perception of similarity between self and English speakers and grades in English. It suggests that it is affe

8、ctive reactions toward the other group rather than toward ones own community which is the pertinent variable. It makes a big difference whether the learner holds a positive or negative attitude toward learning a second language. If the learner has a positive attitude, he will spend much more time on

9、 learning; he will be interested in learning; he will like the second language materials. As a result, he will do well in learning a second language. On the country, if the learner has a negative attitude, he will hate learning, and he will avoid learning. In the end, he will be very poor in learnin

10、g a second language. Thus we should develop the learners active attitude toward learning a second language, it will benefit the learners a lot in second language learning.4.2 MotivationMotivation is a term which occurs in the discussion of second rather than first language learning. It has been larg

11、ely accepted that motivation is one of the most important factors which may contribute to the success in second language learning. Brown discovered it is supported by mans needs after a series of experiments.4.2.1 DefinitionThe concept of motivation is concerned with the question Why does an organis

12、m behave as it does? We infer this on the basis of two classes of observations. First, the individual displays some goal-directed activity, and second, that person expends some effort. Moreover, questioning the person would show a desire or want for the goal in question and favorable attitudes towar

13、d the activity of learning the language. In short, motivation involves four aspects, a goal, effortful behavior, a desire to attain the goal and favorable attitudes toward the activity in question.Gardner defined L2 motivation as “the extent to which the individual works or strives to learn the lang

14、uage because of a desire to do so and the satisfaction experienced in this activity.” The learner decides to choose, to pay attention, to engage in one activity but not others; the learner persists over an extended time. And the learner maintains high activity level. Recently, motivation is “a proce

15、ss where a certain amount of instigation force arises, initiates action, and persists as long as no other force comes into play to weaken it and thereby terminate action or until the planned outcome has been reached”. Despite the conceptual differences, however, most researchers agree that motivatio

16、n is related to persons choice of a popular action, persistence with it, and effort expended on it.As becomes obvious, in the above definitions, （a） motivation is a process, （b） it involves goals which individuals have in mind and try to attain, （c） it requires activity on the part of the individual

17、s; the activities that students engage in are geared toward attaining their goal, and （d） motivated activity is both instigated and sustained.4.2.2 The Role of Motivation in SLAMuch of the research conducted by Gardner and his co-researchers suggested that interactively motivated students are more s

18、uccessful language learners than those who are instrumentally motivated. In their opinions, the second language learners motivation is a relative static trait. However, integrative orientation proved far less important in foreign language settings where such integration is virtually impossible and,

19、in some cases, highly ethnocentric individuals who do not even like the cultures of the language are studying have achieved very high levels of foreign language proficiency. American language students would seem to have little instrumental, integrative or assimilative imperative for language learnin

20、g. For most English-speaking Americans, knowing a second language is not an essential life skill, and few career paths require foreign language proficiency. This lack of motivation for language learning cannot be attributed solely to the language learners themselves. For example, in our China, the l

21、earners perhaps show very high instrumental and integrative or assimilative motivations in learning second language. Intrinsic and extrinsic motivations have different influence on learners. The learners are intrinsically motivated when learning is a goal in itself. They find intrinsically motivated

22、 tasks interesting and challenging; the reward is enjoyment of the activity itself or a feeling of competence in doing the task. In contrast, students are extrinsically motivated when learning is done for the sake of rewards. A number of researchers and theorists have contended that intrinsic motiva

23、tion correlates more closely with language learning success than extrinsic motivation, but a students total motivation is most frequently a combination of extrinsic and intrinsic motivation.Generally speaking, highly motivated, successful learners possess the following natures: self-efficacy; an int

24、ernal locus of control; positive attitudes toward learning, a need for achievement and intrinsic motivation; both social relatedness and self-direction or autonomy.4.3 AnxietyWhile all humans experience anxiety at one time, it is believed that some people might be anxious more often than others, or

25、have a more severe reaction to anxiety-producing situations so that language learning could be hampered.4.3.1 DefinitionAnxiety is a very important affective factor for the second language learning. Anxiety has been studied in the psychological domain and it is associated with feelings of uneasiness

26、, frustration, self-doubt, apprehension or worry. From the perspective of definition, anxiety is viewed negatively and it is also regarded as affective disorder and a common affective problem. Anxiety is, perhaps, the most pervasively obstructive factor in learning process.4.3.2 The Role of Anxiety

27、in SLAThough exact anxiety can help the learners in language learning, anxiety indeed makes learners nervous and afraid and thus contributes to poor performance; this, in turn, creates more anxiety and even worse performance. Consistent negative correlations have been found between foreign language

28、anxiety and various measures of foreign language achievement. Much of the anxiety is associated with understanding and speaking the foreign language. Speaking publicly in the target language has been found to be particularly anxiety provoking for many learners, even those who feel little stress in o

29、ther aspects of language learning. With respect to understanding the foreign language, some learners report an indecipherable buzz whenever they are asked to listen to the foreign language. Most language researches show a negative relationship between anxiety and performance. The negative kind of an

30、xiety is sometimes called debilitating anxiety, because it harms learners performance in many ways, both indirectly through worry and self-doubt and directly by reducing participation and creating overt avoidance of the language. Harmful anxiety can be related to plummeting motivation, negative atti

31、tudes and beliefs, and language performance difficulties.Language researchers hold different views about the existence or significance of help anxiety. Horwitz （1990） stated that anxiety is only helpful for very simple learning tasks, but not with more complicated learning such as language learning.

32、 Scovel （1978） suggested that a clear-cut result is made more difficult because anxiety can have two effects that cancel each other out, leading to facilitation in some cases and interferences in others. Brown （1994） commented that it could well be that a little nervous tense in the process is a good thing. The construct of anxiety has an optional point along its