Chapter 1 Introduction
1.1 Background of This Study
Traditionally, China's English teaching mainly focuses on three centers,teaching-material center, teacher center and grammar center, which lead to more time .expense and less efficiency. Moreover，a lot of English teachers don't attach importanceto students' emotions, and the students' ability to adjust to their English learning anxiety isnot very strong. To change this difficult situation, College English Syllabus wrote:"College English teaching should adhere to the people-oriented, pay much attention tostudents' emotions，further stimulate the students' interest in learning English and helpstudents develop a sense of accomplishment and self-confidence in learning English"(Ministry of Education of China，1999). Obviously as you can see, there are clearrequirements for paying much attention to students, emotions in the College EnglishSyllabus. Therefore，a survey of English learning anxiety and countermeasures to improvestudents' English learning have great significance for improving their English learning.What's more, in a long period, how to improve teachers' teaching receives moreattention than how to improve students' learning which plays an important role in Englishlearning. With the development of educational psychology，researchers have shifted theiracademic interest from teachers to students who are the main body of English learning.Humanists say the main aim of education is to cultivate the whole person. To achieve thisgoal, cognition and affect are necessary and indispensable. With the development ofsecond language acquisition, a number of researchers have come to realize the importanceof learners and pay close attention to their affective factors influencing language learning.Ellis regarded learner' emotional factors as c -e of the primary factors in illustrating theindividual learners' diffe ences in foreign langi;age learning (1994:883).
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1.2 Research Questions
Based on the previous research material, the Foreign Language Classroom AnxietyScale made by Horwitz et al. is used to measure the English classroom anxiety level ofart major freshmen, and to investigate the differences between the students from Collegeof Music and the students from College of Fine Arts in English learning anxiety, therelationship between the art students' English classroom anxiety and their Englishachievement，and the sources of anxiety. The study addresses three research questions as follows:
1) How is the overall condition of the art students' English learning anxiety and thedistribution of the four components?
2) Are there any statistically significant differences between subjects majoring in musicand those majoring in fine arts in English learning anxiety?3) Is there any correlation between the art students' English performance and theirEnglish classroom anxiety?
To answer these research questions，documentary method, statistical analysis methodand investigation method including questionnaire and interview are used in this study.
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Chapter 2 Literature Review
2.1 Theoretical Framework of the Study
Researches on foreign language learning have got a lot of outstanding achievementssince several decades. As we all know, Krashen's affective filter hypothesis andhumanistic theory make great contribution to these achievements. Affective Filter is first proposed by Dulay and Burt as a term and developed byKrashen in order to illustrate how affective variables influence the foreign languagelearning process. Krashen (1985) states that comprehensible input is an indispensablefactor, but not a sufficient factor for good SLA. Affective factors also have a greatinfluence on the process of SLA. According to Krashen，there can be a mental blockcaused by affective factors such as self-confidence, anxiety, motivation, which are seen asthe adjustable filters which block or pass input necessary to acquisition. In Krashen'sview, the positive affective variables such as a low level anxiety, a good self-image, ahigh motivation can make the filter 'open' and 'down' to the comprehensible input. Thenegative affective variables can make the affective barriers 'closed' and ‘up’ to thecomprehensible input. That is to say，low level anxiety，good self-image，and highmotivation can get more input and make more productive output. On the contrary,.learners having a higher affective filter are likely to be more unsuccessful in foreignlanguage learning. Therefore, according to AFH, the main reasons for individualdifferences in foreign language learning are affective factors and a lower affective filter isdesirable. Therefore, it is urgent and necessary to investig: learning achievement fromthe angle of students' affective factors. As English teachers, we should not only payattention to how to teach well but also to hc;\v to make our students learn well in therelaxed and secure learning environment.
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2.2 Definition and Classification of Anxiety
It is controversial for language researchers to define anxiety. Different languageresearchers have different opinions on the definition of anxiety, and some languageresearchers divide anxiety into three catc trait anxiety, state anxiety as well assituational specific anxiety. The role of anxiety in language learning may have been influenced by differentconceptualization of anxiety (Maclntyre, RD & Gardner, and R.C 1991). Therefore, it isindispensable to delineate three perspectives from which anxiety has been researched in alot of different areas. Many studies related to anxiety and language learning have beenmade by Maclntyre，RD & Gardner, R.C from three perspectives. They are trait anxiety,state anxiety as well as situation-specific anxiety.
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Chapter 3 Methodology .........16
3.1 Subjects .........16
3.2 Instruments......... 16
3.3 Procedure......... 18
3.4 Data Collection......... 18
Chapter 4 Results Analysis......... 20
4.1 Characteristics of FLCA among Art Major Freshmen......... 20
4.2 The Art Students' Anxiety on the Four Components of FLAC......... 21
4.3 Correlation Analysis between FLCA and Students' English Achievement......... 32
4.4 Differences in Anxiety between the Art Students......... 33
Chapter 5 Implications ......... 36
5.1 Main Findings of the Present Study .........36
5. 2 Pedagogical Implications ......... 37
Chapter 5 Implications
5.1 Main Findings of the Present Study
According to the investigation，the three research questions proposed in Chapter 1can be answered and the main findings of this study can be concluded in the following:Firstly，the present study shows that there exists high English learning anxiety amongart major freshmen. Of the four components, test anxiety is the highest, higher thancommunication apprehension, fear of negative evaluation, and general anxiety. Thoughthe general anxiety is the lowest one among these four components, the art students havestrongly negative attitude toward English class.Secondly, the anxiety-arousing sources found in this study are: lack of confidence,the pressure of test, the low self-esteem, the unsuitable teaching method, fast speedEnglish class, being randomly asked to answer questions，not preparing the English classin advance, the wrong assessment method and so on.Thirdly，there is statistically significant relationship between English classroomanxiety and English achievement. The Correlation is significant at the .001 level. At thesame time they have moderate negative correlation, which indicates that Englishclassroom anxiety has a negative impact on English achievement. The lower the learners'anxiety level is, the higher achievement they would tend to get. The result of the presentstudy is consistent with the statements of Aida (1994)，Ganschow and Sparks (1996)，ChenJie (1997)，Wang Xuemei (2004) and so on.
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Conclusion
This research aims to look into the overall condition of the art major freshmen'English learning anxiety in GXNU and further to find the anxiety-arousing sources inEnglish learning. It is conducted to probe into the relationship between English learninganxiety and the art students' English performance as well as differences between studentsmajoring in music and those majoring in fine arts in English learning anxiety.Quantitative and qualitative research approaches are used in the present research. Thisresearch turns out that the art major freshmen in GXNU do suffer from a high level ofEnglish learning anxiety, and there is significantly negative correlation between Englishlearning anxiety and English achievement(r=-.403). Among the four components, textanxiety is the main anxiety-arousing source. The author also finds that lack of confidence,the pressure of test，the low self-esteem, the unsuitable teaching method, fast speed ofEnglish class, being randomly asked to answer questions, not preparing for the Englishclass in advance, the wrong assessment method are the potential anxiety-arousing sources.In addition，there are no significant differences between students majoring in music andthose majoring in fine arts. That is to say，the differences in intelligence strength havelittle influence on English classroom anxiety.
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Reference (omitted)