The Effects of Situational and Contextual Variables on Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety: An Investigation of Pakistani Tertiary EFL Students’ Perceptions

Abstract

Foreign language anxiety is a type of anxiety that is specific to language learning process. Anxiety can not only impact the language students’ negatively but it can also enforce them to give up their studied (Horwitz, 2017; Malik et al., 2020; Milan, 2019). In Pakistan, there is a lack of research in the field of language anxiety and the majority of language teachers and students are not fully cognizant of its existence and effects on language learning (Samad, 2014). Most of the previous studies have investigated anxiety from classroom perspective and there is a lack of studies exploring anxiety from outside of the classroom perspective (Marwan, 2017). Therefore, this study is an attempt to understand language learning anxiety by investigating it in relation to various contextual variables to contribute to the existing body of knowledge. This study explored 100 BS English students’ language anxiety at University of Baluchistan. It aimed to investigate Pakistani tertiary EFL students’ perceptions when speaking English in class and outside of class. The study employed both quantitative (questionnaire) and qualitative (semi-structured interview) tools to collects data. The findings clearly suggested that students experience more anxiety when speaking English in class than speaking English outside of class. The study suggests that a friendly and supportive teacher, gentle error correction, relaxed and social classroom environment and incorporation of activities that don’t require students to be singled out may alleviate students’ anxiety.