With the focus of foreign language teaching research shifting from "how to teach" to "how to learn", the factors affecting students' English learning have attracted more and more attention. Relevant research shows that learners' emotional state is one of the biggest factors affecting the success or failure of second language learning. Among them, learners' anxiety and self-efficacy are two emotional factors that have great influence. From the late 1980s to the 1990s, scholars made some empirical studies on the important influence of anxiety on foreign language learning, and achieved some results.

It is generally believed that anxiety refers to the emotional state of tension and fear formed by individuals who are frustrated by the threat of failing to achieve their goals or overcoming obstacles, or enhancing their sense of failure and guilt.

Self-efficacy theory is a kind of motivation theory put forward by American psychologist Bandura (1977). Bandura believes that self-efficacy is people's judgment on whether they can effectively carry out a certain behavior, which can turn the result factors that affect behavior into antecedents, thus having an effect on behavior. When the sense of self-efficacy penetrates into the system of self-value, it forms the belief of self-efficacy, which affects how people think, perceive and activate actions. It plays an intermediary role between the individual's subsequent behavior and the source of influence, and has a significant role in promoting people's behavior and achievements.

Since 1980s, the theory of self-efficacy has been enriched and developed, and also supported by a large number of empirical studies. These studies have explored the relationship between self-efficacy and learning motivation and attribution, as well as the relationship between self-efficacy and academic performance from different angles and sides (Dong Qi, Zhou Yong, etc.). It shows that self-efficacy and attribution can regulate students' learning activities and are closely related to students' academic performance.

The research on the relationship among college students' foreign language anxiety, self-efficacy and foreign language achievement (Zhang Risheng, Yuan Limin, 2004) also shows that an important feature of excellent language learners is the ability to accept challenges. Students with high self-efficacy have a strong sense of competence, believe in their own abilities, think that their efforts can achieve their goals, persevere in the face of difficulties and challenges, and actively seek solutions; However, students with low self-efficacy doubt their ability and efforts and give up easily. Therefore, the individual's sense of self-efficacy directly determines how much effort he has made and how many challenges he has accepted in his study.

In addition, many studies at home and abroad show that intelligence plays an important role in academic performance, but non-intelligence factors (such as personality, locus of control and learning strategies) have a great influence on academic performance. ) also has different degrees of influence on academic performance. The interaction of learning motivation, intelligence and personality on academic performance (Huo et al., 2003) shows that non-intelligence factors play a role in learning through intermediate links. Some studies also show that locus of control is closely related to personality and anxiety (Sun Yu,1997); Those with excellent academic performance have high E and low N, while those with poor academic performance have high N and low E (Huo, Cai Yan, etc. , 1997).

After reviewing the relevant literature on self-efficacy, personality characteristics and foreign language learning anxiety, it is found that there are few studies on the relationship between self-efficacy and foreign language learning anxiety, and on the relationship between personality characteristics and foreign language learning. Therefore, this paper attempts to explore the differences of foreign language anxiety among [1] students of different grades and genders. [2] The relationship between learners' self-efficacy and foreign language learning anxiety. [3] The relationship between learners' personality characteristics and foreign language learning anxiety. [4] The relationship between learners' foreign language learning anxiety and foreign language achievement. In order to help language learners improve their language learning achievements.

Two methods

2. 1 subject

Two classes (60 boys and 68 girls) from Xuhai Middle School in Nanhai District of Foshan City, one or two classes (58 boys and 52 girls) from Guijiang No.1 Middle School in Nanhai District and one or two classes (5 1 boys and 59 girls) from Guicheng Middle School in Nanhai District were randomly selected. That is, 294 junior high school students and 2 18 senior high school students participated in the questionnaire survey. 492 valid questionnaires were collected, and the recovery rate reached 96%.

2.2 Research tools

2.2. 1 EPQ scale adopts Eysenck personality scale (abbreviated as EPQ-RA). The scale has 24 items, including four sub-scales: P, E, N and L. The P scale represents the spiritual dimension and reflects the stubbornness or antisocial tendency of the subjects. Those who score high on the P scale are usually described as stubborn, withdrawn, eccentric, lonely or impulsive, adventurous and disobedient. E scale reflects the introversion-extroversion tendency of personality, and people with high scores on E scale are described as extroversion, restlessness, flexibility and poor behavioral stability. N scale represents the neurotic dimension of personality, and people who score high on N scale are described as depression, tension, anxiety and emotional instability. The L Scale is a revised scale, and those with high scores are considered to be more susceptible to social expectations, so the honesty of the answer sheet is questioned.

2.2.2 Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety Scale adopts the Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety Scale (FLCAS) compiled by Horwitz E. K.( 1986), with 33 items in the form of Likert 5 scale, 1 means very inconsistent, and 5 means very consistent, and the higher the score. The data collected in this study were used in the survey scale, and the results showed that the Chronbachα coefficient was 0.83.

2.2.3 Self-efficacy Scale (GSES-R) This scale includes three sub-scales: hard work, enterprising and persistence. Item *** 12 of the scale is in the form of Likert 5 sub-scale, 1 means very inconsistent, and 5 means very consistent. The higher the score, the higher the self-efficacy of the subjects. The Chronbach α coefficients of the three subscales are 0.55, 0.74 and 0.72, respectively, indicating that the scale has good reliability. The correlation coefficient between each factor and the total table is 0.70 ~ 0.82, which is significantly higher than the correlation coefficient between each factor of 0.43 ~ 0.44, indicating that the scale has good internal structural validity.

2.3 measurement process

The researcher is the main test, and requires students to read the instructions carefully by means of group test, emphasizing that the questionnaire is anonymous and there is no right or wrong answer, and requires students to fill in according to the real situation and not to miss any item. Students can ask any questions about the questionnaire. Then complete the whole questionnaire according to your actual situation. At the end of the questionnaire, students are also required to fill in the English test scores at the end of last semester. It takes about10-15 minutes to complete all tasks.

2.4 data processing

After inputting the data of the questionnaire into the computer, statistical analysis was made by using the social science statistical software (SPSS 10.0).

Three results

3. 1 Difference Test of Foreign Language Learning Anxiety of Students of Different Grades and Sexes

Table 1 Analysis on the Difference of Foreign Language Learning Anxiety between Male and Female Students and Junior and Senior High School Students

Foreign language anxiety

M SD

Junior high school (n = 283) 88.21.17.96

Senior high school (n=209) 95.96 16.0 1

Male (n=236) 88.94 17.63

Female students (n=256) 94.88 16.82

Note: * *= p

Table 1 shows that there are significant differences in foreign language learning anxiety among different grades and sexes. Senior high school students' foreign language learning anxiety level is significantly higher than that of junior high school students (t =-3.29 p

3.2 Correlation Analysis of Middle School Students' Self-efficacy and Foreign Language Learning Anxiety

Table 2 Correlation between General Self-efficacy Scale and Foreign Language Anxiety Scale

Foreign Language Anxiety (Junior High School) Foreign Language Anxiety (Senior High School)

Efforts -.294** -.304**

Enterprise -.466** -.240*

Persistence -.724** -.5 13**

Note: * *= p

The results in Table 2 show that there is a significant negative correlation between foreign language learning anxiety and self-efficacy of junior and senior high school students. The higher the sense of self-efficacy, the lower the level of anxiety.

3.3 Correlation analysis between middle school students' personality characteristics and foreign language learning anxiety

Table 3 correlation between EPQ-ra and foreign language anxiety scale

Foreign Language Anxiety (Junior High School) Foreign Language Anxiety (Senior High School)

Outgoing -. 187 -.359**

Neuroticism. 425 * * 44 1 * *

Lying -.267** -. 108

Psychotropic substance.041.105

Note: * *= p

The results in Table 3 show that junior high school students' foreign language learning anxiety is positively correlated with neuroticism and negatively correlated with lying. Senior high school students' foreign language learning anxiety is positively correlated with neuroticism and negatively correlated with extraversion.

3.4 Correlation Analysis of Middle School Students' Foreign Language Learning Anxiety and Foreign Language Achievement

Table 4, Correlation between Foreign Language Anxiety and Foreign Language Achievement

Foreign language achievement

junior school

Foreign language anxiety -.273** -.368**

Note: * *= p

The results in Table 4 show that there is a significant negative correlation between foreign language achievement and foreign language learning anxiety, indicating that the higher students' foreign language learning anxiety, the worse their foreign language achievement.

discuss

4. 1 Differences in foreign language learning anxiety of different grades and genders

The results show that the level of foreign language learning anxiety of senior high school students is significantly higher than that of junior high school students, and that of girls is significantly higher than that of boys.

Bandura and others have shown through a lot of research that one of the most important sources of information for the formation of self-efficacy is the experience of past behavior success or failure. Because junior high school students' learning tasks are not heavy, the materials are simple, they can answer teachers' questions smoothly in class, finish their homework easily after class, and get good grades in exams, and most of them are successful experiences in past behavior experience, so they have a high sense of self-efficacy. Students at this stage have no pressure to go to school and are more likely to accept teachers' affinity. Compared with senior high school, senior high school students face the college entrance examination, with heavy learning tasks, complicated contents, higher requirements and deeper examination difficulties. It is difficult for them to show their advantages in the selected class groups at the same level, so their sense of self-efficacy is lower than that of junior high school. Therefore, in the face of the same foreign language learning task, junior high school students are more confident and show a higher sense of self-efficacy, and the degree of foreign language learning anxiety is naturally lower than that of senior high school students.

The results show that the level of foreign language learning anxiety of girls is significantly higher than that of boys, which is consistent with the research results of Shan Yaping (2002). Practice has proved that girls' anxiety level is higher than that of boys, which has the opposite effect on English performance. This may be related to girls' high emotional sensitivity, easy awareness of subtle changes in themselves and others, and strong and delicate inner experience. At the same time, they are vulnerable to hints and cowardice. This may also be related to their different learning characteristics, life concepts and ways of thinking. Girls need image thinking and emotional input more, while boys need abstract thinking and rational logical reasoning more, which leads to the different ways of thinking between boys and girls. Girls' imagination is richer and more emotional, so their foreign language anxiety level is higher.

4.2 Relationship between self-efficacy and foreign language learning anxiety

The results show that there is a significant negative correlation between middle school students' foreign language learning anxiety and self-efficacy, that is, the higher the anxiety level, the lower the self-efficacy. Bandura emphasizes the stimulating effect of self-efficacy. He pointed out that people's self-efficacy beliefs determine their motivation level, which is manifested in the amount of individual efforts and persistence in the face of difficulties. Generally speaking, students with high sense of self-efficacy are full of confidence in their learning ability and have high self-expectations. Therefore, in actual learning, they often study actively, dare to face up to problems and difficulties, overcome inappropriate behaviors through their own efforts, and adopt various methods to ensure the success of learning. On the other hand, students with low self-efficacy lack confidence in their learning behavior, which leads to uncontrollable psychology in their learning activities and learning results. Therefore, they often take a passive and coping way in the actual learning process, unwilling and unwilling to work hard, and give up and escape whenever they encounter problems and difficulties. In the long run, students with different self-efficacy will have different task-solving abilities, which will lead to different learning styles and different learning anxiety.

Self-efficacy is also an extremely important variable for students' self-monitoring in learning (Dong Qi, 1994). Students with high self-efficacy will have positive self-regulating reactions in the process of foreign language learning, such as changing the positioning standard of self-evaluation, improving review strategies, managing review tasks and time, and improving review efficiency. Therefore, they can effectively prevent learning anxiety and exam anxiety. On the other hand, students with low self-efficacy can't effectively monitor themselves in the process of learning a foreign language, so they tend to have negative emotions such as worry, fear, frustration and helplessness, doubt themselves and think that all their efforts are in vain, which leads to higher learning anxiety.

4.3 Relationship between personality characteristics and foreign language learning anxiety

Most research results at home and abroad prove that the role of non-intelligence factors exists. The academic performance of primary and secondary school students is significantly related to the emotional and directional characteristics of temperament. The academic performance of teenagers is positively related to E and negatively related to N, and the L- scale is obviously related to students' "performance in school". Students with excellent learning and conduct usually have higher L- scale scores. This result makes it more difficult to explain the L scale: students with excellent academic performance are more likely to obey the wishes of adults, behave naively and have poor autonomy.

Some people think that learners with high E and low N belong to the strong type with high neural activity or close to strong and flexible type; However, learners with high N and low E belong to the weak type with high neural activity, or the weak and inflexible type. In addition, some studies believe that the occurrence of test anxiety is related to students' personality, and introverted and emotionally unstable students are prone to test anxiety.

The results show that junior high school students' foreign language anxiety is positively correlated with nervousness and negatively correlated with lying. Senior high school students' foreign language anxiety is positively correlated with neuroticism and negatively correlated with extraversion. It shows that students who are introverted and emotionally unstable are more anxious about foreign language learning.

Extroverted personality characteristics, compared with introverted and emotionally unstable learners, extroverted learners are strong or close to strong and flexible in higher nervous activities, and have the personality characteristics of starting and finishing, so they can learn independently in foreign language learning and ensure that they can study actively and seriously without the supervision of teachers. Therefore, such students will have a more positive attitude towards foreign language learning, and have good interpersonal relationships, and it is easy to organize collective learning and exchange oral English with each other. Introverts belong to the type of weak or inflexible higher nervous activity, and are prone to inferiority and negative emotions. Therefore, when they encounter difficulties in foreign language learning, they are easily anxious because they can't cope for a while.

Under normal circumstances, junior high school students' evaluation of their behavior and attitude is more based on external standards, which may be teachers' praise or criticism, school rewards or punishments, and social recognition or stop. Excellent students are more obedient to the wishes of adults in order to get the recognition of teachers, parents and classmates, and lie because of their poor autonomy.

4.4 The relationship between foreign language learning anxiety and foreign language achievement

The results of this survey show that the foreign language achievement of middle school students is negatively correlated with foreign language anxiety, and the higher the foreign language anxiety, the worse the foreign language achievement, which is consistent with the relevant findings abroad (MacIntyre, 1997). Eysenck believes that cognitive activities caused by anxiety will always reduce the quality of task completion. Anxiety individuals focus on cognitive activities unrelated to tasks, such as fear of failure and excessive self-evaluation, which reduces the efficiency and quality of completing tasks. Therefore, students with high anxiety in foreign language learning are eager to improve their academic performance in a short time because of their strong learning motivation, and often overestimate the difficulty of learning materials and worry that they will not be able to successfully complete their learning tasks. Therefore, they are always in a state of "preparing for war", too nervous, and are prone to panic, helplessness, confusion and other adverse reactions when encountering problems. It has more negative effects on foreign language learning.

5 Teaching suggestions

To sum up, I put forward some suggestions for foreign language teaching:

(1) Teachers should be aware of the existence of foreign language anxiety in foreign language learning and its negative impact on foreign language performance, and try to help students reduce their anxiety, so that they can concentrate on learning foreign languages better and improve their performance.

(2) In foreign language teaching, teachers should take appropriate measures to stimulate students' interest in learning, give them more successful experiences, and improve students' self-confidence and self-efficacy, which is the key to alleviating students' learning anxiety and improving their English scores.

(3) Consciously cultivating students' good personality has a long-term impact on students' learning and their own development.

6 conclusion

(1) The foreign language anxiety level of senior high school students is significantly higher than that of junior high school students, and that of girls is significantly higher than that of boys.

(2) Foreign language anxiety is negatively correlated with self-efficacy.

(3) Foreign language anxiety is positively correlated with neuroticism, and negatively correlated with extraversion and lying.

(4) Foreign language anxiety is negatively correlated with foreign language achievement.

References:

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[2] Zhang Risheng, Yuan Limin. A study on the relationship among college students' foreign language anxiety, self-efficacy and foreign language achievement. Psychological development and education, 2004 (3): 56-6 1.

[3] Gao Ke, Sun Yu, Huo, etc. A preliminary study on locus of control, personality, anxiety and academic performance. Chinese mental health journal, 1997, 1 1 (5): 289-290.

[4] Zhou Yong, Dong Qi. Study on the Relationship between Learning Motivation, Attribution, Self-efficacy and Students' Self-monitoring Learning Behavior. Psychological development and education, 1994 (3): 30-34.

[6] Shen Yane. Enlightenment of Bandura's self-efficacy theory on "teaching students to learn to learn" Journal of Minjiang Vocational University, 2001(1):18-21.

[7] Wang Caikang. Test report of college students' foreign language anxiety scale. Psychological Science, 2003,26 (2): 281-284.

[8] Shan Yaping. Anxiety and its influence on second language learners. Journal of Xi University of Architecture and Technology (Social Science Edition), 2002,21(1).