The Relationships between Social Class, Listening Test Anxiety and Test Scores

Omid Talebi Rezaabadi

Abstract


This study investigated the relationships between the social anxiety, social class and listening-test anxiety of students learning English as a foreign language. The aims of the study were to examine the relationship between listening-test anxiety and listening-test performance. The data were collected using an adapted Foreign Language Listening Anxiety Scale and a newly developed Foreign Language Social Anxiety Scale. The potential correlation between social anxiety and listening-test performance was investigated by the correlation coefficient rxy. A moderate positive correlation was found between students’ social class and social anxiety. The results suggest that pedagogical methods suggested to lessen this anxiety were effective. There was also a clear relationship between social anxiety, listening-test anxiety and listening performance. This exploratory research has several pedagogical implications.

Keywords: anxiety, Foreign language (FL) learning, listening, sociolinguistics, Social class


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