NEGATIVE IMPACTS OF AFFECTIVE FACTORS ON LANGUAGE LEARNERS AND IMPLICATIONS FOR IMPROVEMENT

Abstract

Through a survey using questionnaires given to 36 teachers and 67 students of Chinese in Taiwan, we investigate the impacts of affective factors on language learners. The survey result shows that affective factors exert negative impacts on learners at different levels; speaking and writing are much more affected than listening and reading; Oriental students are much more affected than Western ones; and teachers play an important role in reducing the negative impacts of these factors. Also, the right learning purposes, the reduction in pressure from examinations, friendly learning environment, fair learning competitiveness, etc., will help protect leaners from the negative impacts of affective factors, and subsequently improve the quality and effectiveness of foreign language teaching and learning.