Investigating English Language Classroom Anxiety and Its Relation to the Achievement of Iraqi Upper Secondary School Students

Abstract

As shown over the recent studies, English language classroom anxiety plays a critical role in acquiring a second or foreign language in the context of non-native speakers. Thus, this study aims to investigate the classroom anxiety of English language among Iraqi upper secondary school students in relation to their gender and academic achievement. FLCAS developed by (Horwitz et al, 1986) was administered to the participants of the study to collect the needed data. A total of (260) students were chosen randomly from six secondary schools at the Al-Karakh side of Baghdad city. SPSS software version (20) was run to analyze the collected data. The findings revealed no statistically significant difference was found between male and female students in experiencing anxiety in EFL class at the level of (0.05): There is a significant difference between low and high proficient students in experiencing anxiety in EFL class. Moreover, the findings shown there is a negative correlation (r= -.357) between the achievement of students and the foreign language classroom anxiety.