The Impact of Writing Anxiety on Performance

Running head: FINAL CRITICAL REVIEW 1
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FINAL CRITICAL REVIEW 2
Introduction
Writers in institutions of higher learning are subjected to many different factors that can
affect their learning. These factors can be either psychological, cognitive problems or linguistic
problems. The following are the analysis of findings based on subjective elements based on the
graduates’ internal variables such as writing anxiety, emotional intelligence, and self-efficacy.
Summary
Some studies argue that writing anxiety is necessarily the cause of graduates’ poor
performance in writing. The researchers attribute writing anxiety as the leading cause of a
writer’s block that is experienced by students during the process of writing. A writer's block is
whereby a student is unable to proceed with his or her writing because they cannot come up with
an idea of what they are writing next; their ability to be creative diminishes at that particular
moment and therefore subjected to a state of blankness. However, studies show that a writer’s
block can be caused by other significant factors such as exhaustion from studies, perfectionism,
high standards set by the institution of higher learning, and lack of a starting structure.
Margarita, Patricia, Mina, and Dominique argue that a good predictor of academic
performance is the emotional intelligence which also plays a part in the student’s general,
successful performance. A learner’s performance is significantly improved with the development
of competency through emotional intelligence. A study found that psychological intelligence
results in improved decision making, increased motivation and better planning which thus
reflects in a positive performance in writing but have provided no analytical evidence and the
studies done to link emotional intelligence and performance mainly focused on jobs and not
return.

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Additionally, since activities are self-scheduled, self-efficacy becomes essential for
academic writing. These writers attribute higher self-efficacy to higher writing achievement in
the secondary and university students in the United States of America. The writers have the view
that self-efficacy is a psychological factor that depends on the individuals level of confidence
and has a direct influence on the learners writing performance.
The writers of ‘Graduate students as academic writers: writing anxiety, self-efficacy, and
emotional intelligence’ conclude that there is a relationship between two of the psychological
factors affecting writing performance which are writing anxiety and self-efficacy in learning
institutions. The findings are based on studies carried on young students and at the university
concluded that lower writing anxiety in students reflected them to have a higher self-efficacy
score. Writing improvement is achieved when students foster self-efficacy which then reduces
the level of writing anxiety in learners. No research links El to writing anxiety, however, high El
reports low writing anxiety. The researchers base these findings on the view that, tension is an
emotion and utilization and regulation of emotions is done by the El.
Evaluation
Researchers argue that gender and writing anxiety have a particular relationship but have
provided no concrete evidence for this study. The latter depends on accuracy, self-expression,
high dependence on self-organization, confidence, use of complex grammatical, and flow of
ideas. In gender aspect, researchers concluded that the textual organization and paragraphing
between boys and girls are different (Daud and Kassim, 2016). Boys are acknowledged to have a
more competent textual structure and paragraphing compared to girls who are said to be less