Topics in Psychology: Analyzing Anxiety in Language Learning Context

This essay delves into the psychology of language learning and teaching, focusing on the construct of anxiety and its influence. It begins by defining anxiety and its characteristics, highlighting the cognitive, psychodynamic, physical, and behavioral constructs associated with it. The essay explores how anxiety affects adult learners, impacting their cognitive abilities, memory, and overall learning process. It further discusses the relationship between anxiety and language learning, noting that high anxiety levels can obstruct information processing and retrieval, leading to test anxiety and impaired concentration. The essay also suggests classroom activities, such as games, fun activities, translation exercises, role-playing, and talk show interviews, to address anxiety in language learning environments. It emphasizes the importance of creating a relaxed and fun-filled environment where students can practice new words and express themselves freely. The essay concludes by underscoring the need for educators to understand and address anxiety to promote effective language learning.

Topics in the psychology of
language learning and teaching

Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................1
PART 1............................................................................................................................................1
Construct of anxiety.....................................................................................................................1
Influence of construct of anxiety on language learning or teaching............................................2
PART 2............................................................................................................................................4
CONCLUSION ...............................................................................................................................7
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................8

INTRODUCTION
Anxiety is an emotion which is characterized by intense feelings of worrying, increase in
blood pressure and other psychological changes. Individuals suffering from anxiety often suffer
from recurring concerns and intrusive thoughts because of which anxiety related issues develop.
Some of the signs of anxiety includes sensing impending danger, panic, profuse sweating,
trembling and even hyperventilation (Sudina & Plonsky, 2021). The construct of anxiety enables
researchers to hypothetically develop a tool to understand human behaviours towards anxiety
related issues. This report highlights relevant research findings and the complexity about
construct of anxiety in context to psychological concept in learning. The discussion also revolves
around how the social construct of anxiety influences language learning and teaching in students.
MAIN BODY
PART 1
Construct of anxiety
The theories of cognitive behaviours suggest that anxiety disorders are characterized by
negative self evaluation and its associated behaviours. Anxiety construct helps cognitive
psychologists to evaluate certain behaviours of an individual. These behaviours describe the
similarities between health and anxiety related disorders. Some constructs of anxiety include
sensitivity towards anxiety, uncertainty intolerance and regulation of emotions. Construct is
defined as a skill or an attribute which is analysed on the basis of established theories. Some of
the examples of construct are intelligence, fear and motivation. There are three types of
psychological constructs- cognitive, psychodynamic, physical and behavioural. The process of
learning is highly based on cognitive construct of psychology (Russell, 2020). Cognitive learning
is an active way through which enables effective application of the brain. This ensures that the
brain is used at its full potential. Language learning often linked with anxiety as a psychological
construct. According to psychologists, learning is defined as a permanent change in behaviour as
it leads to development of cognitive skills in an individual. Therefore, during the process of
learning, a learner is bound to faced certain challenges which can be connected to psychological
illnesses or other observable behaviours. The construct or behaviours exhibited by individuals
are assessed by psychologists to ensure smooth functioning of learning processes. The
characteristics of anxiety in learning and teaching contexts is somewhat similar to the signs and
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symptoms of anxiety. Each and every adult learner has a different way of dealing with anxiety
which depends on their thoughts, ideas and cultural beliefs. It is crucial for educators to deal with
the complex cycle of anxiety while working with adult learners as poor learning can lead to
inappropriate outcomes and struggles. Development of teaching processes according to the
different characteristics of anxiety experienced by learners promotes smooth learning. Anxiety
causes undesirable imbalance in the normal functioning of body and mind. Thereby, influencing
social and personal aspects of lives in individuals. The bodily sensations of anxiety are followed
by by palpitations of the heart, dryness of mouth, dreaded look and chest pain. These symptoms
lead to inhibited actions of learning such as improper physiological and biochemical functioning
(Benson & Tippets, 2018). There is also a high chance that an adult learner might suffer from
immediate cognitive effects such as excessive worrying, nervousness and a tensed state of mind.
According to a research conducted by a group of psychologist, it was reported that the
behavioural aspect of anxiety is greatly linked to reduced memory span, impairment of attention
and also incapability followed by malperformance in learning. The physiological dimension of
anxiety involves hyperactivity of sympathetic nervous system and shallow depth processing.
Influence of construct of anxiety on language learning or teaching
The relationship of humans with anxiety is has been well researched. However, severe
conditions of anxiety is considered a disability as they can obstruct learning, teaching and
retrieval of information. High levels of anxiety can cause difficulty in concentrating and
following information. The over-taxing of cognitive abilities during does not cause information
processing. This causes lack of concentration and the ability to grasp concepts is lost. Learners
suffering from anxiety are often experience trouble accessing information for longer periods of
time as a result of which a learner can develop 'test anxiety'. The onset of anxiety is often linked
to being uncomfortable which impairs the ability to concentrate during learning or teaching. The
behaviours associated with anxiety can generate sense of isolation which can further dampen the
educational and learning aspect (Haase, Guimarães & Wood, 2019). Evidence shows that there
are tangible effects of anxiety on working memory as learners have a hard time collecting
information. Presence of anxiety in body and mind leads often overrides cognitive ability leading
to impairment. The majority of mental capacity is navigated towards processing thoughts which
makes it difficult for learners to concentrate on positive aspects of situations. Prolonged stress
levels can initiate the onset of depression and affect daily emotions. Alternations are made in the
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brain due to depression cause potential cognitive changes which impair learning and memory by
lowering the processing speed of the brain. One major predictors of academic performances is
anxiety as due to prevalence of this disorder learners often exhibit lack of interest in learning.
This results in poor performances in exams and assignments, negatively impacting the trajectory
of their career path. Attention and memory ability is impaired along with alteration in decision
making skills hampering information processing. Executive functioning along with the cognitive
flexibility are affected causing cognitive dysfunction (Chen, Koong & Liao, 2022). Persistent
anxiety takes a toll on the mental health of learners, this causes remembering only negative
incidences and ability to retain information is hampered. Some of the risk factors that can lead to
development of anxiety in young and adult learners includes family history, trauma, build-up of
stress, presence of chronic illnesses, substance abuse or alcohol consumption. Feelings of anxiety
and panic interfere with the daily activities as simple as learning. Repeated and sudden episodes
of anxiety can lead to development of panic disorder which is characterized by feelings of doom
and pounding of the heart. This inability to concentrate interfere with the cognitive action of the
brain and causes problems with social functioning (Abdous, 2019).
Anxiety is a condition which provoke very persistent and strong feelings of fear and
worry, frequently regarding situations and things that can not be controlled or changed. With
anxiety people might find themselves stuck in a cycle of worry and nervousness and not be able
to prevent mentally running via dreaded effective results. This loop of anxiety can absorb a huge
amount of mental and physical energy. A large numbers of human being found that this anxiety
state of near constant hyper vigilance and stress take a damage on their memory. Usually,
anxiety show negative impacts on the memory (Abdullaev, 2021). Therefore, human beings
might have face difficulty in memorising things such as:
 Directions to a house of friends.
 Instructions of learning and teaching task.
 Conversation person had with others.
 A play date of child.
 Information in the chapter of textbook, they studied.
This type of memory losing condition due to anxiety can be treated by memory booster games
and various activities which help to increase the brain function and memory.
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By playing these games people would not only exercise their brain, so to speak (Borg, 2019).
They can also make a huge distance from anxious thoughts. Memory can also enhanced through
doing various things like:
selecting up an old or new instrument of music and refreshing their teaching and learning skills.
 Memory can also be booted up through learning a new languages.
 Through teaching a new skills such as water colour painting, knitting, and different
fundamental home repair people can boost up their memory.
Anxiety can also lead the stress, mood swing, feeling of farness, depression and many more
physical and mental disorder. Physical activity can help the people to enhance or improve the
mood and ease depression and anxiety symptoms and also assist to boost up the overall health of
brain. Anxiety may have various effects on the efficiency of performance that is the quality of
performance and on effectiveness processing that is efficiency or efforts of performance.
Processing effectiveness will always reduced by the anxiety, but it will not impair the efficiency
of performance if there there is proper expenditure effort (Choudhury, & Pattnaik, 2020).
Accordingly, dependency on standard of performance efficiency will frequently unknown or
unclear the harmful effects of anxiety on ongoing effectiveness. Some of the anxious individuals
may enhance efforts to manage for the enhanced cognitive demands, directing to best outcomes
in learning and teaching fields. Anxiety can also interact with task demands and linguistic
capability in determining performance of l2 learners and the correlation frequently becomes
negative when tasks of language are complicated. A maximum numbers of time anxiety plays an
adaptive character, high anxiety that is out of proportionate to the like-hood or real presence of
issue can results suffering and distress to people with disorder as clinical anxiety (Lee, 2022).
PART 2
Language learning is a very hard work procedure. Effort or practice is needed at every
single moment and must be carry on over a very huge period of time. There are different types
of classroom activities which can assist the language teachers and they can use and can enable
the language practice and use. These activities can also address the construct of anxiety. In this
essay five classroom activities which language teacher can use are following:Fun activities,
Games activities, Translation activities, Next level role playing activities, The talk show
interview activities (Maqableh, & Alia, 2021). Using games activities in the language
classroom: Games, it support the language teacher to make the contents in which the language is
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meaningful and useful. The learners and students desire to participate and in order to do like
must acknowledge what others have written or are saying, and they must write or speak in order
to display or reflect their own view point or provide information. The requirement to
meaningfulness in learning of language has been adopted to some years. A practical explanation
of the meaningfulness is that the students or learners show response to the context in a fixed way.
If they are angered, surprised, or intrigued the context is well clearly meaningful to them.
Therefore, the actual meaning of the content and language they read, write, listen to and speak
will be very distinctly experienced and so, better remembered (Mercer, & Kostoulas, (Eds.).
2018). Gamification is a very popular learning strategies which does not emerge to be widely
accepted or explored in higher education. In the gaming activities, there are some question
gauging learners behavioural and emotional engagement while playing the games, some question
gauging test anxiety and some question regarding student point of view of gamified activity and
their performance and confidence in the class. Learning of languages is a very hard task through
which sometimes learners can be frustrated. Therefore, by the help of games, learners can do
constant effort which is needed to produce, manipulate and understand the aimed language.
Games are highly inspiring because they are interesting and entertaining (Pawlak, Kruk, &
Zawodniak, 2022). Therefore they can be utilised to practice various kinds of communication
and used to provide practices in every language skills. Using fun activities in the language
class room: learners can be benefited through the fun activity. By using the fun activity,
language teachers can be offer a relaxed and fun filled environment at where language teacher
and student can practice through utilising the new words and always free to reflects themselves.
Take part in recreational fun activities is an potential approach for developing communication
and language skills. It also assists the children to be socially more confident and a approach to
build up appropriate communication skills (Taguchi, (Ed.). 2019). There are some of the
examples of classroom fun activities and fun games which combine fun with the language
learning. Words games: By utilising the words game as classroom activities vocabulary of
children can be enhanced by the language teacher. Jokes: telling age proper lines will also assist
to enhance humour, creative language skills and other creativity in young children. This fun
activity can also encourages imagination and word power. Riddles: These are ways of fun to use
paint pictures and word of situations and scenes. Rhymes: The again and again reading, hearing
chanting and writing of any rhymes enhances the well listening skills and power of memory
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retention also assist the learners to develop good speech. Songs: This type of fun activities can
also be used by the language teacher to helps the learners because songs can assist the children to
learn the new words. Lyrics of the songs have a sense of rhythm and rhyme therefore, it will be
beneficial to learners to develop their language sense (Tennant, 2019). Tongue twisters: This
types of activities provides an appropriate or excellent fun way to teach learners correct
enunciation and pronunciation of words. By using these fun activities construct of anxiety can be
eliminated or reduce the chance of anxiety because these activities can boost up the moods and
environment of the learners. Some fun activities are use to determine the behaviour and mood of
the learners and assist to addressing the construct of anxiety and also assist to decrease the level
of anxiety. Using translation activities in language classroom: By using these activities in the
classroom to manage the skills of learners, teachers can develop the proper language skills,
pronunciation skills and enhance the vocabulary strength of children's. Translation is the
essential parts of the any language classroom because it assist to enhance the understanding and
skills of learners. The modern translation activities generally have a clear communicative
objectives and actual depth, represent very high inspiration levels and can generate very
impressive communication outcomes. These activities teaches learners about language, but not
how to express or use it. Translations inspire the learners to use language appropriately for long
periods of the class times. Since translation is the complex skill therefore, it can be frustrating
therefore, it must be done appropriately for generating rewards and productivity. Through this
activities teachers can assist the learners to improve language style and idioms and phrases in the
languages (Umida, Zarina, & Shahram, 2020). These activities can enhance the the accuracy
flexibilities and clarity of the languages. Through, these activities teachers train the student to
use most of the appropriate or precise words to transfer the appropriate meanings of their
feelings and words. Translation can also assist the learners to argue the meaning and utilisation
of the language at the deepest probable levels. Translation is the natural and actual activities to
express their construct of anxiety and also develop the skills in persons to understand the
symptoms of anxiety of another persons. Since the high level of construct of language anxiety
are related with the low levels of the classroom achievement in various languages learning.
Apart from this, students with more anxiety have the avidity to ignore interpersonal
communication more frequently than learners who is less anxious. Using next level role play
activities: in the classroom role playing is a crucial communicative activity. It allows the
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learners to practice the aimed language in a appropriate environment where the mistakes and
errors are not a big deal. They will achieve a feel to what it is like flourishing the the language in
various contexts and situations. It is the difference between discussing regarding a hammer, how
to hold it , the various parts and utilisations and the learners actually swinging that hammer in all
direction, aiming to the nail or pounding the walls. In this activities teachers assign scene to the
student pairs, these scenes can be based on any things but ensure that it is appropriate to the
learners. The scenes are basically dependence on the selected or interest field of language. The
complexion of the dialogues will totally depends on whether the students are advanced learners
or beginners. With the advanced learners, teachers can just assign the task or scene for the
students situation or roles and them have to perform that activities (Walsh, Owen, Mustafa, &
Beech, 2020). These activities can assist the students to understand the languages and also
support the learners to reflects their feeling in-front of others. A student who is suffering from
the fear of anxiety they face lots of problem to express their roles in better way as compare to the
less anxious students. Using the talk show interview activities: In this activities, a live show
interview is conducted by the language teacher in the class room, through which learners will
experiences the way of talking or way of representing languages and what it is like being the
main host of the interview or talk show or being the guest to answering the various question in
front of audience. This types of activities can boost up the confidence of the students to represent
their feelings in front of another persons or group. The host learner should have to prepare the
questions and also have to writes all the answer on a piece of papers. Another student should
have to answers those question in front of the audience. Which support the student to build up
their confidence na also polishing their communication styles. An anxious student can not be
answering those question and they get fear to face audience where as less anxious students can
face more precisely than the anxious students (Abdullaev, 2021).
CONCLUSION
According to the above discussion, it is concluded that Anxiety is a situation which
enhance very persistent and strong feelings of depression and worry, frequently regarding
conditions and things that can not be controlled or changed. There are several types of
classrooms activities which can be utilise by the language teachers to enhance the language skills
of the students. These activities also assist to address the another construct of psychology. In this
topic construct of anxiety and how it associates with another construct has been discussed.
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