New Insights into Language Anxiety

Christina Gkonou is Lecturer in TESOL and MA TESOL Programme Director in the Department of Language and Linguistics at the University of Essex, UK. Her research interests include language anxiety and emotions, and teacher education.Mark Daubney is Adjunct Professor in the Department of Languages and Literatures at the School of Education and Social Sciences-Polytechnic Institute of Leiria, Portugal. His research interests are teacher education, and affective factors - especially anxiety and motivation - in classroom interaction.Jean-Marc Dewaele is Professor in the Department of Applied Linguistics and Communication, Birkbeck, University of London, UK. His research interests include individual differences in multilingualism and emotion and he is President of the International Association of Multilingualism.

Much of the current research in SLA and the neurosciences points to the strong influence of affective factors, such as anxiety, on the process of language learning. With chapters from important experts in the field, this book makes a valuable contribution to understanding the research and theoretical proposals regarding anxiety and also makes useful suggestions for reducing its influence in the classroom.

• 1. Mark Daubney, Jean-Marc Dewaele and Christina Gkonou: IntroductionPart 1: Theoretical Insights2. Peter D. Macintyre: An Overview of Language Anxiety Research and Trends in Its Development3. Elaine Horwitz: On the Misreading Of Horwitz, Horwitz, and Cope (1986) and the Need to Balance Anxiety Research and the Experiences of Anxious Language LearnersPart 2: Empirical Investigations 4. Erdi Şimşek and Zoltán Dörnyei: Anxiety and L2 Self-Images: The ‘Anxious Self’5. Jean-Marc Dewaele: Are Perfectionists More Anxious Foreign Language Learners and Users?6. Jim King and Lesley Smith: Social Anxiety and Silence in Japan’s Tertiary Foreign Language Classrooms7. Tammy Gregersen, Peter D. Macintyre and Tucker Olson: Do You See What I Feel? An Idiodynamic Assessment of Expert and Peer’s Reading of Nonverbal Language Anxiety Cues8. Christina Gkonou: Towards an Ecological Understanding of Language Anxiety9. Zsuzsa Tóth: Exploring the Relationship between Anxiety and Advanced Hungarian EFL Learners’ Communication Experiences in the Target Language: A Study of High- Vs. Low-Anxious LearnersPart 3: Implications for Practice10. Rebecca L. Oxford: Anxious Language Learners Can Change Their Minds: Ideas and Strategies from Traditional Psychology and Positive Psychology11. Fernando D. Rubio-Alcalá: The Links between Self-Esteem and Language Anxiety and Implications for the Classroom12. Christina Gkonou, Jean-Marc Dewaele and Mark Daubney: Conclusion