Motivation, emotion, learning experience and second language comprehensibility development in classroom settings: a cross-sectional and longitudinal study

This study presents a cross-sectional and longitudinal analysis of how 108 high school students in English-as-a-Foreign-Language (EFL) classrooms enhanced the comprehensibility of their second language (L2) speech according to different motivation, emotion and experience profiles. Overall, the students’ learning patterns were primarily associated with their emotional states (anxiety vs. enjoyment), and secondarily with their motivational dispositions (clear vision of ideal future selves). The students’ anxiety (together with weaker Ideal L2 Self) negatively related to their performance at the beginning of the project which they had achieved after several years of EFL instruction. Their enjoyment (together with greater Ideal L2 Self) predicted the extent to which they practiced and developed their L2 speech within the time framework of the project—three months. The results suggest that more regular/frequent L2 use with positive emotions directly impacts acquisition, which may in turn lead to the lessening of negative emotions and better L2 proficiency in the long run