Foreign language anxiety and its effects on studets' determination to study English: to abandon or not to abandon?

Foreign language anxiety (FLA) has attracted much interest. However, little is known about whether FLA affects students’ determination to study a foreign language, which is believed to be an important initial condition for students to be able to learn the foreign language effectively. This study investigated anxious tertiary students’ experiences in learning English as a foreign language (EFL) in order to determine whether their anxiety affected their determination to study English. Participants were 49 non-English major students from a university in Vietnam who were identified as being anxious. Data were collected using autobiographies and interviews, and were analysed using a content analysis approach facilitated by NVivo. The findings indicate that awareness of the importance of English and volition were two important factors that influenced anxious students’ determination to study English. The study suggests that students’ awareness of the importance of English should be enhanced, and that their volitional strategies should be strengthened, in order to assist them in managing their anxiety effectively and thus to persist in EFL learning