Teacher supporting a nervous ESL student overcoming foreign language anxiety

Foreign Language Anxiety: 7 Essential Fixes

Foreign language anxiety is the specific fear and physical tension students feel when asked to understand or produce a second language, separate from general shyness or public-speaking nerves. Researchers Horwitz, Horwitz, and Cope identified it in 1986 as its own category of anxiety, built from three parts: communication apprehension, test anxiety, and fear of negative…