Relationship between Anxiety, Attitude and Motivation of Tertiary Students in Learning English as a Second Language

The aim of this paper is to determine the relationship between anxiety, attitude and motivation of tertiary students in learning English as a second language with regards to discipline, gender and language proficiency. The respondents were 60 first year undergraduates students studying at the Faculty of Education in a local university in Malaysia. The data was collected using a questionnaire (adapted from Gardner and Smythe's AMTB survey) and semi structured interviews. Data obtained were analysed using SPSS software to determine the relationship between anxiety, attitude and motivation of tertiary students in learning English as a second language while the interviews conducted was transcribed and were used to triangulate the findings. The findings from this study indicated that there is a negative but significant relationship in learning English as a second language between the three main variables of discipline, gender and language proficiency among the tertiary students. Findings also revealed that Science major students have slightly higher positive attitude towards learning English than the Non-Science students but interestingly, low proficiency students have higher and significant relationship in attitude and motivation than high proficiency students.