Although it is believed and even proved that students’ anxiety in foreign language learning is usually negatively associated with their performance in this field, this paper presents that higher level of such anxiety correlates with higher level of motivation, which is linked to better achievement in classroom settings for second language (L2) learning. This study explores how a combination of learner-internal factors (anxiety and motivation) may have positive impact on the performance of a group of Chinese graduate students, based on a repeated two-way ANOVA of the data collected before and after a mock business negotiation in English. The results suggest that negative psychological factors may work positively in a result-oriented project, which may in turn alleviate negative emotions and facilitate L2 learning in the long run.
Keywords: Anxiety, Motivation, second language learning
