Language anxiety mediates the link between Agreeableness and self-perceived foreign language skills

Abstract

The influence of personality, though overt in the mother tongue, may not be easily detected in foreign language (FL) learning, due to the change of language obscuring the clarity of universally observable influences. Hence, the research on the relationship of the personality trait of Agreeableness with FL attainment has not rendered reliable results. Consequently, the main aim of this research was to expose the role of Agreeableness in shaping self-perceived FL skills, considering the explanatory role of language anxiety. The participants were 590 secondary grammar school students (383 females and 207 males). The results of the mediation analysis revealed that the significant positive relationship between Agreeableness and self-perceived levels of FL skills is cancelled by the mediation of language anxiety. It follows that high levels of this negative emotion may destroy the agreeable learner’s estimation of their FL abilities by drawing their attention away from the importance of positive social contacts with peers and teachers, fuelled by the social character of the FL learning process. Thus, the influence of the characteristics embedded in Agreeableness, such as getting along with others in a group, lose their importance when language anxiety, ubiquitous in the FL process, comes into play.