Background

The concept of“foreign language enjoyment”has been inspired by the recent development in psychology，positive psychology in particular.Researchers interested in positive psychology seek to move away from past unpleasant and negative experience，such as depression，stress and discrimination，and focus on more positive emotions(Lake，2013).Fredrickson’s Broaden-and-Build Theory(Fredrickson，2001)distinguishes between positive emotions and negative emotions.According to this theory，negative emotions are linked to specific behavioural tendencies，an example being that fear spurs behaviours of self-protection;on the other hand，positive emotions result in different human reactions，and certain positive emotions，such as joy，being interested，satisfaction，pride and love，etc.，all enhance individuals’ability to think and act，though these emotions appear to be different from one another.Positive emotions encourage exploration，from which new experiences are gained and more effective ways of learning are developed.This aspect is captured in the“broaden”part of the theory.Because of their social attributes，positive emotions are closely linked with“build”—humans are easily“infected”with positive emotions，which help with building social bonds，and therefore people gain social capital from such social bonds.

The development of positive psychology encourages researchers to keep thinking about the effect of positive emotions in learners’foreign language development(Lake，2013).MacIntyre and Gregersen(2012b)believe that positive emotions and negative emotions are not the two extremes of the same issue，nor are they opposite to each other;on the contrary，they are two entirely separate types of experience.Positive emotions are different from negative emotions in essence.Learners’imagination is with the function of expanding positivity，similar to the function of positive emotions in the Broaden-and-Build Theory，which effectively improve health and wellbeing.However，a learner with imagination does not mean that she/he is free from anxiety.

Dewaele and MacInyre(2014)use the word“enjoyment”for a positive emotion opposite to anxiety.To them，enjoyment，first of all，comes from Csikszentmihalyi’s(1990)concept of“flow”(a highly focused mental state conducive to productivity)，which is a positive state of mind.In this state of mind，individuals are able to take up challenges;and secondly，enjoyment indicates a need to have psychological satisfaction.Such satisfaction comes from anticipation of completing a task，so that a person with this type of satisfaction is able to concentrate on the tasks with a clear objective in mind and seek prompt feedback.Language learners derive enjoyment from daily activities of language learning and use，which is manifested in developing conducive interpersonal relationships and progressing towards set objectives of learning.In the initial stage of language learning，learners may experience anxiety due to the fact that requirements in learning a foreign language are beyond their current proficiency in the target language.However，as their language proficiency improves and they are able to meet the requirements of language learning，enjoyment arises.On the other hand，if learners’proficiency is well beyond the level at which the language class operates，they will feel bored sitting in such a class.Therefore，it is important for a teacher to have his/her fingers on students’pulse and find out if they are enjoying the course and learning activities，whether they are feeling anxious or experiencing any other emotion.

Dewaele and his colleagues(Dewaele，2015;Dewaele and Alfawzan，2018;Dewaele and MacIntyre，2014;Dewaele and MacIntyre，2016;Dewaele et al.，2017)are among researchers who have looked at foreign language enjoyment.In recent years，they have worked on the relationship between foreign language enjoyment and foreign language anxiety，the impact of sources of foreign language anxiety，student and teacher variables(including age，gender，nationality，EQ，length in the workforce，foreign language proficiency，etc.)on foreign language enjoyment and foreign language anxiety，and the interrelationship between enjoyment and anxiety and learners’language development.

Since the time when the concept of foreign language enjoyment was first proposed，its relationship with foreign language anxiety has become a focus of research interest.Research has found that there is a weak negative correlation between foreign language enjoyment and foreign language anxiety，but their sources are different and they are two independent emotions rather than two sides of the same coin(Jiang and Dewaele，2019;Li，Dewaele，and Jiang，2019).Learners with high levels of foreign language enjoyment do not necessarily have low levels of foreign language anxiety，and learners with high levels of foreign language anxiety do not necessarily have low levels of foreign language enjoyment(Dewaele and MacIntyre，2014;Dewaele et al.，2017).Nevertheless，it appears more important and meaningful to study the proportion of both emotions，i.e.enjoyment and anxiety，among learners than studying only one of them，because the interaction between them may play an important role in shaping learner behaviours.More specifically，it has been found that enjoyment and anxiety jointly impact on language learning，that is，the emotion of enjoyment encourages learners to explore in language learning and the emotion of anxiety promotes learners to focus on problem solving;as learners progress in their language learning，their foreign language enjoyment will gradually dominate over their foreign language anxiety(Dewaele and MacIntyre，2014).The implication of such a finding for foreign language teaching is that a reduction of negative emotions does not necessarily come with an increase in positive emotions.It is worth noting that the teacher and the classroom environment have a much greater impact on foreign language enjoyment than on foreign language anxiety.Therefore，it is more conducive to students’development of the target language for the teacher to encourage students’enthusiasm for language learning than to try to reduce their anxiety.When positive atmosphere of a classroom has been established，students will engage in learning with any negative emotions they may have shaken off(Dewaele et al.，2017).

Foreign language emotion scales are a tool in researching foreign language emotions.Dewaele and MacIntyre(2014)have developed a scale comprising of foreign language enjoyment and foreign language anxiety.This scale includes 29 questions，with 21 questions measuring foreign language enjoyment adapted from the interest/enjoyment scale(seven questions)developed by Ryan et al.(1990)，which test emotions of enjoyment，joyfulness，interest and boredom.In addition，the other 14 questions are related to making errors in public，identity，improvement in using the target language，pride brought by progress made，relationship among group members，social environment，attitude toward foreign language learning，attitude toward being laughed at，and adaptability to peers and teachers.The foreign language anxiety scale incorporates eight questions taken from the foreign language anxiety scale developed by Horwitz et al.(1986).These eight questions test anxiety-related psychological manifestation，stress and lack of confidence.The internal consistency of the 21 questions on the foreign language enjoyment scale is high(0.86)and so is the internal consistency among the eight questions in the foreign language anxiety(0.86).Dewaele and MacIntyre(2016)and Li et al.(2018)have conducted analyses of properties contained in this scale in order to further explore what constitute foreign language enjoyment.Dewaele and MacIntyre(2016)have found that foreign language enjoyment consists of two types，i.e.social factors and individual factors;while Li et al.(2018)believe that foreign language enjoyment is of three aspects，i.e.teacher factors of the enjoyment，individual factors of the enjoyment and environmental factors of the enjoyment.A closer look at their studies reveals that the samples in these two studies are different:Dewaele and MacIntyre(2016)surveyed foreign language learners from various countries around the world，whereas Li et al.(2018)looked at high school students in one country(China)who were learning English.Both these studies have shown that foreign language enjoyment is the result of multiple factors，including individual factors and external factors，acting together to create enjoyable experience for the learner.These research findings confirm Csikszentmihalyi’s contention that positive emotions mostly come from two aspects of daily life，i.e.interpersonal relationships and progression toward set goals(Csikszentmihalyi，1990).

The relationship between foreign language enjoyment and other factors in foreign language learning，such as the learner’s gender，social and classroom environments，study skills and language achievement，is also a focus of research.Dewaele et al.(2016)find that female learners experience noticeably higher levels of foreign language enjoyment than male learners，and females are more interested in language learning and feel prouder for their foreign language skills;however，female learners’levels of anxiety are also considerably higher than those of male learners，and they are more worried about making errors and less confident in language use than male learners.Overall，female learners experience more emotions in language learning，and such experience is also an impetus pushing language learning forward(MacIntyre，2007).These findings support Fredrickson’s Broaden-and-Build Theory(Fredrickson 2001)，which encourages studies of both positive and negative emotions in the process of learning a second language.De Smet et al.(2018)conducted an investigation into how enjoyment and anxiety had developed among 896 primary and secondary school students in learning a second language，with an aim to compare the impact of educational environment and the target language on students’foreign language emotions.Their results indicated that historic and political backgrounds(the Dutch language is not popular in Belgium where French is spoken)and the classroom environment had a great impact on learners:learners of English experienced greater enjoyment and less anxiety than learners of Dutch;children in task-based classrooms had noticeably lower levels of anxiety than their counterparts in non-tasks-based teaching and learning environments;and the levels of enjoyment and anxiety of primary school children were greater than levels of secondary students.Piniel and Albert(2018)studied 186 Hungarian college students’emotions in developing English skills of listening，speaking，reading and writing.They found that enjoyment and anxiety were two emotions experienced by those students the most，and factors affecting these students’emotions included learning of different skills of listening，speaking，reading and writing，the lengths of time enrolled in a college course and contexts of language use(in and outside the classroom).These researchers noticed that language learning outside the classroom may bring students more and greater levels of positive emotions.Ross and Rivers(2018)reported a study of eight learners of English as a second language in Australia and they were native speakers of Portuguese，Spanish，Chinese and Japanese.They found that the informants in their study often experienced emotions of hope，enjoyment，struggling，etc.in their use of English in real life，which affected their enthusiasm for learning English.Li et al.(2019)assigned their participants into three language proficiency groups.Their study reveals that in general students experiencing less anxiety and more enjoyment are more likely to have higher achievement in learning English as a foreign language;and this trend is especially obvious among students at higher language proficiency level.

As research progresses，researchers have become aware that learners’foreign language enjoyment and anxiety are not static，i.e.，they fluctuate among the time scale from minutes to years(Boudreau，MacIntyre，and Dewaele，2018;Dewaele and Dewaele，2017;Elahi Shirvan and Taherian，2018;Elahi Shirvan and Talebzadeh，2018).Several studies have yielded findings to this effect.Dewaele and Dewaele(2017)indicated that not only do the level of enjoyment and anxiety change over a period of time，their sources also vary among participants of different age groups.Both Elahi Shirvan and Talebzadeh(2018)and Boudreau et al.(2018)adopted an idiodynamic approach to examine the rapid change of foreign language enjoyment and anxiety during given tasks.Results of these two studies suggest that foreign language enjoyment and foreign language anxiety change rapidly，yet producing various kinds of relationship patterns of these two emotions.

In summary，research into positive emotions in foreign language learning is still in its early stage，and studies are largely conducted in western countries.In this contexts，the study reported in this chapter is interested in finding out what emotions learners of Chinese as a second language in the traditional Chinese classroom experience，whether Chinese language enjoyment and Chinese language anxiety are related among learners of Chinese，whether students’academic results are related to their foreign language emotions，and what factors affect these students’Chinese language enjoyment.