Meihua Liu

• Doctor of Philosophy
• Tsinghua University

The role of learner emotions in language learning has long been observed and researched. Of various emotions, foreign language anxiety, enjoyment and boredom have been the most often researched, while research on other emotions like pride and sadness is hardly available in the current literature. Research on emotions in students with special charac...

This study compared the five-word lexical bundles (LBs) expressing gratitude in acknowledgments of dissertations written by Chinese and American PhD students of linguistics. Two corpora were built: (1) The Chinese University Dissertation Acknowledgments Collection (CUC) which contained 700 acknowledgments with a total of 300,686 tokens, and (2) the...

This article compared three-word move-specific lexical bundles (MLBs) in dissertation abstracts authored by linguistics doctoral students from China and the United States. Two separate corpora were constructed for analysis: (1) The China Linguistics PhD Abstracts Corpus (CLC), consisting of 700 abstracts totaling 613,713 words generated by doctoral...

Guided by the complex dynamic systems theory, the present study explored university students’ dynamic motivation to learn Chinese as a second language and its interaction with their learning experiences during a semester while studying in China. The study was conducted in a state-owned university in China and collected data at two time points of th...

The present large-scale quantitative study investigated the predictive effects of learning strategies and styles on Chinese undergraduate students’ English achievement and their mediating effects on each other’s relation to English achievement. A total of 439 students from different universities answered the 30-item Perceptual Learning Style Prefer...

The present study examined the relationship between English classroom anxiety (ECA) and learning style and their predictive effects on students’ English achievement. In total, 691 Chinese university EFL (English as a foreign language) students answered the English Classroom Anxiety Scale, the Perceptual Learning Styles Preferences Questionnaire and...

It is generally acknowledged that emotions play important roles in second/foreign language learning. Nevertheless, though interpreting is highly stressful, not much research on emotions has been conducted is this area. Hence, this research investigated foreign language anxiety and enjoyment in interpreting class and self-efficacy in learning interp...

Learners’ beliefs on language learning and perceived self-efficacy are important to the success of their second/foreign language (SL/FL) learning. To reveal the general profiles of and relationship between Chinese students’ beliefs about English learning and self-efficacy, the present study examined beliefs about English learning and self-efficacy...

This study investigated the effects of learner variables on Chinese bilingual undergraduates’ intercultural sensitivity and effectiveness. A total of 439 students from different universities answered a battery of questionnaires. Major findings were: (a) the participants reported a moderate to high level of intercultural sensitivity and a moderate l...

The present longitudinal study examined the changes in foreign language reading anxiety and its predicting effects on Chinese university students’ reading English performance. The 29-item Foreign Language Reading Anxiety Scale (FLRAS), a background questionnaire and a reading quiz were administered to two intact classes of an English Reading course...

This study examined lexical bundles (LBs) used differently by Chinese and American PhD students of linguistics in their dissertation abstracts. Two corpora were built, with each having 700 dissertation abstracts produced by Chinese and American PhD students of linguistics, respectively. The study then used lexical analysis software to retrieve freq...

This study explored the relations among and predictive effects of Chinese-learning motivation (CLM), use of Chinese (UOC) and Chinese proficiency on 218 international students’ intercultural sensitivity (IS) to the Chinese culture via a battery of questionnaires. Major findings were: (a) the respondents showed high CLM and UOC and were moderate to...

The present study explored the relations among foreign language (FL) classroom anxiety, enjoyment, expectancy-value motivation, and their predictive effects on Chinese high school students’ self-rated FL proficiency. Participants were 280 senior high school Chinese English as a foreign language learners who were surveyed on their foreign language c...

The present large-scale mixed-method study examined English language classroom anxiety and enjoyment in Chinese young students in relation to gender and grade level. Quantitative and qualitative data were collected from 709 primary and secondary school students from a province in south China. Major findings were: (1) Around one third of the partici...

This research study explored the changes in and effects of TED talks on Chinese postgraduate students’ English speaking performance and speaking anxiety over a period of 10 weeks. In this research, TED talks were used as a learning mode to provide a quasi-realistic sociocultural context for speaking English. 166 students from the experimental group...

The present research explored how foreign language listening anxiety (FLLA) affected Chinese university students' English listening test performance and how proficiency and gender mediated the effects of FLLA on the latter. Two different populations from two universities in China answered the 20-item Foreign Language Listening Anxiety Scale (FLLAS)...

The present longitudinal survey study explored changes in and effects of foreign language classroom anxiety (FLCA) and listening anxiety (FLLA) on Chinese undergraduate students’ English proficiency over a semester in the COVID-19 context. A set of 182 matching questionnaires was collected from first-year undergraduate English as a foreign language...

Despite the plethora of research on speaking anxiety, most studies focus on speaking for general purposes in various bilingual contexts, particularly ESL/EFL (English as second/foreign language) contexts. Little research has been done on anxiety when speaking English for academic purposes in bilingual students. Even fewer studies are available on t...

This study explored teaching anxiety and teacher foreign language anxiety (FLA) in 151 Chinese college English teachers in relation to their individual characteristics. Analyses of data collected from mixed-form questionnaires revealed the following major findings: (a) Major causes for teaching anxiety were concern about classroom teaching, researc...

The present research investigated the quasi-causal relationship between foreign language classroom anxiety (FLCA) and English performance in relation to gender and discipline via cross-lagged regression analyses. A total of 934 freshmen from a well-known state-owned university in Beijing answered the Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety Scale and a b...

The present mixed-method study examined the foci and effects of peer and machine feedback on the revisions of Chinese university EFL learners’ English argumentative essays. The data included Draft 1, peer feedback (PF), PF-based Draft 2, machine feedback (MF), MF-based feedback, questionnaires, and interview recordings. The main findings were: (a)...

As a highly important affective variable, motivation has always been a focus of research in second/foreign language (SL/FL) learning and proved to play a critical role in SL/FL learning. Even so, considering the complex and dynamic nature of SL/FL motivation, it always deserves research. Guided by the newly proposed framework of L2 Motivational Sel...

Source-based writing research has received much attention in recent years, which generally shows that both novice and expert EFL (English as a foreign language) writers have difficulties in writing from sources. As many Chinese institutes of higher education attach increasingly more importance to publications in international journals, citation and...

The present research explored L2 motivation, demographic variables and Chinese proficiency among adult learners of Chinese as a second language. A total of 83 international students studying in a Chinese university in Beijing answered the 54-item L2MSS questionnaire and a Demographic Questionnaire. Analyses of the data revealed the following findin...

Insufficient information was generated from the existing literature of cross-sectional studies about the changes of language learning anxiety, especially in technology-assisted language settings. This paper filled the gap by designing a longitudinal study of 10 weeks in which the mobile learning apps of Rain Classroom was administered to 158 postgr...

As revealed by literature, anxiety and stress are complicated yet serious issues among teachers at all educational levels. Though widely studied, research on them often focuses on pre-service or primary and middle school teachers, with little research on in-service university teachers. It is especially so in China. The present study thus examined a...

Not much research has been done on motivation to study a second, third or even fourth foreign language though learners of such languages have been increasing. To contribute to this, the present study examined German learning motivation of Chinese university students at different proficiency levels. A total of 297 German learners at three different...

This chapter examines adult CSL (Chinese as a L2) learners' intercultural sensitivity and effectiveness while studying in a university in Beijing. Seventy-four international students from various countries answered the intercultural sensitivity scale (ISS) and intercultural effectiveness scale (IES) as well as other scales in the present study; eig...

With globalization, intercultural communication plays an increasingly more important role in various fields, including business, transportation and education. It is the same with intercultural sensitivity (IS), a critical component of intercultural communication. Though much research has been done on IS, little can be found on effects of demographi...

As an important affective factor in language learning, foreign language anxiety (FLA) has been extensively researched. Nevertheless, not many studies have targeted postgraduate students or been longitudinal to reveal the dynamic nature of FLA. Hence, the present quantitative study examined changes in and effects of FLA on postgraduate students’ per...

This study employed a concurrent mixed method to find out whether Chinese young EFL learners (7th-to 9th-graders) were anxious, what caused them to feel/become anxious in English speaking class, how anxiety affected their learning of (spoken) English, and what differences existed in English speaking anxiety among the learners. Both quantitative (19...

As trust becomes increasingly important in software domain, software trustworthiness — as a complex high-composite concept, has developed into a big challenge people have to face, especially in the current open, dynamic and ever-changing Internet environment. Furthermore, how to recognize and define trust problem from its nature and how to measure...

This chapter examines adult CSL (Chinese as a L2) learners' intercultural sensitivity and effectiveness while studying in a university in Beijing. Seventy-four international students from various countries answered the intercultural sensitivity scale (ISS) and intercultural effectiveness scale (IES) as well as other scales in the present study; eig...

We surveyed the practices and abilities of 103 students at 4 universities in China to write from sources in English, documenting in their first and second years of Bachelors’ and Masters’ programs (longitudinally and cross-sectionally): (a) students’ self-reported approaches to writing from sources and instruction that had helped them; (b) the freq...

This study examined Chinese university learners’ anxiety in German language classrooms in at-home and study-abroad contexts. About 138 learners from a university in Beijing (at-home context) and 91 learners from a university in Germany (study-abroad (SA) context) participated in the present study. The participants answered a Background Information...

This study investigated the interactive effects of English-speaking anxiety and strategy use on oral English test performance of high- and low-proficient Chinese university EFL learners. In total, 1092 first-year undergraduates answered the English-speaking Anxiety Scale (ESAS), the Oral Communication Strategy Inventory (OCSI) and other questionnai...

The present research explored the effects of cultural, affective, and linguistic variables on adult Chinese as a second language learners' willingness to communicate in Chinese. One hundred and sixty-two Chinese as a second language learners from a Chinese university answered the Willingness to Communicate in Chinese Scale, the Intercultural Sensit...

The present research examined how university students perceived a 2-week summer English immersion program organized and designated by Chinese teachers of English in a highly prestigious university in Beijing and whether their perceptions changed during the period. Data included 208 surveys and 19 informal interviews in week 1 and 207 surveys and 19...

The present research examined the associations between foreign language listening anxiety (FLLA) and strategy use (FLLSU) and their predicting effects on test performance of high- and low-proficient Chinese university English as a foreign language learners. 1160 first-year undergraduate non-English majors answered the battery of questionnaires and...

The present research explored bilingual/multilingual students’ willingness to communicate in Chinese (WTCC) and foreign language anxiety (FLA) when speaking Chinese and their associations with self-rated proficiency in Chinese in a university in Beijing. The study recruited 167 bilingual and multilingual learners of Chinese to fill in a battery of...

The present study explored the interrelations between foreign language (FL) reading anxiety, FL reading strategy use and their interactive effect on FL reading comprehension performance at the tertiary level in China. Analyses of the survey data collected from 1702 university students yielded the following results: (a) Both Foreign Language Reading...

During recent decades, both institutions of higher education and university students of the world are trying to become international by offering or gaining some form of international education, which has caught the attention of increasingly more researchers (Jackson, 2004; Trenchs-Parera, 2009). As East Asian students have increasingly become the m...

This paper reports on the result of a study on Chinese university EFL learners’ foreign language writing anxiety in terms of general pattern, effect and causes. 1174 first-year students answered the 26-item Foreign Language Writing Anxiety Scale (FLWAS) (Young, 1999) and took an English writing test, 18 of whom were invited for semi-structured inte...

The present study examined foreign language (FL) listening anxiety and listening strategy use in relation to the FL listening comprehension performance of 1702 undergraduate EFL learners from 5 universities in China. The findings were: (1) more than half of the students generally did not feel anxious when listening to English, were low in English l...

The present study examined the writing processes of 20 L1 writers and 20 L2 writers on a course task of writing a narrative in a Chinese university naturalistic setting, as well as the challenges they encountered and their coping strategies during the processes. Analyses of the data collected via questionnaire, journal and semi-structured interview...

The present case study investigated university students’ academic and linguistic gains during a semester-long exchange program abroad. Thirty three third-year English majors from a Chinese university answered a battery of questionnaires and 13 of them participated in semi-structured interviews both prior to and after the program. Analyses of the da...

The study reported in the present paper focused on the expectations of and concerns about the impending semester-long study abroad of students from a prestigious Chinese university. Data were collected via questionnaires and semi-structured interviews. Analyses of 33 questionnaires and 15 semi-structured interviews yielded the following main findin...

This paper reports on a study of syntactic errors in English essays composed by Chinese university students. Thirty undergraduate non-English majors across disciplines produced 90 essays on three tasks during eight weeks, and answered a self-developed questionnaire at the end of the course. Analyses of the data resulted in the following main findin...

The present paper reports on the findings of a study on the general patterns of Chinese university students’ foreign language learning anxiety and motivation and their relationships to the students’ performance in English. Analyses of 1697 questionnaires revealed that 1) the whole sample, as well as male and female students, reported a medium or ev...

Though blended learning had been continuously adopted in an Academic English Writing course (AEW) in a key university in Beijing, no attempts had been made to describe this new learning environment or investigate its effectiveness and impact. To fill in the gap, the present paper describes and evaluates blended learning in this AEW course in terms...

This paper reports on the results of a study of Chinese EFL learners’ personality traits and motivation in relation to their contributions to achievement in English at the tertiary level. An 88-item survey involving 934 first-year undergraduate non-English majors revealed that: (1) the participants were generally moderately extroverted, moderately...

The present research explored the effect of Chinese university students' oral test anxiety and speaking strategy use on their oral English performance. 1697 university students answered the 19-item Achievement Test Anxiety Scale and the 32-item Oral Communication Strategy Inventory (OCSI) (speaking part) in study 1. In study 2, 493 university stude...

Although the interactive effects of different variables in language learning have increasingly become the focus of recent research, the interaction of such variables as personality traits, self-esteem, language class risk-taking and sociability has not been much investigated. Hence, the present study explored the predicting effects of these variabl...

The present study explored foreign language anxiety and strategy use in relation to their interactive effect on the students' performance in English. The participants were 934 Chinese undergraduates who completed a 71-item survey. Complicated statistical analyses (e.g., correlation analyses, regression analyses and structural equaling model) were r...

This paper reports on the results of a study of Chinese EFL learners' foreign language anxiety, personality traits, self-esteem, and their interactive effects on students' performance in English at the tertiary level. A 94-item survey involving 934 first-year undergraduate non-English majors revealed that: (1) nearly a third of the respondents felt...

This paper reports the results of a study of changes in risk-taking and sociability in Chinese university EFL class over a term. A 10-item survey involving 934 first-year undergraduates revealed that: (1) the students generally did not like to risk using English and were moderately sociable in English class both at the beginning and toward the end...

This paper reports on an investigation of Chinese university EFL learners' attitudes towards English and Chinese in relation to their motivation to learn the language and awareness of their ethnic identity. 302 university students answered a 22-item Language Attitudes Questionnaire and 112 of them answered four open-ended questions. Analyses of the...

The present study investigated the paragraph-level errors in 90 English compositions produced by 30 Chinese undergraduate non-English majors on three tasks during eight weeks. Analyses of these errors and the survey data yielded the following main findings: (1) Among the four categories of paragraph-level errors, errors in paragraph development acc...

In recent decades, research has revealed that reticence and anxiety can have a debilitating impact on second language (L2) learning (Horwitz et al., 1986; MacIntyre & Gardner, 1991a; Tsui, 1996; Jackson, 2002a; Liu, 2006a; Liu & Jackson, 2008). It is widely agreed that reticent students often speak less and exhibit more negative forms of arousal (e...

Perceived to be two important affective variables, anxiety and motivation have been found to be highly correlated to second/foreign language acquisition. In order to examine the relationship between foreign language anxiety, English learning motivation, and performance in English, the present study investigated 980 undergraduate students from three...

Reticence in foreign language classes has long been a challenge for both teachers and students. With the advent of globalization, there is a pressing need for EFL (English as a Foreign Language) teachers to help reticent students develop the skills and confidence needed to take an active role in oral English lessons. This article reports on a study...

This article reports the results of a study of the unwillingness to communicate, and anxiety of Chinese learners of English as a foreign language (EFL) in English language classrooms. A 70-item survey of 547 first-year undergraduate non-English majors revealed that (a) Most of the students were willing to participate in interpersonal conversations,...

This paper reports on a study on orai English test anxiety in Chinese undergraduate EFL students at different proficiency levels. Data collected from a 34-item survey observations, and interviews revealed that (1) the majority of the students felt at least somewhat anxious about oral English tests, (2) the more proficient students tended to be less...

This paper reports a study on anxiety in Chinese undergraduate non-English majors at three different proficiency levels. By way of survey, observations, reflective journals and interviews, the study revealed that (1) a considerable number of students at each level felt anxious when speaking English in class, (2) the more proficient students tended...

Because cohesion is important both to the reader and the writer to create and comprehend a text, teachers have placed much emphasis on text cohesion and coherence in their teaching and evaluation of writing. Using Halliday and Hasan’s [Halliday, M.A.K., Hasan, R. (1976). Cohesion in English. Longman, London] taxonomy of cohesive devices and their f...

This paper reports on the results of a case study on reticence and anxiety in a Chinese ESP (English for specific purposes) poetry class at the tertiary level. A class of 24 undergraduates and their course teacher participated in the study. Analyses of the data collected via survey, observation and semi-structured interview revealed that: (1) the s...