Chapter 1 Introduction
1.1 Reasons for the Present Study
Since the 1970s, the research about second language teaching and learning has paid more attention to how to learn than how to teach. In terms of how to learn, it is emphasized on the learner's individual differences, which include cognitive, affective and personality characteristics. Recently, more and more attention has been paid to the individual factors. The tolerance of ambiguity is not only a cognitive style and an ability to learn, but also an emotional and personality trait. The concept of tolerance of ambiguity has been paid widely attention by psychological and linguistic scholars from domestic and abroad. Tolerance of ambiguity mainly refers to the attitude the leaner held when they encounter ambiguous, strange and contrary study materials, which cover the different levels from receiving passively to resisting negatively. In foreign language learning, tolerance of ambiguity refers to the degree of psychological tolerance when the learner faces uncertainty in the process of learning. Therefore, this variable is one of the most important personality characteristics and learning styles which certainly draw our due attention.
1.1本探讨的原因
自20世纪70年代以来，英语论文，有关第二语言教学的探讨和学习，更注重如何学习，而不是如何教。如何学习方面，它强调的是学习者的个体异同，其中包括认知，英语毕业论文，情感和个性特征。最近，越来越多的关注已经支付给个人的因素。歧义容忍度是不仅是一种认知方式和学习能力，但也是一个情感和人格特质。已支付的概念模糊的容忍度由来自国内和国外的心理和语言学者的广泛关注。模糊的容忍度，主要是指精简举行时，他们遇到暧昧，陌生而相反的探讨材料，涵盖不同层次，从被动接受抗负面的态度。在外语学习，模糊的容忍度是指心理耐受程度时，学习者在学习的过程中面临的不确定性。因此，这个变量是一个最重要的个性特征和学习风格，这当然引起我们应有的重视。
The tolerance of ambiguity, abbreviated as TO A, is an important factor affecting thestudents' English learning. However, lots of research attention is paid to some other individualdifference factors, such as motivation, anxiety and self-esteem, the study of TOA is relativelyunder- cultivated field. The research on TOA starts from psychological field. Severalpsychologists have given their own identification of TOA as an important individual factor.Frenkel-Brunswik (1949) suggests that TOA is the way that an individual accepts and dealswith ambiguous information when they confronted with a series of unfamiliar, complex andunsure clues. Tolerant individuals perform well in new and complex learning situations(Jonassen & Grabowski, 1993). Individual with more tolerant of ambiguity would like to takerisks and accept changes (Mclain, 1993). Swiss cognitive psychologist Jean Piaget refers thatthe cognition develops from a skeptical, fuzzy and uneven state to determinate and balancedone; then, further develops again into doubtable, vague, unbalanced and reaffirmed state. Thus,in the terms of cognitive psychology, foreign language learning is a progressive processstep-by-step from ambiguity to determination. Language learning is a complex process ofinternalization, in which tolerance of ambiguity determines how much the language filterultimately, the speed and quality of language learning in the input process of the language, andeven affects the results of language acquisition. The higher the learner's degree of tolerance ofambiguity is , the more relaxed he/she is and the better he/she learned; on the contrary, the lower the learner's degree of tolerance of ambiguity is, the greater his/her pressure is and theless the input of language is, and even unable to complete the construction of the language.Therefore, as an important affective variable, the effect of tolerance of am
|
