The Relationship between Achievement Motivation and Test Anxiety and its Effect on the Students’ Performance in English of the Basic and Secondary Levels at Al–Mafraq City

Abstract

This study attempted to investigate the relationship between achievement motivation and test anxiety and its effect on the students’ performance of the basic and secondary levels in English at Al-Mafraq city. The participants consisted of (180) students selected from 2 schools in Al - Mafraq city, one boys’ school and other girls’ school. For collecting the data three measures were used as the following: achievement motivation measure, test anxiety measure, and achievement measure. After confirming the validity and reliability coefficients, data were analyzed by using mean, standard deviation, one-way ANOVA. The findings of this study were as following. 1. The performance of the students in English language subject differs according to their motivation level, but we cannot attribute this to the test anxiety, neither to grade levels nor to the interaction between them 2. No statistical differences were found between achievement motivation and test anxiety in term of grade levels. 3. Students significantly differ in test anxiety according to their grade levels in favor of the ninth grade. The study recommended to place a greater emphasis on the cooperative relationship between school and parents. Also, it emphasizes on the role of the educational advisor to direct students in order to improve their achievement motivation.