Boredom in the Foreign Language Classroom: A Micro-Perspective [1st ed.] 9783030507688, 9783030507695

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Second Language Learning and Teaching

Mirosław Pawlak Joanna Zawodniak Mariusz Kruk

Boredom in the Foreign Language Classroom A Micro-Perspective

Second Language Learning and Teaching Series Editor Mirosław Pawlak, Faculty of Pedagogy and Fine Arts, Adam Mickiewicz University, Kalisz, Poland

The series brings together volumes dealing with different aspects of learning and teaching second and foreign languages. The titles included are both monographs and edited collections focusing on a variety of topics ranging from the processes underlying second language acquisition, through various aspects of language learning in instructed and non-instructed settings, to different facets of the teaching process, including syllabus choice, materials design, classroom practices and evaluation. The publications reflect state-of-the-art developments in those areas, they adopt a wide range of theoretical perspectives and follow diverse research paradigms. The intended audience are all those who are interested in naturalistic and classroom second language acquisition, including researchers, methodologists, curriculum and materials designers, teachers and undergraduate and graduate students undertaking empirical investigations of how second languages are learnt and taught.

More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/10129

Mirosław Pawlak Joanna Zawodniak Mariusz Kruk •

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Boredom in the Foreign Language Classroom A Micro-Perspective

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Mirosław Pawlak Faculty of Pedagogy and Fine Arts Adam Mickiewicz University Kalisz, Poland

Joanna Zawodniak University of Zielona Góra Zielona Góra, Poland

State University of Applied Sciences Konin, Poland Mariusz Kruk University of Zielona Góra Zielona Góra, Poland

ISSN 2193-7648 ISSN 2193-7656 (electronic) Second Language Learning and Teaching ISBN 978-3-030-50768-8 ISBN 978-3-030-50769-5 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-50769-5 © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. This Springer imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland

You’ll find boredom where there is the absence of a good idea. Earl Nightingale

Preface

A foreign language (L2) classroom is a unique kind of learning theater where from the very outset students find themselves in a stressful, face-threatening situation of the individuals whose range of L2 resources is limited and whose immature command of a new language is subject to constant evaluation. They bring into the classroom different beliefs, expectations and motivations which are more or less skillfully responded to by the teacher. The extent to which students are successful, satisfied and determined to pursue their goals depends to a great extent on a constellation of individual difference (ID) factors influencing the learning process (e.g., Dörnyei & Ryan, 2015; Pawlak, 2017, 2020a). While there has been an evident tendency in recent years to shift the emphasis to the positive aspects of L2 learning, primarily under the influence of positive psychology (e.g., MacIntyre, Gregersen, & Mercer, 2016; Mercer & MacIntyre, 2014), it is clear that negative emotions have always played a crucial role in language classrooms. One of them is boredom which has been reported to be the most pervasively experienced emotion in school settings (Mercer & Dörnyei, 2020; Pekrun, Goetz, Daniels, Stupnisky, & Perry, 2010) and which therefore constitutes an overarching concept that guides this volume. Boredom is among the most neglected, insufficiently understood and underexplored emotions, and at the same time, it is referred to as one of the most deactivating, disturbing and aversive human experiences. Although it occupies an important place in educational psychology, in applied linguistics it is still something of a terra incognita that necessitates and deserves systematic attention from theorists, researchers and teachers. The main reason is that for more than several decades, applied linguists have been preoccupied with examining other, more conspicuous ID factors, such as motivation, anxiety, aptitude, age, or learning strategies, not realizing how devastating boredom can be for students’ work and achievement. This being the case, the purpose of this volume is to approach the phenomenon of boredom from the interconnected theoretical, empirical and pedagogical perspectives intended to enhance the understanding of this complex emotion and its place in the process of teaching and learning a foreign or second language. The book is composed of four chapters. Chapter 1 presents the concept of boredom in the light of theories elaborating on its definitions, causes and typologies as well as with vii

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respect to disengagement as its major manifestation. Chapter 2 provides an overview of boredom-related research which is first discussed with reference to educational psychology and, second, most importantly, with respect to the main lines of inquiry focused on the L2 classroom. The theoretical considerations are followed by Chapter 3 which outlines the methodological underpinnings of the study conducted for the purpose of this publication whose aim was to shed light on the nature of boredom in L2 classrooms, its fluctuations as well as the causes of such changes in two groups of Polish students majoring in English following identical lesson plans. This empirical investigation approaches boredom from a micro-perspective, where this negative emotion is examined in a situated manner in the course of naturally occurring classes with the help of both quantitative and qualitative data collection instruments. Chapter 4 is dedicated to the presentation of the findings of the research project as well as the discussion of these findings, attempting to account for the observed patterns of the experience of boredom and its dynamics, but also addressing some inevitable limitations of the conducted study. Finally, the conclusion to this monograph briefly summarizes the main outcomes of the study, discusses the directions of future research concerning boredom in L2 learning and teaching, both with respect to their goals and methodology, and offers a handful of pedagogical recommendations that could help minimize the occurrence of this negative emotion or aid teachers in combating it. We are confident that this volume will pave the way for numerous studies helping us further delve into the secrets of boredom and that it will also provide food for thought for teachers who need to come to terms with its inevitability in educational contexts and actively seek ways of helping students face up to and overcome this distressing condition. Kalisz, Poland Zielona Góra, Poland Zielona Góra, Poland

Mirosław Pawlak Joanna Zawodniak Mariusz Kruk

Acknowledgements The authors would like to express their deep gratitude to Prof. Aleksandra Wach (Adam Mickiewicz University, Poznań, Poland) whose insightful comments and suggestions have helped improve the quality of the final version of the present work.

Contents

1 Approaching Boredom from a Theoretical Angle . . . . . . . 1.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.2 Boredom in Philosophy and Literature . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.3 The Challenge of Defining Boredom . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.4 The Typological Description of Boredom . . . . . . . . . . . 1.4.1 State Boredom Versus Trait Boredom . . . . . . . . 1.4.2 Various Intensities of Boredom . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.5 The Antecedents of Boredom . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.6 Dis/Engagement in Relation to Boredom . . . . . . . . . . . 1.7 Ways of Coping with Boredom in Educational Settings 1.8 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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2 Approaching Boredom from an Empirical Angle . . . 2.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.2 Research on Boredom in Educational Psychology . 2.3 Research on Boredom in L2 Learning . . . . . . . . . 2.3.1 Boredom as an Indirect Object of Study . . 2.3.2 Boredom as a Direct Object of Study . . . . 2.4 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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3 Design of the Study . . . . . . . . . . . 3.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.2 Aims and Research Questions 3.3 Participants . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.4 Description of the Classes . . . 3.4.1 Class 1 . . . . . . . . . . . 3.4.2 Class 2 . . . . . . . . . . . 3.5 Data Collection Instruments . . 3.6 Data Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.7 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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4 Findings of the Study . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.2 Changes in Overall Boredom Levels in Group 1 and Group 2 . . 4.3 Self-reported Boredom Levels and Class Evaluations in Group 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.3.1 Overall Changes in Boredom Levels in the Two Classes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.3.2 Changes in Boredom Levels During Individual Classes . 4.3.3 Changes in Boredom Levels Within Individual Students . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.3.4 Participants’ Evaluation of the Classes . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.4 Self-reported Boredom Levels and Class Evaluations in Group 2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.4.1 Overall Changes in Boredom Levels in the Two Classes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.4.2 Changes in Boredom Levels During Individual Classes . 4.4.3 Changes in Boredom Levels Within Individual Students . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.4.4 Participants’ Evaluation of the Classes . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.5 Factors Responsible for Changes in the Levels of Boredom in Group 1 and Group 2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.6 Discussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.6.1 RQ1: What Are the Differences in the Levels of Boredom in the Classes Taught in Both Groups? What Can They Be Attributed to? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.6.2 RQ2: How Does the Experience of Boredom Change and What Patterns Can Be Identified in This Respect? . . 4.6.3 RQ3: What Are the Differences Regarding the Experience of Boredom for Individual Students? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.6.4 RQ4: What Influences Are Responsible for the Changes in Boredom Levels? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.6.5 Limitations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.7 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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5 Conclusions, Directions for Future Research and Pedagogical Implications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Appendix B . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101 Appendix C . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105 References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107

Chapter 1

Approaching Boredom from a Theoretical Angle

1.1 Introduction This chapter aims to delve into the essence of boredom and specify its place in the process of second and foreign language learning. The concept of boredom has only recently attracted the attention of second language acquisition (SLA) researchers, which explains why it is still an insufficiently researched and thus poorly understood emotion in this particular learning context (Chapman, 2013). This also refers to teachers whose idea of which activities are or are not boring is based on their own beliefs, perceptions, sentiments and assumptions rather than on their students’ opinions and preferences, not to mention insights from carefully designed research studies that are few and far between. At the same time, researchers in the domain of educational psychology (e.g., Belton & Priyadharshini, 2007; Goetz, Frenzel, Hall, Nett, Pekrun, & Lipnevich, 2014; Goetz, Frenzel, Pekrun, Hall, & Lüdtke, 2007; Pekrun et al., 2010; Tulis & Fulmer, 2013) report that boredom is the most intense and the most commonly experienced academic emotion and that it has been on the increase among adolescent student populations in relation to different subjects (e.g., social studies, math, foreign languages). For this reason, it certainly deserves closer investigation with regard to its various dimensions, types, sources and manifestations that may affect learning an additional language. This is because a thorough understanding of the complex and equivocal nature of boredom may facilitate a search for ways of successfully dealing with it in the L2 classroom. The chapter begins with the presentation of the definitions of boredom that are followed by a discussion of its typologies and causes. Subsequently, the role of disengagement as part and parcel of the experience of boredom is explained and, lastly, options that practitioners can fall back upon to combat this aversive and disturbing emotion are considered, in particular those that have been proposed by educational psychologists.

© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 M. Pawlak et al., Boredom in the Foreign Language Classroom, Second Language Learning and Teaching, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-50769-5_1

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1.2 Boredom in Philosophy and Literature Although the phenomenon of boredom became subject to regular scientific inquiry no sooner than in the 1930s, it has been an important philosophical theme since antiquity. Philosophers were the first to signal problems with defining boredom which they perceived as a complex condition, common to all human beings, that occurs in a variety of modes and requires conceptual and phenomenological examination (O’Brien, 2014). They reflected on the nature of boredom, trying to provide its typology, seeking ways to overcome it and discovering what it can reveal about the meaning of life, where it derives from and what phenomena can be explained by referring to it. Looking into these considerations may be beneficial for grasping the essence of boredom in the learning process (Toohey, 2011), including the learning of additional languages. The etymology of the English word “boredom” can be traced back to the 18th and nineteenth century when it first appeared in print and it is hypothesized that it was derived from the past form of the word “to bear”. It can be found in one of the 1829 issues of the British weekly newspaper, The Albion, and in Charles Dickens’ Bleak House, published in 1853. Before that time, the state of boredom was most frequently referred to as tedium, acedia, spleen, sloth or ennui (Healy, 1984; Martin, Sadlo, & Stew, 2006). Interesting views on boredom, which are quite close to the contemporary understanding of this concept, were presented by the ancient Roman Stoic philosopher Lucius Annaeus Seneca (1917), who distinguished two main components of this condition: (1) fickleness and restlessness, and (2) lack of motivation and interest. He also pointed to possible ways of ameliorating boredom, including work and engagement with practical affairs. The next author worth mentioning is the17thcentury French philosopher, Blaise Pascal (1958) [1670], who associated boredom with the feelings of helplessness, dependence, inadequacy and emptiness stemming from life without entertainment, passion and effort. He claimed, however, that despite the human tendency to seek diversions and distractions, individuals always return to a pervasive of sense of ennui as a response to their own unimportance and nothingness. According to the 18th-century German philosopher of the Enlightenment, Immanuel Kant (1963) [1797], boredom afflicts inactive individuals who have no idea what to do. His recipe for overcoming this negative experience is to participate in activities of recreation and diversion (Spacks, 1995). Another interesting stance on boredom was taken by the 19th-century German philosopher of pessimism, Arthur Schopenhauer (2008) [1819], who defined this construct as the reverse side of fascination and indicated that, next to pain, it is one of the major obstacles on the way to human happiness. He associated boredom with the vacuity of soul that pushes an individual towards a hasty and misguided search for excitement, diversion and society. Interestingly, Schopenhauer regarded the proneness to boredom as reflective of intelligence, believing that individuals with higher intellectual potential require more challenge and novelty which are not easy to find in the surrounding world. As a result, they have to withstand prolonged periods of boredom for most of their lives, one of the few

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ways of combating this negative experience being the contemplation of art, in particular music. Yet another author who voiced his opinion on the subject of boredom is the 19th-century Danish philosopher, Søren Kierkegaard (1992) [1843], who defined this condition as a sense of inner emptiness resulting from a lack of meaning rather than an absence of diversion. At the same time, he stressed the fact that despite its sedateness and solidity, boredom can initiate and encourage action As far as the means of preventing this negative emotion are concerned, Kierkegaard emphasized the importance of idleness, understood as fertile solitude and readiness to perceive life as a collection of moments to be filled with meaning rather than a sequence of tasks to be performed. Finally, it is worth mentioning that for the 20th-century English moral philosopher, Bernard Williams (1973), not being bored can at least in some circumstances be the evidence of one’s inability to notice and reflect, which is, in turn, indicative of intellectual and ethical failure (Kuhn, 1976). Aside from philosophers, the concept of boredom has occupied the minds and thoughts of a number of writers (e.g., Charles Baudelaire, Joseph Brodsky, George Gordon Byron, François-René de Chateaubriand, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Leo Tolstoy, Henrik Ibsen, August Strindberg, Thomas Stearns Eliot) who used their imagination and literary skills to specify its place in human life (Martin et al., 2006). One of the authors whose works offer insights into the nature of boredom is the 19th-century French poet and essayist, Charles Baudelaire (2012) [1857]. His interpretation of this phenomenon undergoes a kind of evolution as he proceeds from portraying it as a monster to be struggled with to viewing it as an internal element of creativity (Healy, 1984; Spacks, 1995). Consequently, boredom is represented in his writings as an action-provoking force making individuals look for something that could keep them alive. It is also worthwhile to comment on the approach to boredom embraced by one of the major 20th-century American poets, essayists, playwrights and social critics, Thomas Stearns Eliot. He perceived it as a socio-cultural phenomenon emerging from the tough historical experience, in this case that of World War II, which evidently added to the meaninglessness and absurdity of human existence and contributed to the pervasiveness of boredom. In this way, Eliot linked this condition to modernism, portraying it as a state accompanied by uncertainty, insecurity and decay as well as identifying it with emotional numbness, blankness and bankruptcy (Eliot, 1961, as cited in Labang, 2010, p. 44; Kim, 2013). The phenomenon of boredom has also featured prominently in the thoughts of the 20th-century Russian-American poet and essayist, Joseph Brodsky (1995), who metaphorized it as the psychological Sahara that is everyone’s window on the infinity of time, with its redundancy, monotony and repetitiveness. To be more precise, he argued that boredom can be instrumental in teaching the life’s most precious lesson of human insignificance, littleness and finiteness; such a lesson should put an individual’s life into a proper perspective increasing his or her sense of humility and reducing any signs of self-aggrandizement. Finally, Brodsky asserted that it is important to embrace boredom so as to better understand its mechanisms and claimed that the most effective antidote to this negative emotion is passion for doing things.

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1.3 The Challenge of Defining Boredom There is no consensus on one single, unanimously accepted definition of boredom, which should not come as a surprise because it is a complex construct consisting of and interacting with a lot of different factors as well as having many faces and stemming from a variety of causes (cf. Ally, 2008; Caldwell, Darling, Payne, & Dowdy, 1999). It is often described in a self-referential way as, for example, tedium, anguish, listlessness, lethargy, the blahs, doldrums or languor. This makes its image all the more blurred and at the same time reveals its aversive and highly disturbing nature (Brodsky, 1995; Goldberg, Eastwood, LaGuardia, & Danckert, 2011; Martin et al., 2006; Vodanovich, 2003; Weinerman & Kenner, 2016). There are a variety of definitions attempting to depict the essence of boredom by addressing its many different characteristics. Perhaps the most general one was formulated by Fahlman (2009), who posited that the experience of boredom, usually referred to as an emotion, a feeling, an affect, a drive, or a state, draws on a combination of disengagement, dissatisfaction, attention deficit, distorted time perception and decreased vitality. She refers to it as a “silent” emotion because, while it can be easily identified by careful observers, it does not have such a disruptive effect on what transpires in the classroom as anger and anxiety. Boredom is also found among achievement emotions since it emerges from achievement-related contexts, including in-class instruction and study, as well as out-of-school learning (Pekrun, 2006; Pekrun, Goetz, Frenzel, Barchfeld, & Perry, 2011). Students are bored as a consequence of a lack of activity from which they could generate pleasure and, therefore, they fail to see purpose in the learning endeavor (Eastwood, Frischen, Fenske, & Smilek, 2012). In effect, their motivation to perform tasks and activities or engage in self-regulated learning is decreased and they are less likely to make an effort cognitively (Preckel, Götz, & Frenzel, 2010). Once they realize they have nothing to do that they like, they tend to resort to avoidance behaviors (Mann & Robinson, 2009; Pekrun et al., 2010). Although usually considered to be a distinct emotion, boredom may resemble to a certain extent such conditions as anhedonia, apathy and depression (Goldberg et al., 2011). Boredom can be approached from a broad array of psychological and social/sociological perspectives, which only adds to its perception as an equivocal and complex phenomenon (Weinerman & Kenner, 2016). In psychology, it is defined as a permanent (trait) or temporary (state) affective experience which may severely inhibit the learning process (Acee et al., 2010; Daniels, Tze, & Goetz, 2015; Goetz, Cronjaeger, Frenzel, Lüdtke, & Hall, 2010; Nett, Goetz, & Daniels, 2010). Boredom is often associated with an acute lack of interest which is accompanied by concentration problems and which negatively impacts one’s performance of the task at hand (Fisher, 1993; Nett, Goetz, & Daniels, 2010). It should be noted, however, that lack of interest is not merely the flipside of boredom whose emotional load is heavier than that of the former. In other words, boredom is in most cases a painful and frustrating experience, whereas lack of interest and enjoyment is a neutral state with different motivational consequences. More specifically, while lack of interest entails

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neither the will to participate in an activity nor the desire to escape it, boredom directly leads to the state of being disengaged, thus triggering avoidance behaviors. There is of course some kind of relationship between lack of interest and boredom but it is more of a cause-and-effect nature as the former may result in the latter (Goetz & Frenzel, 2006; Pekrun et al., 2010). In sociology, the concept of boredom is explained with reference to adolescents and young adults who find it difficult to accept the adult system of values to which they respond with diverse manifestations of boredom. More precisely, boredom is viewed here as a component of the individual’s persona adopted as a means of resistance to school authority reflected in the rules and restrictions imposed by the educational system (Brumhead, Searle, Trowbridge, & Williams, 1990; Larson & Richards, 1991). In some of the definitions, emphasis is laid on the arousal dimension of boredom. There is a controversy over whether boredom stems from a higher or a lower activation of peripheral physiological processes. For example, according to Fisher (1993), Harris (2000) and Mikulas and Vodanovich (1993), boredom is a painful condition of fairly low arousal and dissatisfaction ascribed to an insufficiently stimulating environment. By contrast, Barbalet (1999) defines boredom as a high arousal state that contributes to feelings of restlessness and irritability, thus having nothing in common with acceptance or resignation (see also Berlyne, 1960; Fenichel, 1934). At the same time, Vogel-Walcutt, Fiorella, Carper and Schatz (2012) maintain that boredom is a condition of either increased or suppressed arousal resulting from individual learner characteristics and/or situation-specific factors. Finally, Leary, Rogers, Canfield and Coe (1986) suggest that there exists an optimal level of arousal at which boredom will not occur, though it may be experienced above or below this optimum threshold. Boredom is also discussed in relation to gifted individuals and it is not yet clear whether it is more symptomatic of low- or high-ability learners (Preckel et al., 2010). On the one hand, this negative emotion is reported to be a defining characteristic of low-ability and low-achieving students who stop focusing on what is going on in anticipation of failure. However, on the other hand, it might as well pose a threat to gifted students who do not feel sufficiently challenged or stimulated. This is especially likely to happen when they attend classes adjusted to their average-ability counterparts, which leads the more gifted learners to play truant and/or reduce the amount of effort that they are prepared to invest in learning (Larson & Richards, 1991; Pekrun et al., 2010; Plucker et al., 2004). As has been shown above, there have been systematic attempts to approach boredom from a broader perspective, viewing it as something more than just a purely emotional condition. In line with this reasoning, Nett et al. (2010) and Pekrun (2006) discuss boredom as a multifaceted condition composed of affective, cognitive, physiological, expressive and motivational factors. Therefore, they suggest that boredom includes unpleasant feelings, the impression that time is slowing down, reduced arousal, various extralinguistic and vocal manifestations of this experience, as well as a desire to make some changes or terminate the tedious situation. This multidimensionality of boredom, together with the lack of consensus on its components as well as the controversy over its role in the learning process (Martin et al., 2006) make

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it a unique and nebulous phenomenon (Daniels et al., 2015), which surely deserves to be systematically and thoroughly investigated.

1.4 The Typological Description of Boredom Different authors have attempted to disentangle the complexities of boredom, classifying it into distinct subtypes which would help us better understand how it functions as well as identifying the factors that play a part in shaping it. With this purpose in mind, they distinguish between endogenous and reactive boredom, where the former comes from the inside of the learner and the latter is generated in response to what takes place in their environment (Neu, 1998). They also describe this emotion in terms of its task-focused and self -focused quality, the former being connected with having to do meaningless tasks, and the latter referring to situations when students are frustrated (Acee et al., 2010). Some researchers (Malkovsky, Merrifield, Goldberg, & Danckert, 2012; Weir, 2013) indicate that boredom could be a force culminating either in lethargy, when students remain apathetic, or agitation, when they simmer with unused energy. Yet other scholars, for the most part philosophers and psychoanalytic thinkers (e.g., Frankl, 1962; Maddi, 1970; O’Connor, 1967), focus on chronic or existential boredom which has much in common with depression. Since the final two typologies, pertaining to the in/stability and intensity of boredom, allow more complete understanding of its intricacies in connection with the language classroom, they will be discussed in greater detail below.

1.4.1 State Boredom Versus Trait Boredom Similarly to other individual difference variables examined in research on L2 learning (e.g., self-esteem, anxiety, motivation) (Masgoret & Gardner, 2003; Pawlak, 2020a; Plonsky & Sudina, in press), boredom can be referred to as a more situation-specific attribute or as a more general disposition characterizing individuals. State boredom is a transient, context-dependent, short-term condition that results from an individual’s perception of their immediate learning environment as impoverished and thus not sufficiently stimulating (Bench & Lench, 2013; Fahlman, 2009). This type of boredom can be experienced in a wide range of situations, when, for instance, teacher instructional practices are not adjusted to students’ proficiency and ability levels, teaching methods are repetitive and unchallenging, or selected tasks do not meet students’ expectations or fail to arouse their interest. State boredom can also be triggered by different institutional constraints imposed on learners, limited selfcontrol or the requirement to pursue goals that are unclear or unfocused, thus being difficult to achieve (Vogel-Walcutt et al., 2012; Weinerman & Kenner, 2016). This type of boredom results from low arousal caused by dissatisfaction, disinterest or frustration and it can be characterized by constant fluctuations over time. State boredom is

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a negative, yet reversible, psychological condition that can work to students’ advantage because it has the potential of motivating them to search for new goals and alternative solutions conducive to the implementation of change (Sharp, Hemmings, Kay, Murphy, & Elliott, 2017; Vogel-Walcutt et al., 2012). As for trait boredom, it is equated with boredom proneness and, as such, it refers to individuals who are extremely susceptible to experiencing this negative emotion. To be more precise, boredom seems to be an inherent part of their personality, which means that they exhibit a tendency to be permanently disengaged and/or disinterested. Researchers further categorize this more stable type of boredom into external boredom proneness, connected with the perception of environment as uninteresting, and internal boredom proneness, referring to one’s difficulty in generating involving things to do (Macklem, 2015). Students who are more prone to experiencing boredom also have the tendency to succumb to negative rather than positive emotions. Consequently, they can encounter difficulty controlling anger in everyday situations as well as can experiencing higher levels of impulsivity and aggression than their peers (Barnett & Klitzing, 2006; Dahlen, Martin, Ragan, & Kuhlman, 2004). On the one hand, students exhibiting susceptibility to boredom tend to be extraverted, but, on the other, they often act as if they were shy and can easily be hurt (Gordon, Wilkinson, McGown, & Jovanoska, 1997). Trait boredom has been reported to correlate with introspectiveness, loneliness, negative affect (e.g., hostility and aggression), and a variety of dysfunctional behaviors (e.g., sleep disorder, drug abuse, eating disorders, juvenile delinquency, gambling) (Anshel, 1991; Blaszczynski, McConaghy, & Frankova, 1990; Gana, Deletang, & Metais, 2000; Gordon et al., 1997; Kass, Wallace, & Vodanovich, 2003; Mercer-Lynn, Hunter, & Eastwood, 2013; Newberry & Duncan, 2001; Vodanovich & Rupp, 1999). It has also been shown to be related to school absenteeism and dropout, lower school achievement, lower grades, anxiety, lower levels of self-actualization, reduced willingness to speak and decreased motivation (Bridgeland, Bruce, & Hariharan, 2013; Daschmann, Goetz, & Stupnisky, 2011; Kass et al., 2003; LePera, 2011; McLeod & Vodanovich, 1991; Sommers & Vodanovich, 2000; Toohey, 2011). Despite the obvious differences between state and trait boredom, the two conditions may overlap when the external and internal experience of this negative emotion is put together. This means that an individual can be both generally susceptible to boredom as well as bored at a particular point in time due to the unchallenging or unrewarding environment (Fahlman, 2009; Todman, 2003).

1.4.2 Various Intensities of Boredom Boredom can also be classified with respect to its intensity. This can be seen in the classification put forward by Goetz et al. (2014), which can be referred to as describing multiple boredoms and pertaining to the different degrees of un/pleasantness of this emotion. These are as follows:

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• Indifferent boredom is a state of pleasantly experienced fatigue, calmness and withdrawal, which usually occurs in students’ free time. • Calibrating boredom is a moderately unpleasant state of dispersed thoughts wandering off the topic being discussed, the content addressed in the classroom, or the materials used to illustrate it. Students who experience this boredom subtype do not like the situation they are in and need to change it but they are at a loss not knowing how to attain this goal. • Searching boredom is an unpleasant experience of restless yet creative students who are determined to change the situation they found themselves in. As a result, they actively seek opportunities for doing something else, including hobbies and more involving activities. • Reactant boredom is a strongly unpleasant and aversive emotion typical of students who desperately want to find a way to avoid it, whose arousal levels are high, and who may, as a result, act in an angry or even aggressive manner. However, unlike students experiencing searching boredom, instead of looking for more interesting things to do, they tend to deflect blame for being bored onto different external factors, such as, for instance, the teacher, the topic, the materials employed in the classroom, the subject, or the syllabus. • Apathetic boredom is an exceptionally unpleasant experience that characterizes dissatisfied and helpless individuals whose levels of positive and negative emotions are equally low. While four of these subtypes (i.e., indifferent, calibrating, reactant and apathetic boredom) alienate students from their passions, interests and desires, searching boredom seems to offer them a chance to discover or realize their goals and think how they could accomplish them. In other words, searching boredom may serve the function of a motivating force which is likely to trigger a need for meaningful engagement (van Tilburg & Igou, 2011).

1.5 The Antecedents of Boredom Boredom can be traced back to a wide array of factors which have been discussed by a number of models and theories discussed in the present section. They provide a psychologically relevant explanation why some students may be withdrawn from tasks and activities perceived by others as interesting and, as a result, they may refuse to invest the necessary effort in trying to perform them. These theoretical positions are explained in some detail below: • The under-stimulation model (Larson & Richards, 1991) shows boredom as emerging from a paucity of new stimuli that could encourage students to actively seek new facts and investigate the world around them. In other words, if students are taught by being told what to do and/or by memorizing rather than by being given problems to solve in their own trial-and-error way, they are likely to switch off, which triggers boredom.

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• The forced-effort model (Hill & Perkins, 1985; Pekrun et al., 2010) posits that boredom results from being compelled to invest mental energy in doing tasks which are regarded as monotonous, repetitive and lacking in challenge. This mainly happens when the teacher acts as a controller, according students very few or no opportunities to take charge of their own learning. • The attentional theory of boredom proneness (Carriere, Cheyne, & Smilek, 2008; Cheyne, Carriere, & Smilek, 2006; Eastwood, Cavaliere, Fahlman, & Eastwood, 2007; Fisher, 1993; Harris, 2000; LePera, 2011) asserts that boredom is the consequence of an individual’s difficulty in taking attentional control over the task at hand. To be more precise, if a given task does not meet students’ interests, concerns or expectations, they will have to generate self-sustained attention, which will give them the impression that time is slowing down, thus contributing to the experience of boredom. This theory clearly shows that inattention can be viewed not only as one of the components of boredom (Fahlman, 2009) but also as its cause. Failure to engage attentional processes may exert a negative impact on learners’ motivation as well as diminishing their persistence in task performance. For this reason, particular importance needs to be attached to fostering self-awareness of attention as a way of helping students overcome boredom-related problems (Damrad-Frye & Laird, 1989; Eastwood et al., 2012). • The control-value theory of achievement emotions (Pekrun, 2006; Pekrun et al., 2010; Tulis & Fulmer, 2013) proposes that students’ emotional experiences, including boredom, are predicted by their appraisals of control that they have over a given task and the value that they attribute to it. If no value or valance is perceived in the completion of this task and if learners feel obliged to do it regardless of whether they like it or not, then the most likely outcome will be the emergence of boredom with its avoidance behaviors, passivity and reduction of cognitive focus. It has to be stressed that a lack of perceived intrinsic value of the task being performed, connected with its uninvolving and uninteresting nature, is more influential for the instigation of boredom than failure to see its extrinsic benefits. • The emotion theory (Eastwood et al., 2007, 2012) stipulates that an important antecedent of boredom may be an individual’s alexithymic inability to identify, access, understand and communicate their own feelings. This emotional unawareness, typical of externally oriented students, makes the learning process a strenuous and unrewarding experience fraught with difficulties in diagnosing one’s problems as well as finding effective solutions. • The Menton Theory of Boredom (Davies & Fortney, 2012) indicates that cognitive processing necessary for task performance requires the use of mental energy units, referred to as mentons, and that boredom can be caused not only when an individual has a surplus of mentons but also when their number is insufficient. More specifically, students can be bored as a result of being exposed to over-challenging as well as under-challenging tasks, in which case boredom has a positive function of motivating them to seek new incentives for action and therefore constructively use the excess energy at their disposal.

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• The dimensional model (Pekrun et al., 2010) focuses not only upon the deactivating quality of boredom, but also upon its activating potential. More specifically, in some circumstances, when, for example, students have been bored for too long, their activity levels may display a rising tendency in response to their attempts to sustain attention or combat frustration at being unable to change the situation. In this sense, boredom can be again viewed as serving a motivating function of helping students persist in completing the assigned task (Tulis & Fulmer, 2013). Boredom can also be connected with a lack of meaning in learning, which entails an inability to set one’s own goals and which is likely to result in lower levels of selfregulation or diminished readiness to plan, monitor, control and reflect on one’s own actions (Arsenio & Loria, 2014; Grund, Brassier, & Fries, 2014; Wolters & Taylor, 2012; Zimmerman, 1998). If school tasks are situationally meaningless, having little or no relationship to real-life contexts, students will perceive them as boring and undeserving of their perseverance or engagement (Eastwood et al., 2012; Yeager et al., 2014).

1.6 Dis/Engagement in Relation to Boredom One of the crucial components of boredom is disengagement, which results in lower performance, thus impeding the learning process (Fahlman, 2009; Pekrun et al., 2010). Bored students switch off and avoid participating in activities, even though others may regard them as satisfying (Martin, Anderson, Bobis, Way, & Vellar, 2012; Schreck, 2011). Because preventing disengagement is usually considered to be synonymous with overcoming boredom (Macklem, 2015), it is worthwhile to discuss the nature of the former, which, however, would be difficult without first addressing of the concept of engagement. Engagement is what educational psychology currently focuses on and what represents one of its leading research topics (Sinatra, Heddy, & Lombardi, 2015). It can be defined as an intense experience of simultaneous concentration on, interest in and enjoyment of the task at hand (Shernoff, 2013), which contributes to active and effortful involvement (participation) in it (Appleton, Christenson, & Furlong, 2008; Fredricks, Blumenfeld, & Paris, 2004). While many educational psychologists view engagement as enabling meaningful learning in all possible contexts (Christenson, Reschly, & Wylie, 2012; Pekrun & Linnenbrink-Garcia, 2012; Shernoff, 2013), applied linguists (e.g., Mercer & Dörnyei, 2020) posit that it plays an even more important role in the L2 classroom where a lot of emphasis is placed on communication skills whose development necessitates active involvement. Given the unique, face-threatening nature of the L2 learning process, it may be a formidable challenge for teachers to encourage student engagement. Engagement is a multifaceted phenomenon and an indispensable part of the learning process. This disposition relies on a number of factors, such as effort and prosocial actions (i.e., behavioral engagement), high levels of enthusiasm entailing

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low levels of anxiety and boredom (i.e., emotional engagement), learning strategy use and self-regulation (i.e., cognitive engagement), and/or conscious attempts to enrich one’s learning experience (i.e., agentic engagement) (Finn & Zimmer, 2012; Mahatmya, Lohman, Matjasko, & Farb, 2012; Veiga, Reeve, Wentzel, & Robu, 2014). In this way, “the soft skills of engagement” (Schreck, 2011, p. 4) can be associated with meaningful learning that goes hand in hand with active participation in task performance, which in turn is conducive to achieving success in SLA. Of all the four aspects of engagement indicated above, the most crucial for the language classroom is the behavioral one as it is directly connected with the actual, here-and-now realization of an individual’s learning potential (Dörnyei, 2019; Oga-Baldwin, 2019). It is also possible to distinguish two different dimensions of engagement, internal and external. The former is the amount of time and effort expended by an individual in the learning process, whereas the latter involves the measures taken at the institutional level to handle its resources and organize the curriculum as well as other learning options and support services intended to encourage participation in activities believed to result in expected outcomes (e.g., persistence and satisfaction) (Harper & Quay, 2009; Kuh, 2009; Kuh, Klinzie, Buckley, Bridges, & Hayek, 2006). Although not very firmly grounded in SLA literature, the notion of engagement was discussed a decade ago by such scholars as Ellis (2010) in relation to corrective feedback and Svalberg (2009) in relation to language awareness. The reason why engagement deserves a lot of attention from teachers and researchers is that it serves as a behavioral means of realizing students’ motivation and as such it may directly contribute to their development (Jang, Reeve, & Deci, 2010). Participatory engagement is likely to protect their motivation from possible distractions and make them perceive encountered obstacles as worth tackling and overcoming. Since the nature of such engagement is concrete and straightforward, teachers can initiate and regulate it as well as observe how well they have done in this respect. Encouraging active involvement in the L2 classroom is an opportunity for preventing disruptive behaviors and reducing negative emotions, such as anxiety, frustration and boredom. While engagement is a manifestation of motivation, boredom is overtly revealed by disengagement, which is why the latter condition deserves serious consideration below. Disengagement represents the flip side of engagement that refers to the learner’s withdrawal from active participation in the task at hand because of the inability to derive pleasure, interest and/or satisfaction from it (Henry & Thorsen, 2018; Macklem, 2015). Disengagement is a condition akin to amotivation, because it comprises a complete lack of effort, alienation from one’s desires and passions, as well as feeling discouraged from getting involved in the learning environment, perceived as impoverished (Skinner, Kindermann, Connell, & Wellborn, 2009). Disengagement decreases positive emotions, increases helplessness and has a negative effect on self-esteem and self-regulated learning (Lam, Wong, Yang, & Lui, 2012; Peterson, Maier, & Seligman, 1993). In effect, disengaged students either resort to avoidance behaviors or seek ways to change the frustrating situation, depending on their individual characteristics as well as environmental factors. Once disengaged, students feel stuck in the present, distracted and reluctant to go on doing the task at

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hand, which altogether contributes to the experience of boredom (Daschmann et al., 2011). Some authors (e.g., Skinner, 2016; Skinner, Kindermann, & Furrer, 2009) assert that disengagement in its pure form does not occur too frequently in formal school settings which, due to various institutional restrictions, are not particularly conducive to total non-commitment. This is why rather than speaking of disengagement that refers to more extreme behaviors, they prefer to use the term disaffection which, being marked by disinterest, apathy, resignation and reduced effort, better specifies what may go on in the classroom. Looking at boredom through the lens of disengagement and its weaker variant (disaffection) may enhance our understanding of this complex emotion and allow handling it in a more systematic, psychologically relevant way.

1.7 Ways of Coping with Boredom in Educational Settings Careful analysis of the models and theories elaborating on the antecedents of boredom discussed in this chapter seems a good point of departure for indicating remedial actions that can be taken by teachers and students who are determined to confront this perplexing experience. In order to successfully address the causes of boredom and come up with a tentative list of ideas for intervention, it is necessary to take into account the types of proposed activities, the learning environment, individual students together with their expectations, abilities and preferences, and the intricate interplay between learners and their environment (Fisher, 1993). Although the ideas outlined in this section derive for the most part from the field of educational psychology, many of them are likely to be relevant to battling boredom in L2 teaching and learning, which will be the focus of Chapter Two. Daniels et al. (2015) and Nett et al. (2010) distinguish and comment on three boredom-coping profiles classifying students as evaders, criticizers and reappraisers. Evaders typically fall back upon avoidance strategies which help them escape participation in uninteresting or unchallenging tasks and find other things to do. Criticizers’ disapproving attitude to boredom is reflected in their attempts to reduce its level by pinning the blame for their condition on the teacher. As regards reappraisers, they are the most reflective group, viewing boredom as an internally determined condition and intending to extend control over a given task by incorporating its content into their value system, which would enable them to re-engage with the material being covered. Some authors (e.g., Eastwood et al., 2007, 2012; Weinerman & Kenner, 2016) point to developing boredom awareness as one of the crucial responsibilities of a present-day teacher who, given that this negative emotion is common to most students in virtually all learning environments (Goetz et al., 2014; Pekrun et al., 2010), should even arrange a class in which boredom would be openly discussed rather than treating this unfavorable condition as a taboo topic. Training students in boredom-focused mindfulness (Feldman & Kuyken, 2019), which would enable them to accept a temporary lack of stimulation, and better understand their own feelings and needs, is

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an opportunity for them to attend to activities with more intentionality, equanimity, perseverance and engagement (Eastwood et al., 2007). An important recommendation is that the teacher should give students choices connected with who they will work with or what topics they will discuss so that they can feel more in control of the learning process and, as a result, more motivated to participate in classroom activities and persist in the tasks they are assigned (Caldwell et al., 1999; Patall, 2013). Boredom can also be reduced by the enhancement of mastery goals which are beyond immediate reach and, as such, push students towards excellence showing them the real value of effort and progress, and enabling them to realize the role of self-regulation strategies in the learning process. Individuals who set and pursue mastery goals are less prone to give up in adverse circumstances and at the same time more determined to search for task-related self-improvement (Ames, 1992; Furner & Gonzalez-DeHass, 2011; Mattern, 2005; Pekrun, 2006; Turner & Husman, 2008). Another factor likely to lower students’ boredom levels and also positively impact the emotional climate in the classroom is teacher enthusiasm about the content of classes and their academic value as well as respect for students’ needs and attitudes (Frenzel, Pekrun, & Goetz, 2007; Gregory, Allen, Mikami, Hafen, & Pianta, 2014). What else needs to be mentioned is the provision of appropriate, positive affective feedback as a means of addressing students’ appraisals and thus helping them believe in their own abilities, which may encourage them to seek opportunities for combating boredom (Goetz et al., 2010; Pekrun, 2006). Last but not least, all kinds of proactive, learner-centered interventions have to be emphasized as conducive to enhancing engagement and hence promoting meaningful, hands-on contexts with the challenge set at the right level (Prince, 2004; Smith & Cardaciotto, 2011).

1.8 Conclusion As has been repeatedly shown throughout this chapter, boredom remains an insufficiently understood and researched learner variable when it comes to educational settings in general and the L2 classroom in particular. It has also been demonstrated that, although silent and elusive, boredom is a deleterious, distressing and debilitating emotion with serious implications for students who find the learning environment unchallenging and unrewarding. On the one hand, boredom is one of the greatest maladies of the modern world, while on the other, it is an essential, to some extent inherent, part of human behavior and mentality with its brighter and darker, initiativeand withdrawal-provoking sides. It is an emotion characterized by various degrees of intensity, with the effect that students may experience it in more or less un/pleasant ways. This is connected with their decision whether or not to be active and search for possibilities of actively coping with this negative condition. The complexities of the multidimensional phenomenon of boredom have been explained within the framework of a number of models and theories shedding light on its numerous antecedents,

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including, among others, a paucity of novel stimuli, excessive teacher control, situational meaninglessness, attentional constraints, and the overuse or the underuse of mental energy units. The role of many of these factors in affecting student boredom will be presented in Chapter Two devoted to an overview of the most important studies examining this construct in different educational environments with a particular focus on teaching and learning additional languages.

Chapter 2

Approaching Boredom from an Empirical Angle

2.1 Introduction The present chapter aims to provide an overview of empirical investigations into the much neglected phenomenon of boredom, first, with respect to educational psychology, and, second, in relation to L2 learning. Since this negative emotion is the most intense and the most frequently experienced in educational settings (Goetz et al., 2014; Pekrun et al., 2010) and since there is still a dearth of empirical evidence concerning this issue (Chapman, 2013; Kanevsky & Keighley, 2003; Macklem, 2015), boredom certainly calls for more research endeavors that would shed light on its numerous aspects, thus helping us more fully comprehend its complexity and multidimensionality. The attempts that have already been made with this goal in mind are described below. The overview will begin with studies where boredom was explored in contexts other than the L2 classroom, including, for instance, different school subjects and out-of-class situations. This will be followed by the discussion of the handful of studies that have addressed boredom in relation to L2 learning. First, emphasis will be placed on the few studies that have investigated this phenomenon in an indirect manner, that is, in the process of examining other variables and other facets of L2 student behavior. Second, the focus will be shifted to research projects that have addressed boredom directly, most of which have been designed and conducted by the present authors in the Polish educational context. These empirical investigations have been undertaken with the intention of directly examining this negative emotion in relation to its smallest building blocks and fluctuations observed over longer periods of time as well as developing tools that can be used to measure its levels.

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2.2 Research on Boredom in Educational Psychology Despite the pervasive, debilitating and distressing nature of boredom, which is reported to have a deleterious effect on the learning process in general (Tidwell, 1988; Wegner, Flisher, Chikobvu, Lombard, & King, 2008), little empirical attention has been given to this issue and the vast majority of studies conducted to date have adopted a quantitative design, which leaves the picture of this complex emotion incomplete (Martin et al., 2006). Nonetheless, the studies overviewed in this section shed some light on different aspects and dimensions of boredom, such as its causes, strategies that can be employed to cope with it, its place in out-of-school contexts and in learning various school subjects, or its connection with the perceived control over and value of the tasks performed. Daniels, Tze, and Goetz (2015) Ways of combating boredom caught the attention of Daniels et al. (2015) who quantitatively examined the extent to which 446 Canadian university students’ boredom coping profiles may be related to perceived causes of this emotion. The data were collected with the help of the 5-point Boredom Coping Scale (BCS) and the English version of the 5-point Precursors to Boredom Scale (E PBS) (Daschmann et al., 2011) which was used to measure eight causes of boredom, that is, over-challenge, under-challenge, lack of meaning, monotony, opportunity costs, teacher dislike, low involvement and general boredom. The analysis yielded results that were in line with Nett et al.’s (2010) distinction as all the three boredom coping profiles, that is, evaders, criticizers and reappraisers (see Sect. 1.7 in Chap. 1), were identified and significant differences for each of the eight antecedents of boredom were detected between the three groups. When it comes to more specific results that are worth highlighting, evaders were found to link their boredom to as many as seven causes, which implies that, with the increase of the number of its precursors, students become determined to deal with this problematic emotion by resorting to avoidance behaviors. It was also observed that the students who perceived their boredom as a permanent condition were more likely to represent the evader or criticizer profile. The respondents who indicated a smaller number of reasons for boredom, usually excluding over-challenge, teacher dislike, lack of involvement or lack of meaning, were more likely to be classified as reappraisers. Finally, teacher dislike was the only antecedent of boredom that distinguished criticizers and evaders differently from reappraisers. Malkovsky, Merrifield, Goldberg, and Danckert (2012) Malkovsky et al. (2012) set out to quantitatively investigate the relationship between boredom proneness, sustained attention and adult symptoms of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). A total of 48 Canadian university undergraduates participated in this study and its data were collected by means of five questionnaires, including the Boredom Proneness Scale (Farmer & Sundberg, 1986), the Mindful Attention and Awareness Scale (Brown & Ryan, 2003), the Attention-Related Cognitive Errors Scale (Cheyne et al., 2006), the Conners’ Adult ADHD Rating Scale-Short Version (Conners, Erhardt, & Sparrow, 2003), and the 7-item depression subscale

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of the Depression Anxiety Stress Scale (Antony, Bieling, Cox, Murray, & Swinson, 1998). The findings demonstrated that boredom proneness can be divided into two separate types: (1) an apathetic boredom-prone state, which characterizes individuals who lack motivation to engage in particular tasks, and (2) an agitated boredom-prone state, which relates to those individuals who lack satisfaction, even though they are motivated to get involved in learning activities. Apathetic boredom proneness was found to negatively correlate to attentional control, while agitated boredom proneness was shown to be negatively associated with sensitivity to errors and positively associated with ADHD symptoms. Pekrun, Goetz, Daniels, Stupnisky, and Perry (2010) Drawing on the control-value theory of achievement emotions (Pekrun, 2006), Pekrun et al. (2010) conducted a series of five exploratory, cross-sectional and predictive studies aimed at examining appraisal antecedents and performance outcomes of achievement-related boredom with regard to the university students recruited from two different cultural settings of North America and Germany. Using a wide range of data-gathering tools, such as a modified version of the Learning-Related Boredom Scale of the Achievement Emotions Questionnaire (Pekrun, Goetz, Titz, & Perry, 2002), slightly altered scales from the Learning Strategies Questionnaire (Wild & Schiefele, 1994), the Perceived Academic Control Scale (Perry, Hladkyj, Pekrun, & Pelletier, 2001), and open-ended descriptions of experienced emotions, the researchers depicted achievement-related boredom as an unpleasant, deactivating emotion associated with low-value and low-control conditions. It was also reported to contribute to attention deficits as well as to negatively correlate to effort, perceived self-regulation of learning, motivational engagement and academic performance. What consistently connects all these five studies is that the perceived lack of control over particular activities and failure to attach value to those activities function as antecedents of student boredom, which allows some degree of generalizability across different cultural contexts. Dettmers, Trautwein, Lüdtke, Goetz, Frenzel, and Pekrun (2011) Dettmers et al. (2011) conducted a two-wave longitudinal study aimed at investigating the antecedents and consequences of emotions and academic effort when performing homework assignments in the domain of math. The participants were 3483 German high school students who completed a 4-point Likert-type questionnaire intended to measure a number of variables such as, for example, perceived quality of homework task selection, perceived homework challenge, homework behavior and homework emotions, including enjoyment, anger, anxiety and boredom. The results demonstrated that the experience of unpleasant homework emotions negatively correlated with homework effort and that a high perceived homework challenge was positively associated with these emotions. At the same time, there was a negative correlation between high perceived quality of homework task selection and unpleasant emotions related to the completion of these tasks. Dettmers et al. (2011) conclude that these negative emotions in the case of math can be successfully coped with if teachers

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prepare interesting, yet not too challenging, homework assignments that are inherently linked to and that reinforce what has been done or is currently being done in the classroom. Finally, it has to be stressed that in this study a general homework emotions scale was used, and, therefore, it was not possible for the researchers to report findings for discrete emotions’ variability in relation to homework quality and achievement outcomes. Goetz, Nett, Martiny, Hall, Pekrun, Dettmers, and Trautwein (2012) In their quantitative study, carried out among 553 8th- and 11th-grade German high school students, Goetz et al. (2012) examined the academic emotions of enjoyment, pride, anxiety, anger and boredom in the homework context, and juxtaposed them with the ones experienced in class. In addition, both in-school and out-ofschool contexts were assessed separately for the subject domains of mathematics, physics, German and English. The analysis of the data obtained through a modified version of the Achievement Emotions Questionnaire (Pekrun, Goetz, & Frenzel, 2005) and the German version of the Self -Description Questionnaire (Goetz et al., 2010; Marsh, 1990) showed that homework- and class-related emotions were conceptually distinguishable and that the relationship between emotions experienced in the classroom and self-concept were stronger than in the case of those manifested when performing homework assignments. Also, greater domain-specificity was found for older students both in homework-based and classroom-related situations, indicating that their academic emotions were clearly linked to specific subjects. Shaw, Caldwell, and Kleiber (1996) The main goal of the study conducted by Shaw et al. (1996), which used a combination of quantitative and qualitative methodologies, was to investigate the extent to which adolescents experience boredom, time stress and lack of choice (absence of control) in their everyday lives, including in-school and out-of-school contexts, with a specific focus on the latter. The full student sample was comprised of 93 Canadian 10-graders who participated in a survey and a semi-structured interview, with the results in both cases revealing that the majority of them experienced at least a certain amount of boredom in school as well as in non-school situations. When it comes to inschool boredom, it proved to be a form of resistance to adult-structured activities and it most often took the form of avoiding participation in them. Although the students perceived others’ control as higher in the classroom than outside school, they complained about having to meet others’ expectations in out-of-school settings as well. In this case, boredom can be viewed as related to a rejection of taking part in “adult” free-time activities and pleasing other people rather than themselves. Boredom was also found to be positively associated with time stress in the two contexts as the respondents reported feeling bored when being under the pressure of classwork and homework deadlines. It is worth highlighting that in-school boredom was associated with specific subjects, being the most frequently experienced in the case of history, followed by English and math. In regard to the reasons for finding some subjects more boring than others, the participants referred to teaching style but also content, particularly when it carried little practical meaning in real life.

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Nett, Goetz, and Hall (2011) Nett et al.’s (2011) quantitative research project was intended to examine 537 German high school students’ use of boredom-coping strategies at trait and state levels when learning math. The analysis of the data derived from a trait self-report questionnaire enabled the researchers to identify two boredom-coping profiles of the participants. These were similar to the ones proposed by Nett et al. (2010) and mentioned in Sect. 1.7 of Chap. 1, with the students being classified into evaders and reappraisers, the latter reporting lower levels of boredom. Using an experience sampling method for state levels, Nett et al. (2011) demonstrated that cognitive-approach strategies were more often adopted by the respondents than behavioral-approach strategies. More specifically, the students’ responses were indicative of attempts to directly “attack” the problem and change their thinking in response to the situation they found themselves in. Generally, the participants’ behavior was shown to be more determined by situational than dispositional factors, which led the researchers to stress the importance of the classroom environment in potentially reducing the levels of student boredom. Mann and Robinson (2009) Mann and Robinson’s (2009) quantitative study aimed to identify the factors contributing to and moderating the experience of 211 British university students’ boredom as well as to identify its consequences and strategies used for coping with it. The data were gleaned from the shortened version of the 5-point Likert-type Boredom Proneness Scale (Farmer & Sundberg, 1986) and a set of queries referring to various details connected with participants’ perception of lectures they attended (e.g., the teaching methods, the amount of time assessed as boring) as well as the boredom-coping strategies they elected to resort to. The results demonstrated that for over 50% of the respondents the lectures were boring half the time, whereas 30% of them indicated that lectures were boring in their entirety. As for the factors responsible for student boredom, they included laboratory work, computer sessions and the use of PowerPoint without handouts, the inclusion of which, interestingly, was found to reduce the mean boredom ratings. It is also noteworthy that the level of boredom significantly correlated with the grade point average and that general boredom proneness turned out to be the most important factor moderating the students’ experience of this negative emotion. As far as the consequences of being bored are concerned, they encompassed missing future lectures and falling back on different short-term, adaptive and maladaptive coping strategies, such as, for instance, day-dreaming, doodling, chatting or texting with friends. Baker, D’Mello, Rodrigo, and Graesser (2010) Yet another quantitative study which deserves attention was focused on boredom in relation to computer-based learning. It was conducted by Baker et al. (2010), who examined the incidence, persistence and impact of the cognitive-affective states of boredom and other achievement emotions (i.e., frustration, confusion, engaged concentration, delight, surprise) experienced by 240 high school and university students from the Philippines and the US in three different computerized learning

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environments, expected to arouse participants’ interest. Using quantitative field observations and self-reports, the researchers demonstrated that while the most commonly occurring state was engaged concentration, it was boredom that turned out to be the most persistent emotion and the one most likely to lead the students to game the system. They also came to the conclusion that, once students have succumbed to boredom, it is difficult for them to get rid of this emotion, which led them to emphasize the importance of seeking ways to prevent boredom in the first place.

2.3 Research on Boredom in L2 Learning The empirical investigations of boredom experienced in the process of L2 learning and teaching, still few in number, can be divided into two main categories, in which this underappreciated and insufficiently understood phenomenon is addressed as an indirect or direct object of study. More precisely, in the first case, boredom is referred to in a meaningful though marginal way, somewhat as a by-product of examining other aspects of L2 instruction (e.g., authentic materials, grammar teaching, demotivation). When it comes to the second category, it includes studies primarily concerned with boredom which address it from a wider perspective, examining its multiple facets, antecedents and changes as well as interactions with other variables. Such studies often strive to combine quantitative and qualitative techniques of data collection and analysis, thus representing a mixed-methods approach (Creswell & Creswell, 2017).

2.3.1 Boredom as an Indirect Object of Study Although not primarily concerned with boredom, the studies discussed in this section provide valuable insights into the behaviors, expectations and reactions of individuals who perceive certain activities, materials or target language (TL) skills and subsystems as not entirely involving, challenging or useful. Peacock (1997) The aim of Peacock’s (1997) 7-week, mixed-methods classroom-based research project was to examine the effect of authentic materials on the motivation of L2 learners in a more situated manner. The research project involved 31 (13 females and 18 males) beginner-level Korean university EFL students with the help of two types of observation sheets, meant to: (1) quantify student on-task behavior, and (2) assess general class motivation with respect to the materials used, as well as a structured self-report learner questionnaire, and post-class interviews. While the results derived from both observation sheets revealed that the exposure to authentic materials significantly increased the participants’ on-task behavior, the students, somewhat surprisingly, found them to be significantly more boring than artificial materials.

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As pointed out by Peacock (1997), this implies that being more motivated does not necessarily entail being more interested and that interest in proposed materials does not have much in common with attention, action and perseverance in performing specific learning activities. This may warrant an assumption that, for certain reasons, learners may try to conceal their negative emotions such as boredom, dissatisfaction or frustration, pretending to be engaged with the task at hand, a possibility that was confirmed in one of the studies undertaken by the present authors (Kruk & Zawodniak, 2018). Beerman and Cornjäger (2011) In their longitudinal, quantitative research project carried out among 548 teenage German L2 learners of French, Beerman and Cronjäger (2011) investigated the relationship between their perceptions of the value ascribed to French language instruction and the emotions of joy, boredom and anxiety, experienced during 3-year language study. The analysis demonstrated that whereas the participants’ favorable perceptions of French language instruction were significantly and positively related to joy, they simultaneously significantly but negatively correlated with boredom. Accordingly, it was shown that the learners’ joy and boredom followed different trajectories over the instruction period, meaning that the longer it lasted, the more bored and the less joyful the participants felt. At the same time, no significant correlation between the perceptions of the instruction provided and anxiety was reported. Jean and Simard (2011) The aim of Jean and Simard’s (2011) mixed-methods, descriptive inquiry-based study was to examine L2 learners’ and teachers’ perceptions and beliefs about different aspects of grammar instruction. The participants were 2321 Québécois high school students of L2 English and L2 French as well as 45 teachers who were asked to complete a questionnaire comprised of three parts. The first included a number of 5-point Likert-scale questions referring to grammatical accuracy in oral and written production, corrective feedback and various forms of grammar teaching and learning. The second, also using a 5-point scale, sought to provide insights into the respondents’ opinions about form-only and form-and-meaning exercises, whereas the third consisted of a few open-ended questions intended to gather additional information about their receptivity to grammar instruction. The results, which were on the whole common to both groups of respondents, showed that grammar instruction was perceived as a necessary and effective, though boring, component of L2 learning. The high school students admitted disliking it, but, at the same time, they regarded grammar as a subsystem that is worth learning. This may lead to the conclusion that if seemingly unappealing and tedious things are useful, they will not necessarily result in boredom as students will strive to activate the amount of attention necessary to engage in tasks that are likely to be rewarding in the future (cf. Eastwood et al., 2012; Pawlak, 2020b).

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Kormos and Csizér (2014) In their quantitative study, Kormos and Csizér set out to examine the effect of motivational factors and self-regulatory strategies on autonomous learning behavior in three different groups of respondents altogether comprising 638 Hungarian high school students, university students and adult learners of English as a foreign language. The analysis of the data gleaned from the questionnaire involving two scales on language learning goals and one scale on the self-image of L2 learners, showed, among other things, that, independently of the respondents’ age, there was a causal relationship between their learning effort and the ability to overcome boredom which was referred to by the researchers as satiation control. As a result, effective management of boredom, was reported to be conducive to the development of learner autonomy. Sakai and Kikuchi (2009) Sakai and Kikuchi’s (2009) quantitative study set out to investigate demotivating factors for 656 Japanese EFL senior high school students who were asked to complete a demotivation questionnaire, drawing on a 5-point Likert scale. Using a principal axis factor analysis, the authors identified five demotivation factors, such as learning contents and materials, teachers’ competence and teaching styles, inadequate school facilities, lack of intrinsic motivation and test scores. The findings indicated that for many participants the most important demotivators were test scores, the learning content, as well as instructional materials which all too often revolved around target language forms and or were reduced to coursebook-based exercises1 (cf. Kikuchi, 2015). Aubrey (2017) In his mixed-methods, quasi-experimental 2-stage, 11-week research project, Aubrey (2017) examined the effect of intercultural contact on 63 Japanese EFL university students’ experience of flow, defined as a state of complete involvement in something occurring when people are productive (Csikszentmihalyi & Rathunde, 1993),2 in the performance of five oral tasks. The students, divided into two groups, intracultural and intercultural, were asked to do five tasks, after each of which they were expected to write diaries. Using a content analysis of 208 diary entries made over a period of five weeks, the researcher demonstrated that flow-enhancing experiences of the students who participated in intercultural interactions significantly exceeded those that were detected in the intracultural group members, the most important contributors to this condition being challenge-skill balance as well as a sense of accomplishment. Although Aubrey (2017) does not explicitly address the issue of boredom, it has to be noted that creating conditions conducive to a state of flow 1 Since the learning contents and materials were found among major contributors to boredom in other

studies (Kruk & Zawodniak, 2018; Zawodniak, Kruk, & Chumas, 2017; Zawodniak & Kruk, 2018a, 2019; Peacock, 1997) and since boredom is related to decreased motivation (Preckel et al., 2010), this issue certainly deserves further consideration, especially when it comes to boredom-coping solutions (Pekrun et al., 2010). 2 Flow can be regarded as the flip side of boredom, which is why the findings emanating from this study can give some directions relating to ways of preventing this negative emotion.

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in the L2 classroom will prevent student disengagement, which is one of the most conspicuous manifestations of this aversive emotion.

2.3.2 Boredom as a Direct Object of Study This section is devoted to a discussion of the still insufficient range of qualitative, quantitative and mixed-methods studies primarily aimed at investigating boredom in the L2 classroom. These research projects approach this problematic experience from various perspectives referring to its antecedents, duration, fluctuations or relationships with other ID factors. Table 2.1 provides a brief overview of the L2 boredomspecific studies with reference to their aims and adopted instruments. These studies are described in more detail below. Chapman (2013) Chapman’s (2013) study, which used a combination of quantitative and qualitative methodology and spanned the periods of four weeks, was guided by three aims: (1) investigating the beliefs about boredom held by 57 (27 females and 30 males) second-semester students of German as a foreign language and their three teachers, (2) determining whether boredom is an inherent characteristic of German language classes, and (3) identifying and examining to the causes of this academic emotion. Quantitative research methodology drew on a number of research tools including the Attitude Motivation Test Battery (Gardner, 1985), the Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety Scale (Horwitz, Horwitz, & Cope, 1986), and the 6-point Boredom Proneness Scale (BPS) (Farmer & Sundberg, 1986). Data were also collected by means of three instruments designed by Chapman (2013), that is, the Entrance Questionnaire, the German Class Boredom Proneness Scale, constituting in fact a modified version of the BPS, and the Real-Time Boredom Questionnaire, with a 6-point scale for students and an 8-point scale for teachers. In regard to the qualitative data, they were gleaned from five interview protocols, encompassing a teacher one-on-one entrance interview protocol, a student one-on-one interview protocol, a small-group interview protocol for students, a large-group interview protocol for students and teachers, and a teacher one-on-one exit interview protocol. The students came up with a variety of ideas of what boredom feels like and looks like, referring to it, among other things, as: a desire to be elsewhere, a lack of connection to the teacher, classmates or the material, a lack of interest and engagement, or exasperation or frustration driven by language learning difficulties. The majority of the student participants perceived boredom as an inevitable part of their learning experience that has to be accepted and coped with. To a certain extent, these ideas echoed in the teachers’ beliefs about boredom which is, in their opinion, unavoidable as long as grammar has to be taught and as long as some of the learners cannot wait till a language class is over. When it comes to the factors that the students blamed for experiencing boredom, they most often involved textbook-based activities, unengaged partners and a state of being under-challenged. It is also noteworthy that Chapman classified the respondents’ “bored” behaviors into

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Table 2.1 The overview of studies investigating boredom in the L2 classroom Study

Aim(s)

Study type(s) and tool(s)

Chapman (2013)

• To investigate beliefs about boredom held by 57 students of German as a foreign language and their three teachers • To determine whether boredom is an inherent characteristic of German language class • To identify and examine the causes of boredom

• Quantitative: the Boredom Proneness Scale (BPS) (Farmer & Sundberg, 1986), the German Class Boredom Proneness Scale, the Real-Time Boredom Questionnaire • Qualitative: interview protocols (a teacher one-on-one entrance interview protocol, a student one-on-one interview protocol, a small-group interview protocol for students, a large-group interview protocol for students and teachers, a teacher one-on-one exit interview protocol)

Kruk (2016a)

• To examine the changing nature of boredom experienced by 32 male senior high school students • To examine the antecedents of boredom

• Quantitative: the Boredom Proneness Scale (Farmer & Sundberg, 1986), the English Classroom Boredom Proneness Scale (ECBPS), the English Classroom Boredom Grid (ECBG), the Overall Assessment Scale (OAC) • Qualitative: in-class observation, teacher notes and lesson plans

Kruk (2016b)

• To examine fluctuations in the The three-part session log: levels of boredom, alongside • Quantitative: part one (the motivation and anxiety, participants’ names, session date, its experienced by 16 female topic and aim), part two (three grids English majors during their intended to self-rate levels of visits to Second Life (SL) boredom, motivation and anxiety at regular intervals on a 7-point scale) • Qualitative: part three (descriptions of visits to SL and plans for the nearest future in SL)

Kruk and Zawodniak (2017)

• To investigate the link • Quantitative: the Boredom Proneness between general boredom Scale (Farmer & Sundberg, 1986), susceptibility and boredom the Boredom in Practical English experienced in practical Language Classes Questionnaire English classes by 174 (BPELCQ) • Qualitative: descriptions of English majors • To identify the antecedents of boredom-generating situations boredom (continued)

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Table 2.1 (continued) Study

Aim(s)

Zawodniak, Kruk, and Chumas (2017)

• To examine boredom • Qualitative: a diary (6–10 entries experienced by 30 English over within 2 months) majors in different content subjects and language classes to provide possible reasons for its occurrence • To indicate possible reasons for boredom

Study type(s) and tool(s)

Dumanˇci´c (2018)

• To identify the causes of boredom experienced by 38 Croatian EFL teachers • To examine their most common manifestations of boredom • To examine boredom-coping strategies adopted by those teachers • To examine the effect of teacher boredom on the instructional quality

• Qualitative: a 5-item open-ended survey

Palm, Poveda, and Harutyanyan (2018)

• To evaluate the tools for examining boredom experienced by 34 Ecuadorian EFL students

• Ethnographic study (participant classroom observation, video recording, boredom logs and the teacher’s fieldwork journal)

Kruk and Zawodniak (2018)

• To examine student boredom in practical English classes with respect to its causes, changes in its intensity, ways of manifesting it and coping with it • To examine differences between the experience of boredom in practical English classes and other academic subjects

• Qualitative: semi-structured interviews

Zawodniak and Kruk (2018a)

• To comparatively investigate • A mixed-methods retrospective the levels of boredom study: the two-part questionnaire experienced over a period of (part 1—L2, part 2—L3) intended to three semesters by four investigate boredom at three points in English majors learning the time (the beginning, middle and end L2 (English) and the L3 of each of the three semesters) and (German and French) specify its levels on a 7-point scale • To indicate the antecedents of boredom (continued)

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Table 2.1 (continued) Study

Aim(s)

Study type(s) and tool(s)

Zawodniak and Kruk (2018b)

• To examine the influence of four female English majors’ visits to SL on fluctuations in the levels of their boredom, motivation and anxiety • To examine the reasons for these fluctuations

The three-part session log (Kruk, 2016b) • Quantitative: the assessment questionnaire • Qualitative: a brief justification for students’ evaluation

Kruk (2019)

• To examine two English • A mixed-methods study: the majors’ willingness to three-part session log communicate, motivation, boredom and language anxiety during single visits to Second Life and from one visit to another • to examine the relationship between these ID variables • To pinpoint possible predictors of their fluctuations

Zawodniak and Kruk (2019)

• To examine differences in the • A mixed-methods retrospective levels of boredom study: a questionnaire meant to experienced by two groups of measure boredom in a long-term 44 third-year students of perspective (from primary school up English and German to university-level education) at three • To identify factors points in time (the starting, mid- and responsible for boredom in ending parts of each of these stages) learning English and German and to specify boredom levels on a 6-point scale

Kruk and Zawodniak (2020)

• To comparatively examine 30 • A mixed-methods retrospective English majors’ study: the Language Learning three-semester experience of Boredom in Retrospect Questionnaire boredom in learning English (LLBR) meant to examine students’ (L2) and German (L3) with boredom at three different points in regard to changes in its levels time (i.e., beginning, middle, end) over the course of a semester during each of the three semesters and from one semester to and to rate it on a 7-point scale another • To examine reasons for these changes (continued)

active (e.g., searching the planner for upcoming deadlines in other classes, reading ahead in the textbook, making weekend plans, making grocery lists) and passive (e.g., zoning out, playing with the phone, biting fingernails).

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Table 2.1 (continued) Study

Aim(s)

Study type(s) and tool(s)

Pawlak, Zawodniak, • To investigate the • A mixed-methods study: background and Kruk (2020a) self-reported levels of questionnaire, the Boredom in boredom of three advanced Practical English Language Classes learners of English in a Questionnaire (BPELC), in-class sequence of three English boredom questionnaire, the lesson lessons plan • To investigate the relationship between the three students’ general proneness to boredom and the boredom they experienced in the three classes in question • To identify factors that influence the trajectories of self-reported boredom experience Pawlak, Kruk, Zawodniak, and Pasikowski (2020)

• To identify factors underlying • Quantitative: the Boredom Proneness boredom in the L2 classroom Scale (Farmer & Sundberg, 1986), • To investigate the mediating the Boredom in Practical English effects of general boredom Language Classes proneness and attainment Questionnaire—Revised (BPELC-R)

Pawlak, Kruk, and Zawodniak (2020)

• To investigate the trajectories • A mixed-methods study: the of boredom displayed in a Boredom in Practical English single practical English class Classes Questionnaire (BPELC), by 11 English majors at in-class boredom questionnaire (a university level self-report boredom grid, an • To investigate causes of open-ended query, a semantic boredom differential scale)

Pawlak, Zawodniak, • To investigate differences in and Kruk (2020b) the levels of boredom manifested in practical English classes by 111 2ndand 3rd-year English majors, both overall and with respect to specific factors • To examine the possible causes of boredom

• Quantitative: the Boredom in Practical English Language Classes Questionnaire (BPELC)

Kruk (2016a) In his first study, being of quantitative nature and concentrating on 8 classes conducted over the period of 3 weeks, Kruk (2016a) examined the fluctuating nature of boredom as experienced by 32 second- and fourth-grade male students learning English in senior high school and its antecedents. As regards the data-gathering tools, they were divided into two sets, the first of which was administered to the participants prior to the study, while the second was employed during the actual lessons under investigation. As for the former, it encompassed the Boredom Proneness Scale (Farmer & Sundberg, 1986), comprised of 28 7-point Likert-scale items (1—strongly disagree,

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7—strongly agree), and the English Classroom Boredom Proneness Scale (ECBPS), which was a modified version of the BPS in the sense that general statements were transformed into items specifically referring to the L2 classroom experience. Moving on to the latter set of data-collection instruments, it included the English Classroom Boredom Grid (ECBG), the Overall Assessment Scale (OAC), class observations, teacher notes and lesson plans. The first of them, the ECBG, was intended to measure the levels of boredom indicated by the students four times in the course of a lesson on a 7-point scale, whereas the OAC, which was a modified version of the tool applied by Peacock (1997) and Pawlak (2012), required participants to assess each lesson with respect to seven items on a semantic differential scale (e.g., interesting vs. boring, pleasant vs. unpleasant, monotonous vs. absorbing), which was subsequently converted into a 7-point Likert scale. Finally, in-class observations and teacher notes performed a descriptive function in relation to the students’ behaviors without excessively interfering with the events they had been engaged in. The analysis of obtained data revealed the respondents’ boredom as constantly being in a state of flux in some of the classes and in a state of relative stability during others. The appearance of this negative emotion was attributed to such factors as the topics discussed, activity types, especially those connected with grammar, the experience of being over-challenged, students’ individual characteristics, as well as their susceptibility to boredom in general and in the L2 classroom in particular. Kruk (2016b) The next study conducted by Kruk (2016b) was a one-semester, mixed-methods longitudinal project which aimed to examine fluctuations in the levels of boredom, alongside such ID factors as motivation and anxiety, experienced by 16 female English majors while visiting an online environment constituted by Second Life (SL), and to identify the main causes of the changes observed. The data were collected through the three-part session log filled out by the respondents before, during and after each visit to SL. The first part was completed with the participants’ name, session date, its topic and aim, while the second part comprised three grids, where the students were requested to self-rate their levels of boredom, motivation and anxiety at seven-minute intervals on a 7-point scale (1—minimum, 7—maximum) as well as to specify the amount of time spent in this virtual world during each session. As regards the third part of the session log, it required the students to describe what they were doing in SL, indicate the possible learning benefits reaped during a particular session and plan what they would do in SL in the nearest future. Quantitative analysis of the self-ratings revealed dynamically changing levels of boredom and motivation, with to the former tending to increase and the latter to decrease over time, whereas anxiety levels remained relatively stable. As for the factors responsible for the diminution in boredom levels, they included the students’ willingness to use SL as a tool enabling them to practice the L2 with enjoyment while communicating with its residents, explore the world, freely choose a conversation topic or autonomously set goals for every single visit to this online environment. Kruk also singled out the reasons for occasional increases in the level of observed boredom, involving reluctance to engage in conversations displayed by some of the SL users,

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unwillingness to interact with rude or aggressive residents of this virtual world as well as problems with being understood by others. Kruk and Zawodniak (2017) The focus of the mixed-methods study carried out in the Polish educational context by Kruk and Zawodniak (2017) was to explore the relationship between general boredom susceptibility and boredom experienced in practical English classes by 174 English majors (125 females and 49 males) as well as to identify the causes of this negative emotion. The data were derived from the Boredom Proneness Scale (Farmer & Sundberg, 1986), already adopted by Kruk (2016a) in one of his earlier studies, the Boredom in Practical English Language Classes Questionnaire (BPELCQ), which was a modified version of the BPS, composed of 27 statements allowing assessment of boredom experienced in learning various components of the L2 (e.g., pronunciation, grammar, conversation, writing), and descriptions of boredom-generating situations, connected with classes in which general TL skills were developed. The findings provided evidence for a significant, positive correlation between general boredom proneness and the boredom reported in the case of practical English classes which tended to grow in intensity with the passing of time. In regard to the factors responsible for student boredom, they encompassed the repetitiveness and monotony of the activities included in specific classes, failure to match the level of challenge to the participants’ L2 proficiency, the teacher. as well as modes of work offered to/imposed on the students. Zawodniak, Kruk, and Chumas (2017) The qualitative study conducted by Zawodniak et al. (2017) aimed to examine the emotion of boredom experienced by 30 English majors (28 females and 2 males) in different content subjects and language classes, and to provide possible reasons for its occurrence. The main data-gathering tool was a diary in which the participants were supposed to make six to ten entries over a period of two months, commenting on L2 learning situations which made them feel either particularly involved, enthusiastic and excited or discouraged, dissatisfied and disillusioned. Qualitative analysis of the collected data consisted in the identification of recurring patterns found in the diary entries which drew on the procedures of data reduction, data display, conclusion drawing and verification recommended by Miles and Huberman (1994). The results of this analysis showed that the students experienced less boredom in language classes than during the ones devoted to content subjects, some of which lacked meaning and were, to their disappointment, taught mainly in their mother tongue rather than the TL. As regards the causes of boredom mentioned and complained about by the respondents, they comprised predictable and under-challenging activities, an insufficient amount of explicit instruction and corrective feedback, information overload as well as inadequate teacher engagement and support. Dumanˇci´c (2018) The qualitative study conducted by Dumanˇci´c aimed to identify the antecedents of 38 Croatian EFL teachers’ boredom, to investigate its most common manifestations, to

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gain an insight into the respondents’ ways of regulating this problematic emotion and to examine the relationship between boredom and their instructional quality. Using the data obtained from a five-item, open-ended questionnaire developed with reliance on other tools intended for measuring L2 student boredom (Chahkandi, Rasekh, & Tavakoli, 2016; Kruk & Zawodniak, 2018), the researcher indicated uninvolving teaching content, grammar exercises, student assessment, behavior, knowledge and motivation as the main causes of boredom. As for teacher manifestations of boredom, they were categorized into four groups: cognitive (e.g., lack of creativity and/or imagination, insufficient concentration), expressive (e.g., facial expressions, postures), motivational (e.g., loss of enthusiasm and/or interest), no overt signs of boredom and no boredom experienced. With regard to a repertoire of boredom-coping strategies adopted by the teachers, they included, for instance, physical activity, cognitive change or engaging students. Finally, it is noteworthy that the majority of the teachers did not perceive the instructional quality of their work as influenced by their experience of boredom. Palm, Poveda, and Harutyanyan (2018) Palm, Poveda and Harutyanyan’s ethnographic study, carried out in the Ecuadorian learning environment, was meant to gain a deeper insight into a variety of tools intended to examine the phenomenon of boredom in relation to 34 students of English as a foreign language attending one of the private universities in Ecuador. The tools that were subjected to the researchers’ close scrutiny encompassed participant classroom observation, video recording, boredom logs and the teacher’s fieldwork journal. Obtained findings revealed an urgent need for modifying the existing observation instruments and recommendations were made for using mixed-methods approaches. Kruk and Zawodniak (2018) In another qualitative study, involving a sample of 15 participants (12 females and 3 males) taken from their earlier research projects (Kruk & Zawodniak, 2017), Kruk and Zawodniak (2018) examined student boredom in practical English classes with respect to its causes and changes in its intensity over time as well as ways of manifesting this negative emotion and coping with it. Additionally, the researchers’ attention was directed to possible differences between the experience of boredom in practical English classes and other academic subjects. The data were collected with the help of semi-structured interviews whose open-ended format was believed to encourage the participants to inspect their behaviors and emotions in a reflective and exploratory manner. It was demonstrated that the students tended to be more bored towards the end of classes and that this experience was more intense when it comes to in-class contexts than in the case of out-of-class situations in which they were more inventive about looking for opportunities to overcome this negative emotion (e.g., approaching a given issue from a different perspective, switching to a new area of language and/or other learning resources), such behaviors being indicative of searching boredom (Goetz et al., 2014). As for the main contributors to boredom, the respondents enumerated teacher-imposed topics, the repetitive, unchallenging nature

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31

of learning tasks (e.g., writing essays, doing multiple-choice exercises), the personality of the teacher, and a mismatch between the activities used and the participants’ level of L2 proficiency. The “bored” behaviors mentioned by the participants were mainly passive as they boiled down to daydreaming, doodling, using a mobile phone and pretending involvement. It should also be remarked that the students tended to manifest more boredom in relation to practical English classes than in the case of electives and content subjects that often seemed to lack a practical purpose, relied on Polish as the language of instruction and were taught in large groups, which made it difficult for the teacher to cater for individual students’ needs and expectations. Zawodniak and Kruk (2018a) In this mixed-methods study, Zawodniak and Kruk examined boredom from a retrospective perspective. To be more precise, they set out to comparatively investigate changes in the level of boredom experienced over a period of three semesters by 4 (2 females and 2 males) university students of English while learning the L2 (English) and the L3 (German in the case of three students and French in the case of one student), as well as to indicate the antecedents of this phenomenon. The data were collected by means of a questionnaire consisting of two parts, devoted to the L2and L3-determined experience of this emotion at three points in time, that is, the beginning, middle and end of each of the semesters. The participants were also given some questions which were intended to guide them in their responses and which focused on factors responsible for boredom and situations in which it was likely to arise. Following this, the participants were requested to specify the level of L2 and L3 boredom on a scale ranging from 1 to 7. While the analysis allowed identification of some general patterns for all the four students’ boredom, these patterns did not fully translate into the individual trajectories reflecting this emotion. The participants’ boredom was overall most intensely experienced during German (L3) classes and at the same time its level was consistently low during French (L3) classes, which may have been caused by the French teacher’s successful attempts to sustain the students’ attention through exposing them to interesting tasks as well as that very teacher’s readiness to offer assistance whenever necessary. Also, there was a common tendency for all the respondents to deflect the whole blame for their experience of boredom onto the teachers whom they perceived as lacking engagement and/or failing to treat them on an equal footing. One more complaint made by participants was connected with monotonous activities to which they attributed little value and which they found unadjusted to their level of L2/L3 proficiency (i.e., too easy in L2, too difficult in L3). Yet another thing worth mentioning was a close relationship between the respondents’ negative perception of classes and low assessment of their L2/L3 competence, which implies that uninteresting tasks reduced their self-efficacy beliefs (Magogwe & Oliver, 2007) that, in fact, could have been more positive. Zawodniak and Kruk (2018b) In their study that combined qualitative and quantitative methodologies, spanned one semester and addressed issues connected with L2 learning in SL, Zawodniak and Kruk (2018b) explored the influence of 4 female English majors’ visits to this

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virtual world on fluctuations in levels of their boredom, motivation and anxiety, as well as the main influences accounting for these changes. The instruments employed for collection of data included the three-part session log used in the in the research project described above (Kruk, 2016b), as well as the assessment questionnaire requiring the respondents to indicate the impact of SL on their boredom, motivation and anxiety, using a percentage scale in relation to boredom and a 7-point scale in relation to the other two constructs. Additionally, the students were asked to provide a brief justification for their evaluations. The results demonstrated a dynamic nature of all the three variables which were found to interact with a range of both internal and external factors, encompassing participants’ expectations, grit, self-esteem, attitudes and the topics discussed in class. Finally, SL sessions were shown to make L2 learning an interesting, involving and enjoyable process, enabling the students to effectively communicate with native speakers and actually be able to find meaning in what they were doing. Kruk (2019) Another mixed-methods study conducted by Kruk (2019) over a span of one semester with regard to SL was undertaken with three aims in mind: (1) to examine two English majors’ (a male and a female) willingness to communicate (WTC), motivation, boredom and language anxiety (LA) during a single visit to this virtual environment as well as from one session to another, (2) to examine the relationship between these ID variables, and (3) to pinpoint possible predictors of the fluctuations that these variables underwent. The data were gathered through a three-part session log whose design resembled that of the instrument utilized in the earlier empirical investigations by Kruk (2016b), and Zawodniak and Kruk (2018b). The findings revealed that all the investigated constructs were subject to variation during a single session as well as over time, with the caveat that the extent of these variations differed depending on the participant. It was also demonstrated that in some of the sessions under investigation the trajectory of the individual students’ data viewed from a more general, all-encompassing perspective did not follow the path of their individual session patterns. As far as the relationship between these constructs is concerned, they interacted dynamically and therefore somewhat unpredictably. There were, however, some evident tendencies connecting the two participants’ trajectories at particular points in time (e.g., WTC and motivation, boredom and LA from one visit to another, WTC and motivation in the majority of sessions). A variety of both positive and negative reasons for fluctuations of the investigated variables was detected, such as interesting topics, the ability to understand the messages conveyed by interlocutors, the presence of unfriendly SL users, monotony, or negative experiences related to working in a virtual environment.

2.3 Research on Boredom in L2 Learning

33

Zawodniak and Kruk (2019) The retrospective study carried out by Zawodniak and Kruk (2019) examined differences in the levels of boredom experienced by two groups of 44 third-year students of English (N = 25, 20 females, 4 males) and German (N = 19, 16 females, 3 males) at university level. Apart from this, the authors sought to identify the factors responsible for this negative emotion in these two learning contexts. The data were collected with the help of a questionnaire meant to measure boredom in a long-term perspective, thus tapping into the processes of learning English and German as a foreign language over a period extending from primary school, through high school, up to universitylevel education. More precisely, the respondents were requested to reflect on possible contributors to their experience of boredom at each of the stages of learning English or German, with special emphasis on the starting, mid- and ending points of each of these stages. Their comments were guided by several questions resembling the ones posed in the study by Zawodniak and Kruk (2018a). Additionally, the participants were requested to self-rate the level of boredom on a scale from 0 to 6. A combination of quantitative and qualitative analysis showed that the most frequently mentioned factors shaping the two groups’ experience of boredom included the teacher, classes and language tasks, though there were some discrepancies between the English and German majors when it comes to some details. For example, the former indicated the differences in their expectations in comparison to those of the teacher as well as the activities that were inappropriately adjusted to their proficiency level. The latter complained about excessive focus on theoretical issues at the expense of developing practical skills or about the general monotony of the classes. Some betweengroup and within-group differences were also observed in relation to the intensity of boredom experienced by participants at particular points in time. For instance, the German majors’ level of boredom was relatively high at primary school as opposed to that of the English majors who found their L2 less complex and easier to be used for communicative purposes in this initial phase of education. They were, however, more bored at every single stage following the primary-school period which was marked by enthusiasm about the world-wide popularity and usefulness of English. It seems that this enthusiasm began to wane gradually once they came to realize the necessity of systematically learning the target language with all its rules, structures and exceptions. Kruk and Zawodniak (2020) Yet another retrospective study by Kruk and Zawodniak (in press) aimed to comparatively examine 30 English majors’ (21 females’ and 9 males’) 3-semester experience of boredom in learning English (L2) and German (L3) with regard to changes in its levels over the course of a semester and from one semester to another, as well as the reasons for such changes. The data were collected with the help of the Language Learning Boredom in Retrospect Questionnaire (LLBR) in which the respondents were asked to look back upon their boredom in learning English and German, with the first semester at university constituting the starting point for their reflections on how and why they experienced this negative emotion at three different points in time (i.e., beginning, middle, end) during each of the three successive semesters.

34

2 Approaching Boredom from an Empirical Angle

Additionally, they were requested to rate the intensity of this experience on a 7point scale. The findings showed that, for both L2 and L3 learning, boredom levels were the lowest at the very beginning and the highest at the end of every semester, which implies that initially the students presumably had high expectations and needs that with the passage of time may not have been appropriately catered for by their teachers. When it comes to changes in boredom levels observed from one semester to another, there were some differences in L2 and L3 learning. In the former case the students felt least and most bored during the first and the second semester, respectively, while in the latter this negative emotion reached its apex in the third semester and was the lowest in the first semester, which may have been connected with participants’ desire to actively prepare for the final, third-semester exam in English. The researchers also distinguished some causes of student boredom in these two learning contexts, dividing them into two broad categories, namely, teachers for L2 learning (e.g., lack of teacher engagement, the use of the same teaching methods, a paucity of teacher-student interactions), and classes for L2 and L3 learning (e.g., classes taught in a repetitive or monotonous way, uninteresting topics, a mismatch between the participants’ proficiency level and the assigned tasks). Pawlak, Zawodniak, and Kruk (2020a) The mixed-methods study carried out by Pawlak et al. (2020a) was intended to examine the general patterns of boredom displayed by three English majors, characterized by below-average, average and above-average general levels of boredom, to investigate how general boredom proneness relates to the experience of boredom in three English classes and, lastly, to uncover factors responsible for the observed trajectories of self-reported experience of boredom. The findings, gathered with the help of the Boredom in Practical English Language Classes questionnaire (BPELC) and a 4-part in-class boredom questionnaire, involving a boredom grid, a semantic differential scale and a short descriptive paragraph, revealed a few common tendencies observed in all the three respondents’ experience of boredom (e.g., a rising level of this negative emotion in relation to all the classes and a general perception of one of them as more boring than another). However, those overall tendencies did not thoroughly follow the individual trajectories of the respondents’ boredom (e.g., boredom-level fluctuations turned out to be more systematic for one student than for another). Obtained results also demonstrated a direct relationship between general boredom proneness and the experience of boredom with respect to all the three classes, although some within-participant variations were noticed. As for the factors impacting the trajectories of self-reported boredom, they encompassed the topics discussed, inappropriate sequencing of the activities included in the classes under investigation, a lack of challenge, learning preferences or the disturbed balance between challenging and unchallenging tasks. As a result of this study, boredom was defined as a temporally and spatially situated dynamic system that is subject to periods of change and stability and that exerts a remarkable influence on various factors shaping the learning process, such as in/ability to sustain attention or persistence in doing particular tasks.

2.3 Research on Boredom in L2 Learning

35

Pawlak, Kruk, Zawodniak, and Pasikowski (2020) The aim of Pawlak et al.’s (2020) quantitative study was to identify factors underlying the structure of boredom in the L2 classroom, to examine the mediating effects of general boredom proneness and attainment, and, ultimately, to design a research instrument that can be used to tap into this negative emotion in the case of advanced learners. The participants of this research project were 107 English majors who filled out the Boredom in Practical English Language Classes Questionnaire (BPELC) and the Boredom Proneness Scale (Farmer & Sundberg, 1986). The responses to the items included in these inventories, alongside the participants’ end-of-the-year examination grades, enabled the researchers to categorize the students into less and more prone to boredom as well as high- and low-achievers. The analysis of the data, based on exploratory factor analysis and independent samples t-tests, allowed the researchers to distinguish two factors underlying boredom, namely (F1) disengagement, monotony and repetitiveness, and (F2) lack of satisfaction and challenge. F1 and F2 were shown to be connected with two basic facets of boredom experienced in practical English classes—reactive and proactive, the former concerning calibrating, indifferent and apathetic boredom, and the latter referring to searching boredom. Around half of the items comprised in the first inventory (F1) were found to be reflective of the internal complexity of disengagement and disaffection as the intertwined manifestations of boredom. There were statistically significant differences between high- and low-achievers for F1, and between students who were more and less prone to this negative emotion for both factors. Finally and importantly, the analysis also resulted in the development of a new data-collection tool, the BPELC-R Questionnaire which is likely to constitute an important point of reference in future empirical investigations. Pawlak, Kruk, and Zawodniak (2020) Pawlak et al. (2020) carried out the mixed-methods research whose aim was to investigate the patterns of boredom experienced in a single practical English class by 11 students characterized by moderate (MBS) and high (HBS) levels of this emotion and to examine whether those patterns were reflected in the individual students’ trajectories of boredom. Additionally, the study was intended to identify factors affecting those trajectories. The analysis of the data, gleaned from the Boredom in Practical English Language Classes Questionnaire (BPELC) and an in-class boredom questionnaire comprising a self-report boredom grid, an open-ended query and an evaluation of the class based on a semantic differential scale, led the authors to conclude that general proneness to boredom in practical English classes was related to respondents’ distinct patterns of boredom. While the self-reported boredom levels were found to fluctuate both for MBS and HBS, there were some discrepancies between the two groups as the former exhibited a gradual increase in the experience of this negative emotion and the latter revealed a steadily high level of boredom throughout the whole class. The study also provided evidence for the existence of differences between general patterns of boredom and individual trajectories, for example, one of the MBS was more bored for most of the class than was indicated by the whole group’s overall disposition to experience this emotion, whereas one of the HBS was

36

2 Approaching Boredom from an Empirical Angle

shown to exhibit a much more varied pattern of boredom than was the case with the rest of students in this group. Lastly, rather than merely pinpointing a range of factors shaping individual trajectories of boredom that had already been identified in earlier studies, the researchers sought more nuanced explanations connecting high and/or low levels of this emotion with, for instance, students’ self-awareness, learning experience or learning styles. Pawlak, Zawodniak, and Kruk (2020b) The quantitative research project carried out by Pawlak et al. (2020b) was intended to investigate differences in the levels of boredom experienced in practical English classes between 2nd- and 3rd-year English majors and the possible causes of this academic emotion. The sample consisted of 111 university students who were requested to complete the Boredom in Practical English Classes Questionnaire (BPELC), being a modified version of the data-gathering tool employed in the earlier study conducted by Kruk and Zawodniak (2017). The results demonstrated that 2ndyear students’ experience of boredom was more intense than that of their 3rd-year counterparts and this tendency can be viewed as a natural trajectory followed by this emotion in the course of a three-year program. This is because the induction into the BA program in English is marked by students’ enthusiasm (year 1) that is later replaced with feelings of tedium, disappointment and/or frustration resulting from unchallenging activities and/or excessive requirements of practical English classes (year 2), to finally give way to deliberate engagement (year 3), due to the necessity of completing a diploma paper, the approaching final exams and the prospects of imminent graduation. With respect to the antecedents of student boredom, they were classified as external factors, including lack of intriguing topics, excessive monotony during particular classes or unpleasant previous learning experiences, and internal factors encompassing negative attitudes as well as lack of creativity and involvement.

2.4 Conclusion The present chapter has offered an overview of research into boredom in the learning process, both more generally and with a specific focus on L2 learning. It began with the description of studies referring to different contexts other than L2 classroom. For the most part, such empirical investigations were quantitative in nature and they typically involved large samples of participants, thus mainly representing a macroperspective. In consequence, they deprived the researchers of the opportunity to yield in-depth insights into the complex mechanisms governing and shaping boredom at specific points in time. This was followed by a description of the available studies which sought to examine boredom in L2 learning, whose volume is still blatantly insufficient. As opposed to the bulk of studies thus far carried out in the field of educational psychology, these are mainly mixed-methods projects attempting to approach L2 student boredom from different, often overlapping perspectives. This enables the understanding of the multifaceted nature of this negative academic emotion, with

2.4 Conclusion

37

a focus not only on its causes, types or coping strategies but also on its long- and short-term fluctuations and interactions with other internal and external variables. An important contribution of this line of inquiry is that not only did such studies examine the experience of boredom per se, but also because they set out to paint a more nuanced and comprehensive picture of this negative emotion, looking into possible relationships between its more general patterns and its individual trajectories. It is also noteworthy that the Boredom in Practical English Language Classes Questionnaire-Revised (BPELC-R) was developed and validated, which will enable researchers to further investigate this construct with reliance on a domain-specific tool expected to ensure more consistent findings in the area of SLA. The research project described in the following two chapters adopts an “insider” view of boredom and its uniqueness consists in investigating this emotion as experienced by two groups of respondents participating in two classes based on the same lesson plans. Embracing such a perspective may help in more profound understanding why this experience is so aversive, unpleasant and deactivating, and how it can be effectively controlled.

Chapter 3

Design of the Study

3.1 Introduction The previous two chapters have provided an overview of crucial issues related to the experience of boredom in educational contexts, thus offering a backdrop to the study reported on in the remainder of this book. To be more specific, Chapter One focused on the efforts to define boredom, the theoretical perspectives that have striven to shed light on its causes, as well as the ways in which this negative emotion can be handled in the classroom. Chapter Two, in turn, was devoted to an overview of empirical investigations, both those that have been undertaken by educational psychologists with respect to different school subjects and such that have targeted boredom in the context of L2 learning and teaching. Even a cursory look at the studies conducted thus far shows that the available empirical evidence is scant and further research should be conducted to provide more insights into the occurrence of boredom in different contexts, the extent to which it is stable or, rather, tends, to fluctuate at different time scales, and the causes of these fluctuations, in the hope of proposing some suggestions and recommendations as to how it can be combated in L2 classrooms. Accordingly, the present chapter will present the design, methodology and implementation of a yet another empirical investigation that was meant to provide insights in this respect. The chapter will commence with the presentation of the overall aims that the study pursued as well as the specific research questions addressed. This will be followed by the description of the participants of the study, the classes under investigation, detailed description of the instruments by means of which the requisite data were collected, and the ways the gathered data were analyzed.

3.2 Aims and Research Questions The present study builds on previous research projects carried out by the authors (e.g., Pawlak et al. 2020, 2020b) and it contributes to the body of empirical evidence © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 M. Pawlak et al., Boredom in the Foreign Language Classroom, Second Language Learning and Teaching, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-50769-5_3

39

40

3 Design of the Study

concerning the occurrence and nature of boredom from a micro-perspective. As Mystkowska-Wiertelak and Pawlak (2017, pp. 119–120) comment with respect to research on individual variation in L2 learning: (…) while there is certainly a need for large-scale questionnaire studies which enable us to identify certain trends and tendencies in large populations as well as to determine factors that may influence those tendencies or to come up with models proposing relationships between such variables, such an approach in itself is insufficient to help us fully comprehend the role of individual learner differences and the ways in which they interact. Thus, there is an urgent need to complement research of this kind with empirical investigations that would be much more context-sensitive in the sense that they would yield insights into how a variable in question (e.g., motivational intensity) enters into complex interactions with a myriad of other factors, both situational (e.g. task type, the teacher, group dynamics) and individual (e.g. individual learner profiles) in nature, and how such interactions can mediate the effectiveness of the processes of teaching and learning.

This is exactly the rationale that guided the present empirical investigation since, in the view of the present authors, also in the case of boredom, statistical analyses of responses obtained from questionnaires administered to large samples can yield some general tendencies, which, although valuable, do not tell us much about how this negative emotion is shaped during specific classes, consisting of specific students, taught by specific teachers in specific contexts. Thus, the overall aim of the present study was to explore the changing character of boredom experienced by a group of advanced learners of English (i.e., English majors in a BA program) in the course of naturally occurring English lessons (i.e., focused on integrated skills) and to uncover factors responsible for the ups and downs in the students’ experience of this negative academic emotion. Importantly, what distinguishes this investigation from some of the previous research projects undertaken by the present authors is that the issues listed above were examined in two groups of students during two classes that followed exactly the same lesson plans. In more specific terms, the following research questions were formulated for the purpose of the study: 1. What are the differences in the levels of boredom in the classes taught in both groups? What can they be attributed to? (RQ1) 2. How does the experience of boredom change and what patterns can be identified in this respect? (RQ2) 3. What are the differences regarding the experience of boredom for individual students? (RQ3) 4. What influences are responsible for the changes in boredom levels? (RQ4).

3.3 Participants The whole sample involved in the study consisted of 23 Polish university students, 11 of whom were females and 12 males. The students were enrolled in the final year of a three-year BA program, and they were majoring in English, with the effect that they were expected to attain superior proficiency in that language which would allow them

3.3 Participants

41

in the future to work as teachers, translators, interpreters or business consultants. As a result, like similar programs in other universities in Poland, the program they attended included an intensive course in the target language, divided into separate classes in phonetics, grammar, speaking, writing or integrated skills, the latter being the focus of the present study. They were also required to get credits for a number of content courses, electives as well as seminars in such areas as linguistics, literature, culture or foreign language teaching methodology, which were mostly taught in English. Importantly, at the end of each year, they were supposed to take a highly demanding examination in the TL and, in the final year, they had to compose a diploma paper in that language in a specific content area, as one of the main graduation requirements. What should be stressed here is that most of the students had few opportunities to enter into everyday interactions with native speakers or other proficient TL users, perhaps with the exception of exchange students within the framework of the Erasmus + program. Obviously, they had access to English through the Internet, television and social media, but, based on the experience of the authors who have been teaching in such contexts for many years, it cannot be assumed that all of the students or even most of them availed themselves of such opportunities on a regular basis. The students in the sample as a whole were on average 22.17 (SD = 0.72) years of age and their mean experience in learning English, their target language, amounted to 14.13 (SD = 1.60) years. Overall, the participants’ command of English could be characterized as ranging from B2 to C1 according to the Common European Framework of Reference, as required by the program. However, a certain amount of individual variation could be observed regarding overall mastery and in particular the command of different skills and subsystems, with some participants clearly outperforming others in this respect. The students’ average grade on the final examination in English at the end of the second year, which cumulatively measures all the facets of TL proficiency, amounted to 3.57 (SD = 0.57) on a scale from 2 (fail) to 5 (very good), conventionally used for assessment purposes in Polish institutions of higher education. Such evaluation largely corresponded to the students’ own perception of their target language ability, which is evident in their self-assessment that was only a little higher and stood at 3.70 (SD = 0.49) on the same scale. Detailed information concerning all the participants is included in Table 3.1. The participants were divided into two intact groups for the purpose of their practical English course, including its integrated skills component. Group 1 comprised 13 students (five females and eight males). The learners were 22.38 (SD = 0.77) years of age and their mean experience of learning English as a foreign language equaled 14.15 (SD = 1.21) years. The participants’ average grade on the end-ofthe-year examination in English was 3.62 (SD = 0.51) and was slightly lower that their own evaluation of their TL proficiency (M = 3.69, SD = 0.38). As for Group 2, it consisted of 10 individuals (six females and four males). The students were, on average, 21.90 (SD = 0.57) years of age and they had been learning English for 14.10 (SD = 2.08) years. As regards the participants’ average grade on the final examination in English, it amounted to 3.50 (SD = 0.67), which was a little lower than their self-assessment of their English proficiency (M = 3.70, SD = 0.63).

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3 Design of the Study

Table 3.1 Background information about the participants

Group 1

Student

Sex

Age

Length of English study

Grade on the end-of-the-year examination in English

Self-assessment of English proficiency

1

Female

24

13

4

3.5

2

Female

22

12

4

4

3

Male

22

15

4

4

4

Female

22

15

3

4

5

Female

22

15

3

3.5

6

Male

22

15

3

3

7

Female

22

15

3.5

4

8

Male

23

15

3

3

9

Male

24

13

4

4

10

Male

22

15

3.5

3.5

11

Male

22

12

4

3.5

12

Male

22

15

4.5

4

3.5

4

13

Male

22

14

Overall

13

Female N =5 Male N = 8

M= 22.38 SD = 0.77

M = 14.15 M = 3.62 SD = 1.21 SD = 0.51

M = 3.69 SD = 0.38

Group 2

1

Female

22

15

4.5

5

2

Male

23

12

3

3

3

Female

22

15

3

3.5

4

Female

21

15

3

4

5

Male

22

15

3

4

6

Female

22

10

4.5

3

7

Female

22

12

4

4

8

Female

22

17

3

4

9

Male

22

15

4

3.5

10

Male

21

15

3

3

Overall

10

Female N =6 Male N = 4

M= 21.90 SD = 0.57

M = 14.10 M = 3.50 SD = 2.08 SD = 0.67

M = 3.70 SD = 0.63

Overall

32

Female N = 11

M= 22.17 SD = 0.72

M = 14.13 M = 3.57 SD = 1.60 SD = 0.57

M = 3.70 SD = 0.49

Male N = 12

3.3 Participants

43

As can be seen from the description of the participants constituting both groups, they were very much similar in terms of such criteria as mastery of the TL as well as their overall experience in learning it. The only major difference between the two groups concerned gender distribution. This is because Group 1 consisted of more male than female students when compared to Group 2 in which the number of females exceeded the number of males.

3.4 Description of the Classes The four classes analyzed for the purpose of the present study, two per each group, comprised naturally occurring integrated skills classes for 90 min each and carried out by one of the present authors—an experienced English teacher. As mentioned above, classes of this kind were included in the curriculum for the BA program, constituting an integral component of the intensive practical English language course that was obligatory for all English majors and was intended to ensure that they reach the requisite level of proficiency (i.e., C1). The main goal of the integrated skills course was to develop students’ receptive and productive TL skills as well as subsystems. The classes taught in the course involved a variety of modes of classroom organization (e.g., individual, pair- and group work), they were dedicated to performing different types of language tasks (e.g., gap-filling, multiple-choice, true/false, whole class discussions, presentations), and they were based on a variety of resources (e.g., coursebooks, Internet materials). What follows is a description of the lesson plans devised for the classes under investigation, with a focus on the stages followed, the activities applied, the skills practiced, and the modes of class organization employed. It should be once again pointed out that the two lesson plans were the same for both groups, they included the same topics and language activities and they were conducted in the same manner, with the caveat that the timing of these components might have inevitably differed to some extent (see Tables 3.2 and 3.3).

3.4.1 Class 1 Class 1 (see Table 3.2) revolved around the topic of the world of success. It began with checking attendance, going over the homework assignment (i.e., a true/false exercise based on a text about the psychology of success), and informing the students about the planned tasks and activities to be covered during the class. The first language activity focused on vocabulary in which the learners were asked to work individually and complete six pairs of sentences with words they could find in the text they had read at home. The exercise was checked by the teacher who asked several students to provide their answers. The following three grammar exercises were devoted to practicing the language of cause and effect (e.g., the reason for, be a consequence of , accordingly,

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3 Design of the Study

Table 3.2 A description of Class 1 in both groups Activities

Skills practiced

Organization

Modes of class organization

Time (minutes—approx.) Group 1

Group 2

Whole-class

1–10

1–10

Vocabulary

Individual work

11–15

11–15

Reading a short text and Grammar 1 underlining expressions related to the language of cause and effect

Individual work

16–18

16–19

Reading and completing a text with correct words

Grammar 2

Individual work

19–23

20–23

Listening to an actor and Grammar 3 selecting the words and expressions related to the language of cause and effect

Individual work

24–27

24–27

Reading a text about ‘work experience program’ and answering questions

Reading

Individual work

28–45

28–45

Discussing jobs most valuable to society

Speaking 1

Pair work

46–51

46–53

Listening to people talking about their jobs and answering questions

Listening

Individual work

52–67

54–71

Talking about most and least interesting jobs

Speaking 2

Pair work

68–75

72–77

Whole-class

76–90

78–90

Filling gaps in pairs of sentences

Conclusion

thanks to). In the first of these activities the students were requested to read the initial part of a short text and underline any words and expressions connected with the language of cause and effect. Next, they were asked to read the rest of the text and fill gaps with suitable words indicating cause-and-effect relationships. During the third grammar activity, the participants listened to an audio-recording in which a man talked about why he had become an actor. The students were asked to select the words and expressions concerning the language of cause and effect from a list accompanying the activity. All the grammar activities were performed by the learners individually and on completion of each of them the teacher randomly nominated several students to read the answers and provided feedback. This was followed by a reading task in which the students were asked to read individually a report about “work experience program” and answer a set of questions. Once again, the responses were verified by the teacher who asked at random several students to read the answers. After that, the students were instructed to perform a speaking task in pairs. They were presented with a list of several jobs and asked to talk about the ones that they considered to

3.4 Description of the Classes

45

Table 3.3 A description of Class 2 in both groups Activities

Skills practiced

Modes of class organization

Time (minutes—approx.) Group 1

Group 2

Whole-class

1–15

1–11

Pair work

16–27

12–23

Individual and pair work

28–38

24–37

Grouping adjectives into Vocabulary 1 positive and negative

Individual work

39–43

38–43

Choosing the best adjectives for a set of sentences

Vocabulary 2

Individual work

44–47

44–46

Listening to a radio program in which people discuss things they could not live without and answering questions

Listening

Individual work

48–58

47–57

Working with modal verbs (must, should, ought to, shall, will, would)

Grammar

Individual work

59–68

58–66

Selling an invention

Speaking 2

Pair work

69–76

67–75

Whole-class

77–90

76–90

Organization + feedback on the language test Talking about inventions Speaking 1 Reading and talking about “unsuccessful” inventions

Conclusion

Reading + speaking

be most valuable to society. As the interactions between students were in progress, the teacher walked around the classroom, eavesdropped on the conversations and provided corrective feedback on some of the errors. This short speaking activity was in fact an introduction to the next phase of the class based on a listening task, in which the students were requested to listen to eight people talking about their jobs and answer a set of three questions. At the end of this activity, the teacher asked some of the students to read the answers and offered corrective feedback. Finally, the students performed, in pairs, a speaking activity in which they talked about the most and the least interesting jobs for them. The class finished with a short recap in which the teacher summed up the most important points of the material covered and set a homework assignment related to the revision of the material covered in previous classes.

46

3 Design of the Study

3.4.2 Class 2 Inventions were the general theme of Class 2 (see Table 3.3). At the start of the class, the teacher checked attendance, talked about the language activities to be dealt with in the next 90 min and provided feedback on the language test which the students had taken in the previous week. The first language activity was performed in dyads and the students discussed ten inventions presented in a picture taken from a course book which showed ten inventions (e.g., an electric dishwasher, a pop-up toaster, a video recorder, a can with ring-pull, a computer mouse). During this speaking task, the participants were requested to name each object, put the inventions in chronological order and provide the correct decade in which they appeared. As soon as the students completed the task, it was verified by the teacher who provided the correct answers. This was followed by reading five short descriptions of “unsuccessful” inventions and a discussion performed in pairs as well. The students were asked to explain why each of the inventions failed to catch on and suggest ways in which each of the objects might have been altered to make it successful. As was the norm for classes taught in the course, when the learner-learner discussions were in progress, the instructor circulated around the room, listened to interactions and corrected the mistakes when such a need arose. The subsequent two vocabulary activities were performed individually by the participants and they were devoted to working with a set of adjectives conveying strong, positive or negative, feelings. In the first exercise, the participants were asked to group the given adjectives into positive and negative ones, and, in the second, the students were requested to complete seven sentences with appropriate words. The two activities were as usual validated by the teacher who asked some of the students to provide the answers. The next activity was a listening task in which the participants listened to a radio program where four persons discussed things they could not live without. During the task the students were supposed to answer questions which asked them to recognize objects in the pictures and list the positive and negative features of the objects mentioned by the speakers. The recording was played twice and the answers were verified by the teacher, who randomly nominated some students to read out their choices. This was followed by a grammar exercise performed by the students individually and dedicated to practicing various modal verbs (i.e., must, should, ought to, shall, will, would). During the activity the students were invited to identify the specific meanings of these verbs conveyed in a given context and to complete a number of sentences with appropriate modals. Finally, in the last phase of the class, the students were requested to perform a speaking task which took the form of a role-play in which the participants’ job was to sell an invention. The lesson ended with a short conclusion in which the teacher summarized the most important aspects of the class in question and set a new homework assignment, that is, a written description of an invention of the students’ own choice.

3.5 Data Collection Instruments

47

3.5 Data Collection Instruments As dictated by the requirements of the micro-perspective, where different sources of quantitative and qualitative data are needed to provide a multi-faceted view on the phenomena under investigation, a number of data collection instruments were used to gain insights into the levels of boredom that the students experienced during the four classes as well as the reasons for the changes in this respect. Specifically, four data-collection tools were employed, that is, a background questionnaire, an in-class boredom questionnaire, semi-structured interviews with individual learners and lesson plans with annotations. It should be emphasized that the students gave their informed consent to participate in the study and although their responses were not anonymous, they were assured that their identities would not be revealed and that the information would only be used for research purposes. The data collection instruments are described in detail below. Background questionnaire The purpose of the background questionnaire (see Appendix A) was to obtain general information regarding the participants. The tool consisted of four questions which queried the students about their sex, age, the length of English instruction, the grade on the end-of-the-second-year examination in English and their self-evaluation of their proficiency in English on the scale of 2 to 5. The questionnaire was administered in a paper-and-pencil version and was filled out by the participants in a class that had preceded the ones under investigation. In-class boredom questionnaire The in-class boredom questionnaire (see Appendix B) was a modified version of similar tools used in studies on the dynamics of motivation (e.g., Pawlak, 2012) as well as willingness to communicate (e.g., Pawlak, Mystkowska-Wiertelak, & Bielak, 2016). It was completed by the students as each class was in progress and it consisted of the following four parts: • Part One requested the students to provide their names and the date of the class; it was filled out at the very beginning of each class; • Part Two included a boredom grid in which the students were asked to self-rate the level of their boredom on a scale from 1 (minimum) to 7 (maximum) at 5-min intervals in response to a prerecorded sound; the Cronbach alpha value for this instrument calculated on the basis of all the responses in each class oscillated around the value of 0.93, which speaks to high internal consistency reliability; • Part Three encompassed seven items on a semantic differential scale (i.e., meaningless vs. meaningful, dull vs. exciting, useless vs. useful, unsatisfying vs. satisfying, usual vs. unusual, unappealing vs. appealing and monotonous vs. absorbing), which was later converted into a 7-point Likert scale for the purpose of analysis, with the extreme responses being accorded the values from 1 (e.g., dull) to 7 (e.g., exciting); the questionnaire was completed by the subjects towards

48

3 Design of the Study

the end of each class; Cronbach alpha oscillated around the value of 0.84 and can also be deemed satisfactory; • Part Four required the participants to write a short narrative about their feelings of boredom experienced during each class with an eye to obtaining further insights into the patterns of boredom and the influences shaping these patterns; more specifically, the students were asked to respond to the following prompt: Please write a few sentences related to the experience of boredom during the class. It should be pointed out at this juncture that, despite the relative high level of TL proficiency of the respondents, Polish was used in the in-class boredom questionnaire in order to avoid possible misunderstanding or misinterpretation. In accordance with this rationale, the participants were allowed to use Polish or English when composing the narrative in the last part of the instrument. Semi-structured interview In order to provide further insights into the nature of boredom and its fluctuations, semi-structured interviews were conducted with four individual students, one per class under investigation (see Appendix C). This type of interview was chosen deliberately, since to some extent open-ended format encourages the interviewee “to elaborate on the issues raised in an exploratory manner” (Dörnyei 2007, p. 136). Each interview was held immediately after a lesson with a student who volunteered to share his or her thoughts about the class, it took place in the classroom, it was audio-recorded and subsequently partly transcribed. The interviewees were asked questions intended to probe deeper into the reasons for changes in boredom levels indicated in the grid and to elicit their general opinions about the class taught (e.g., the choice of language activities, the ways the students were asked to perform them, the resources used). Following the reasoning expounded above, the interviews were conducted in Polish so that the interviewees could express their thoughts freely and could say what they really wanted to say as opposed to what they were able to say. Each individual interview lasted approximately six minutes. Lesson plans with annotations Lesson plans were used to provide information related to the conducted classes. More specifically, apart from the intended outline of what was supposed to happen, they included a short description of what actually transpired in the course of the four classes, their stages, the modes of classroom organization, the tasks and language activities included, the ways in which these tasks and activities were executed, and the approximate time needed for their implementation. In addition, they offered space for the teacher to include the exact amount of time devoted to the completion of specific tasks and activities, which, as indicated above, might have varied slightly in the two groups.

3.6 Data Analysis

49

3.6 Data Analysis The data were analyzed quantitatively and qualitatively and, when necessary, a combination of both approaches was applied. The numerical data derived from the background questionnaire and some parts of the in-class boredom questionnaire (i.e., the self-ratings made with the help of the boredom grid and the evaluations of classes on the semantic differential scale) were subjected to quantitative analysis, which involved calculating the mean and standard deviation values. In view of the fact that some of the data were not normally distributed, the levels of statistical significance of the observed differences in boredom self-ratings and overall class evaluations were established by means of the Mann-Whitney U Test and the Wilcoxon Signed Rank Test. The former test was employed to assess the changes in boredom levels between the two groups and the latter was used when the changes within one group were compared. In addition, the significance value was set at p ≤ 0.05 for all analyses. The effect size was calculated on the basis of Rosenthal’s (1994) formula and interpreted as suggested by Plonsky and Oswald (2014). In addition, the changes in boredom levels of selected members of Group 1 and Group 2, that is, those participants who displayed the lowest and highest overall mean values of boredom in the course of Class 1 and Class 2, were also subject to numerical analysis. As far as the qualitative analysis is concerned, it was performed with two sets of data. The first set involved the participants’ narratives (i.e., the last part of the in-class boredom questionnaire) and the transcripts of semi-structured interviews. The second set of data comprised graphical representations of boredom in each class which combined the mean levels of boredom calculated at 5-min intervals set against the background of the tasks and activities performed in a given class on the basis of the lesson plans outlined above. When it comes to the first set of data, the process of analysis by and large adhered to the procedures outlined by Dörnyei (2007, pp. 250–257). Thus, the analysis consisted of four stages: (1) the pre-coding stage, (2) the initial coding stage, (3) the secondlevel coding stage and (4) the final coding stage. The students’ narratives were first transcribed using a word processor program and the individual interviews underwent partial transcription of the parts of the data that seemed to be important in light of the issues under investigation (Dörnyei, 2007, p. 249), with the transcription being subsequently saved as a Word file as well. The pre-coding stage commenced with a careful reading of both sets of responses with the purpose of familiarizing oneself with the data and uncovering some preliminary patterns and tendencies.1 The second stage involved initial coding. According to Miles and Huberman (1994, p. 56), codes are “tags or labels for assigning units of meaning to the descriptive or inferential information compiled during a study.” During this stage the participants’ statements were read several times in order to search “for recurring regularities in the data” (Patton, 2002, p. 465). For any relevant words, phrases or sentences specific labels were created and appropriate descriptions of the codes were made, which permitted 1 It

should be noted, however, that although no analysis was done during the transcription of the data, some subconscious interpretations of the data might have occurred during that period of time.

50

3 Design of the Study

a precise recoding of code properties. As for the third stage, it comprised secondlevel coding. The purpose of this procedure was to “go beyond a mere descriptive labeling of the relevant data segments” (Dörnyei, 2007, p. 252). During this stage, the data were organized into new broad categories and this was done by clustering some similar and closely connected categories produced in the previous stage and, if no similarity was found, a new category was created. This stage proceeded until all the meaningful components were categorized. Finally, the last, fourth stage involved data interpretation and drawing conclusions (Dörnyei, 2007, p. 257). During the this stage, the organized data were reviewed yet again and the present categories were revised to accommodate new insights to be elaborated upon. The plausibility of the obtained categories was subsequently verified by another researcher. As mentioned above, the second set of data comprised graphical representations that emerged from teacher lesson plans onto which students’ self-ratings of boredom at 5-min intervals were juxtaposed. The analysis encompassed the interpretation of the increases and decreases in the participants’ self-reported boredom levels against the background of what happened in a particular lesson at a specific point in time, also taking into account students’ interpretations and assessments revealed in the interviews and written narratives. In this case, the interpretations emerged from discussions among the present authors to minimize the impacts of subjective perceptions and evaluations.

3.7 Conclusion The present chapter has provided a detailed description of the aims of the empirical investigation, its design and participants as well as the research instruments used to gather the requisite data and the procedures in which these data were analyzed. Since the study included only a limited number of lessons and employed a small sample that consisted of 23 students in total, it could be argued that more language lessons and a larger sample may have supplied more data. However, it was the belief of the present authors that meticulously analyzing the lessons and making careful, in-depth comparisons between the two groups involved, which followed identical lesson plans, were an effective way of obtaining further, invaluable insights into the construct of boredom. Moreover, the limited numbers of lessons and participants were compensated for by the employment of specifically designed research instruments by means of which it was possible to obtain rich data and uncover unknown aspects of the changing nature of boredom in the language classroom as well factors causing it. Such an approach is in the spirit of the micro-perspective as it allowed the investigation of boredom in a specific context with the help of information gleaned from a variety of sources, thus revealing the intricate interplay of factors interacting in these contexts rather than general tendencies. The findings of the study and their interpretation can be found in Chapter Four.

Chapter 4

Findings of the Study

4.1 Introduction The present chapter is devoted to the presentation and discussion of the results of the study undertaken for the purpose of the present volume. Specifically, it focuses on the outcomes of the in-depth analysis of the patterns of boredom as well as the influences shaping these patterns in the four integrated skills classes taught to two groups of Polish university students majoring in English. Initially, the differences in the changes in overall boredom levels in Group 1 and Group 2 will be examined and those in the variations in the levels of boredom at 5-min intervals in Class 1 and Class 2 in both groups will be explored. Subsequently, the focus will be shifted to what transpired in the course of the classes, separately for Group 1 and Group 2. In each case, the results will be presented in the following order: (1) overall variation in boredom levels in both classes with respect to the students’ self-reported ratings of the intensity of this negative emotion, (2) the variation in boredom levels during individual classes as well as for individual students, (3) the participants’ evaluations of the classes, and, finally, (4) factors responsible for the changes in the experience of boredom will be considered. This will be followed by the discussion of the findings in terms of the research questions posed for the present empirical investigation and some of the limitations will be highlighted as well.

4.2 Changes in Overall Boredom Levels in Group 1 and Group 2 Figure 4.1 offers a graphical representation of the overall levels of boredom for Group 1 and Group 2 in Class 1 and Class 2, while Table 4.1 includes specific means, standard deviations and information about statistical significance. As can be seen from these data, the students in Group 1 self-reported greater intensity of the feeling of boredom in Class 1 than their counterparts in Group 2 (M = 3.13 vs. M = © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 M. Pawlak et al., Boredom in the Foreign Language Classroom, Second Language Learning and Teaching, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-50769-5_4

51

52

4 Findings of the Study 7

Level of boredom

6 5 4 3 2 1 Group 1

Group 2 Class 1

Class 2

Fig. 4.1 Levels of boredom in Class 1 and Class 2 for Group 1 and Group 2

Table 4.1 Mean self-reported levels of boredom in Group 1 and Group 2 during the two classes under investigation, and the results of non-parametric Mann-Whitney U test Group 1

Group 2

M (SD)

M (SD)

Statistical significance between groups (Mann-Whitney U Test)

Class 1

3.13 (0.49)

2.78 (0.36)

U = 55, p = 0.046, r = 0.38

Class 2

2.33 (0.65)

2.02 (0.23)

U = 61, p = 0.088, r = 0.32

2.78). The difference in the mean boredom level equaled 0.35 and turned out to be statistically significant although the effect size was small (U = 55, p = 0.046, r = 0.38). As regards Class 2, the participants in Group 1, once again, proved to be more susceptible to boredom in comparison with Group 2 (M = 2.33 vs. M = 2.02). The difference in the means amounted to 0.31, but it did not reach a statistically significant value in this case and the effect size was small as well (U = 61, p = 0.088, r = 0.32). What is noteworthy is that not only were students in Group 1 more prone to succumb to boredom in both classes than those in Group 2, but they also proved to be more varied in the extent to which they were likely to experience this negative emotion. This is evidenced by the values of standard deviation which were consistently higher in the former than in the latter (0.49 and 0.65 in Group 1 vs. 0.36 and 0.23 in Group 2). As can be seen in Fig. 4.2, which graphically presents the overall assessment of the classes by Group 1 and Group 2, and Table 4.2, which offers the overall mean and standard deviation values as well as information about statistical significance, the members of Group 1 were less positive about the two classes in comparison with the students in Group 2 (M = 4.48 vs. M = 4.65 for Class 1 and M = 4.79 vs. M = 5.31 for Class 2). It is worth noting that the differences in the means for Class 1 and

4.2 Changes in Overall Boredom Levels in Group 1 and Group 2

53

7 6

Mean

5 4 3 2 1 Group 1

Group 2 Class 1

Class 2

Fig. 4.2 Evaluations of Class 1 and Class 2 by Group 1 and Group 2

Table 4.2 Mean and standard deviation values of the evaluations of Class 1 and Class 2 by Group 1 and Group 2, and the results of non-parametric Mann-Whitney U test Group 1

Group 2

M (SD)

M (SD)

Statistical significance between groups (Mann-Whitney U Test)

Class 1

4.48 (1.04)

4.65 (1.34)

U = 15, p = 0.223, r = 0.33

Class 2

4.79 (0.87)

5.31 (0.24)

U = 15, p = 0.222, r = 0.33

Class 2 amounted to 0.17 and 0.52, respectively, and were not statistically significant (U = 15, p = 0.223 and U = 15, p = 0.222, respectively). It should also be remarked that the standard deviation values differed in each group as well as for each class (e.g., they were higher in Group 2 for Class 2 than in Group 1 for Class 1), which shows that the students differed in their evaluations of the two classes. The levels of boredom at 5-min intervals during both classes in Group 1 and Group 2 can be found in Table 4.3 and are graphically depicted in Fig. 4.3. As can be seen from the data, the observed differences in Class 1 were the largest in minute 15 (3.00 in Group 1 and 2.00 in Group 2; a difference of one point), minute 35 (3.73 in Group 1 and 2.29 in Group 2; a difference of 1.44), minute 40 (3.82 in Group 1 and 3.00 in Group 2; a difference of 0.82), minute 45 (4.00 in Group 1 and 3.14 in Group 2; a difference of 0.86), minute 55 (2.45 in Group 1 and 3.00 in Group 2; a difference of 0.55) and minute 75 (2.27 in Group 1 and 3.00 in Group 2; a difference of 0.73). It should be emphasized, however, that none of these differences proved to be significant (p > 0.05). As regards Class 2, the greatest disparities in the selfreported intensity of boredom between Group 1 and Group 2 were detected in minute

54

4 Findings of the Study

Table 4.3 Means, standard deviations, statistically significant differences and effect sizes for selfreported levels of boredom in Group 1 and Group 2 during Class 1 and Class 2 Minutes Class 1

Class 2

Group 1

Group 2

M (SD)

M (SD)

10

3.36 (1.75)

2.71 (2.06)

15

3.00 (1.34)

2.00 (1.41)

20

2.82 (1.25)

2.29 (1.38)

25

3.18 (1.72)

2.86 (1.35)

30

3.09 (1.70)

2.57 (1.51)

35

3.73 (1.49)

2.29 (1.38)

40

3.82 (1.83)

3.00 (0.82)

45

4.00 (1.79)

3.14 (1.68)

50

3.00 (1.26)

2.86 (1.86)

55

2.45 (1.21)

3.00 (1.73)

60

3.18 (1.83)

3.00 (2.31)

65

3.09 (1.51)

3.14 (1.95)

70

2.82 (1.08)

3.00 (2.08)

75

2.27 (1.35)

3.00 (2.38)

10

2.44 (0.88)

2.25 (1.16)

15

2.33 (1.22)

2.13 (1.13)

20

1.89 (0.60)

2.38 (1.06)

25

1.33 (0.50)

2.00 (0.53)

30

2.44 (0.73)

2.00 (0.76)

35

2.22 (1.72)

2.13 (0.35)

40

2.44 (1.81)

1.88 (0.83)

45

2.67 (1.41)

1.75 (0.71)

50

2.89 (1.45)

1.50 (0.53)

55

3.44 (1.59)

1.88 (1.13)

60

3.44 (1.42)

2.25 (1.04)

65

2.11 (1.17)

2.25 (1.04)

70

1.56 (1.13)

2.00 (1.31)

75

1.44 (0.73)

1.88 (1.13)

Statistical significance between groups (Mann-Whitney U Test) No statistically significant differences found

Minute 25 (U = 15, p = 0.023, r = 0.55) Minute 50 (U = 14, p = 0.023, r = 0.55) Minute 55 (U = 14, p = 0.030, r = 0.53)

25 (1.33 in Group 1 and 2.00 in Group 2; a difference of 0.67), minute 40 (2.44 in Group 1 and 1.88 in Group 2; a difference of 0.56), minute 45 (2.67 in Group 1 and 1.75 in Group 2; a difference of 0.92), minute 50 (2.89 in Group 1 and 1.50 in Group 2; a difference of 1.39), minute 55 (3.44 in Group 1 and 1.88 in Group 2; a difference of 1.56) and minute 60 (3.44 in Group 1 and 2.25 in Group 2; a difference of 1.19). In contrast to Class 1, the Mann-Whitney U Test showed that some of these differences between Group 1 and Group 2 turned out to be significant, with the effect sizes being

4.2 Changes in Overall Boredom Levels in Group 1 and Group 2 Group 1 Class 1

Group 1 Class 2

55

Group 2 Class 1

Group 2 Class 2

7

Level of boredom

6

5

4

3

2

1 10

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

50

55

60

65

70

75

Minutes

Fig. 4.3 Changes in the self-reported levels of boredom at 5-min intervals in Class 1 and Class 2 for Group 1 and Group 2

moderate. This was the case for the following three points of measurement: minute 25 (U = 15, p = 0.023, r = 0.55), minute 50 (U = 14, p = 0.023, r = 0.55) and minute 55 (U = 14, p = 0.030, r = 0.53). It is also worth noting that both groups varied in their self-reported levels of boredom during the two classes as evidenced by the values of standard deviation which were rather high in both groups throughout Class 1 but lower on some occasions in Class 2 (e.g., minutes 20–30 in Group 1 and minutes 25–50 in Group 2).

4.3 Self-reported Boredom Levels and Class Evaluations in Group 1 As mentioned in the introduction, the subsections that follow focus on overall fluctuations in the intensity of boredom in Class 1 and Class 2, changes in the experience of this negative emotion in each of the two classes taken separately, the ways in which boredom changed for individual students and participants’ evaluations of the classes under investigation. These results are based on the outcomes of quantitative analysis.

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4 Findings of the Study

4.3.1 Overall Changes in Boredom Levels in the Two Classes As can be seen from Table 4.4 and Fig. 4.4, which numerically and graphically present the levels of boredom in Group 1 for Class 1 and Class 2, both overall and at 5-minute intervals, the students experienced this negative academic emotion more acutely in the case of the former (M = 3.13) than in the latter (M = 2.33). The overall difference in the means between the two classes amounted to 0.80 and turned out to be statistically significant (p = 0.009), with a medium effect size (r = 0.49). It should also be noted that there was little individual variation in this respect between Class 1 and Class 2, as evident in the values of standard deviation which were quite low and similar. The fluctuations in the self-reported intensity of boredom were more pronounced in Class 2, which is visible in the fact that the lowest boredom mean amounted to 1.33 (minute 25), while the highest stood at 3.44 (minutes 55 and 60), with a difference of 2.11. The Wilcoxon Signed Rank Test found these differences to be statistically significant (p = 0.011) and the effect size was moderate (r = 0.60). By contrast, in Class 1, the extent of variation was lower since the largest difference of 1.73 was detected between minute 45 (M = 4.00) and minute 75 (M = 2.27), but also reached significance (p = 0.44) with the effect size verging on small (r = 0.43). It should also be noted that some similarities but differences as well could be observed in the overall patterns of boredom in the two classes taught to Group 1. More precisely, there was a decrease in the self-reported intensity of boredom from the very beginning of both classes, albeit from different initial levels (higher in Class 1), followed by a temporary growth (minute 25 in Class 1 and minute 30 in Class 2), a small, one could say minute, drop (minute 30 in Class 1 and minute 35 in Class 2), followed by a steady increase until minute 45 in Class 1 and minute 55 in Class 2. Then, in Class 1, a major decrease in boredom levels occurred in minute 50 and continued until minute 55, but then a spike in the experience of this negative emotion was recorded, which was followed by a steady downward trend which persisted until the end of the class in question. As for Class 2, the intensity of boredom leveled off between minutes 55 and 60, with the participants reporting being gradually less and less bored till the end of the class. On a more general level, when the trajectories of boredom in Class 1 and Class 2 are set against each other, it becomes clear that while the reported mean intensity of this negative emotion was consistently higher in Class 1 than Class 2 for the first 50 min, this tendency was reversed between minutes 55 and 60, but then the initial pattern was seen to reinstate itself in the course of the last 15 min in both classes.

4.3 Self-reported Boredom Levels and Class Evaluations in Group 1

57

Table 4.4 Means, standard deviations, statistically significant differences and effect sizes for selfratings on the boredom grid in Class 1 and Class 2 taught in Group 1

Class 1

Class 2

Overall

Minutes

M (SD)

Statistical significance between minutes (Wilcoxon Signed Rank Test)

10

3.36 (1.75)

15

3.00 (1.34)

20

2.82 (1.25)

25

3.18 (1.72)

30

3.09 (1.70)

35

3.73 (1.49)

40

3.82 (1.83)

45

4.00 (1.79)

15 ↔ 45 (Z 20 ↔ 35 (Z 20 ↔ 45 (Z 30 ↔ 40 (Z 35 ↔ 75 (Z 40 ↔ 55 (Z 40 ↔ 75 (Z 45 ↔ 50 (Z 45 ↔ 55 (Z 45 ↔ 75 (Z

= 2.157, p = 0.031, r = 2.332, p = 0.020, r = 2.360, p = 0.018, r = 2.271, p = 0.023, r = 2.399, p = 0.016, r = 2.547, p = 0.011, r = 2.155, p = 0.031, r = 2.326, p = 0.020, r = 2.539, p = 0.011, r = 2.013, p = 0.044, r

= 0.46) = 0.50) = 0.50) = 0.48) = 0.51) = 0.54) = 0.46) = 0.50) = 0.54) = 0.43)

50

3.00 (1.26)

55

2.45 (1.21)

60

3.18 (1.83)

65

3.09 (1.51)

70

2.82 (1.08) 10 ↔ 25 (Z 15 ↔ 25 (Z 20 ↔ 55 (Z 20 ↔ 60 (Z 25 ↔ 30 (Z 25 ↔ 45 (Z 25 ↔ 50 (Z 25 ↔ 55 (Z 25 ↔ 60 (Z 50 ↔ 65 (Z 50 ↔ 70 (Z 50 ↔ 75 (Z 55 ↔ 65 (Z 55 ↔ 70 (Z 55 ↔ 75 (Z 60 ↔ 65 (Z 60 ↔ 70 (Z 60 ↔ 75 (Z 65 ↔ 70 (Z

= 2.157, p = 0.031, r = 2.530, p = 0.011, r = 2.456, p = 0.014, r = 2.388, p = 0.017, r = 2.428, p = 0.015, r = 2.414, p = 0.016, r = 2.388, p = 0.017, r = 2.536, p = 0.011, r = 2.546, p = 0.011, r = 2.070, p = 0.038, r = 2.588, p = 0.010, r = 2.041, p = 0.041, r = 2.636, p = 0.008, r = 2.546, p = 0.011, r = 2.459, p = 0.014, r = 2.585, p = 0.010, r = 2.701, p = 0.007, r = 2.448, p = 0.014, r = 2.236, p = 0.025, r

= 0.51) = 0.60) = 0.58) = 0.56) = 0.57) = 0.57) = 0.56) = 0.60) = 0.60) = 0.49) = 0.61) = 0.48) = 0.62) = 0.60) = 0.58) = 0.61) = 0.64) = 0.58) = 0.53)

75

2.27 (1.35)

10

2.44 (0.88)

15

2.33 (1.22)

20

1.89 (0.60)

25

1.33 (0.50)

30

2.44 (0.73)

35

2.22 (1.72)

40

2.44 (1.81)

45

2.67 (1.41)

50

2.89 (1.45)

55

3.44 (1.59)

60

3.44 (1.42)

65

2.11 (1.17)

70

1.56 (1.13)

75

1.44 (0.73)

Class 1

3.13 (0.49)

Class 2

2.33 (0.65)

Class 1 ↔ Class 2 (Z = 2.605, p = 0.009, r = 0.49)

58

4 Findings of the Study Class 1

Class 2

7

Level of boredom

6 5 4 3 2 1 10

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

50

55

60

65

70

75

Minutes

Fig. 4.4 Changes in the self-reported levels of boredom in Class 1 and Class 2 for Group 1

4.3.2 Changes in Boredom Levels During Individual Classes In the present subsection, an attempt will be made to relate the patterns of boredom intensity that were identified in Class 1 and Class 2 in Group 1 to the ways in which these classes proceeded. When it comes to Class 1, Fig. 4.5 shows that the students

Fig. 4.5 Changes in the level of boredom reported in Class 1 in Group 1. Note O = organization, V = vocabulary, G = grammar, R = reading, S = speaking, L = listening, C = conclusion

4.3 Self-reported Boredom Levels and Class Evaluations in Group 1

59

became quite bored in the first 10 min, which is evident in the fact that the initially reported boredom level in this minute equaled 3.36 points. This was the time when the teacher provided feedback on the homework assignment, explained the aims of the class and talked about activities to be covered in class (O = organization). The situation started to change during the first two activities in which the participants were asked to complete a set of sentences with appropriate words (V = vocabulary) and read a short text devoted to the language of cause and effect (G1 = grammar), where a decrease in boredom levels from 3 points (minute 15) to 2.82 (minute 20) could be observed. Subsequently, the levels of boredom started to rise during the second grammar activity (G2), where the students were requested to read and complete a text with words indicating cause-and-effect relationships. The intensity of boredom continued to grow at the beginning of the third grammar activity (G3), where the students were asked to listen to an actor and select words and expressions concerning the language of cause and effect but it began to fall slightly somewhere in the middle of this activity and when the students set about reading the text about “work experience program” (R) (minute 30). This was followed by a rather sharp increase in the intensity of the experience of boredom (M = 3.73 points, minute 35) which persisted until minute 45 when it reached its peak (M = 4.00). During that time the students were reading the text in question and were subsequently asked to answer a set of questions about it. A one-point drop in the levels of boredom was subsequently observed at the end of the speaking task (S) (minute 50), in which the learners were asked to work in pairs and talk about jobs most valuable to society. The intensity of boredom continued to diminish until the first half of the listening activity (L) (M = 2.45, minute 55), devoted to listening to eight individuals talking about their jobs. As the listening activity was in progress, though, an increase in the level of boredom was initiated, which is evidenced by an increase of 0.73 from minute 55 to minute 60, followed by a slight decrease in the next five minutes towards the end of the task (M = 3.18 in minute 60 and M = 3.09 in minute 65). The remainder of Class 1 (i.e., minutes 70 and 75) witnessed a steady decrease in boredom levels when the participants, in pairs, discussed the most and least interesting jobs (S2) (a change of 0.82 from minute 65 to minute 75). Moving on to Class 2 conducted in Group 1, Fig. 4.6 shows that the students reported a moderate level of boredom after the first 15 min (in this case the mean oscillating around 2.5). This was the time when the teacher introduced the aims of the class, talked about the tasks and activities to be performed and offered feedback on the language test that the students had sat in one of the previous classes (O = organization). The experience of boredom reported by the participants was even lower after the next five minutes (a change of 0.44 from minute 15 to minute 20) and it continued to fall until minute 25, reaching its lowest level during this class at this point (M = 1.33). This steady decrease in the experience of boredom occurred during a speaking activity (S1) devoted to a discussion a number of inventions shown in a picture taken from a coursebook. The following task (R + S = reading + speaking), which consisted in reading five short descriptions of “unsuccessful” inventions accompanied by a discussion performed in pairs, resulted in, first, a substantial increase in the experience of boredom (a change of 1.11 from minute 25 to minute 30), second,

60

4 Findings of the Study

Fig. 4.6 Changes in the level of boredom reported in Class 2 in Group 1. Note O = organization, V = vocabulary, G = grammar, R = reading, S = speaking, L = listening, C = conclusion

a minor drop (a change of 0.22 from minute 30 to minute 35), and, third, a slight increase in its level (a change of 0.22 from minute 35 to minute 40). The level of boredom continued to rise throughout the next two vocabulary exercises (V1 and V2) (2.67 in minute 45 and 2.89 in minute 55), dealing with adjectives (i.e., grouping a set of adjectives into positive and negative ones and completing some sentences with suitable words), and this tendency was maintained during the listening task (L), where the students familiarized themselves with a radio program in which four people talked about things they could not live without and then were requested to answer a number of questions, reaching its apex as this task was drawing to a close (3.44 points in minute 55). This high level of boredom persisted at the beginning of the subsequent grammar activity (G) (minute 60) devoted to modal verbs, in which the learners were asked to identify their meanings in specific contexts and complete several sentences with appropriate verbs of this kind but the intensity of boredom decreased considerably (a change of 1.85 from minute 60 to minute 70) during the grammar activity in question. The last activity, that is, a role-play in which the participants were asked to sell an invention (S2), brought about a further decrease, albeit a minute one, in the experience of this academic negative emotion (a change of 0.12 from minute 70 to minute 75) confirming the overall trend that began to set in towards the completion of the class.

4.3 Self-reported Boredom Levels and Class Evaluations in Group 1

61

4.3.3 Changes in Boredom Levels Within Individual Students As demonstrated in Table 4.5, which includes the mean and standard deviation values for self-reported boredom levels for the two classes taught in Group 1, as well as Figs. 4.7 and 4.8, which diagrammatically represent the levels of boredom for each of the students in Group 1 at the 14 measurement points when self-ratings were provided on the boredom grid in Class 1 and Class 2, there was considerable individual variation in this respect. For example, if we examine the mean values of the self-reported boredom levels for each student in Class 1, it becomes evident that the mean ratings for particular students range from 1.57 to 5.71 (a difference of 4.14 points), and in 5 out of the 11 cases (almost 50%) they exceed the overall average for the entire group (i.e., 3.13). Since it makes little sense to discuss in detail the changes in boredom levels for all of the members of Group 1, not least because some of these were minute and not very revealing, the self-ratings of only selected participants, that is, those who exhibited the lowest and highest overall mean values of boredom in the course of both classes, will be subjected to detailed analysis in this subsection. For this reason, the patterns of boredom of four students will undergo close scrutiny at this juncture, namely S9 and S13 in Class 1 and S2 and S10 in Class 2. Overall, S9 experienced the lowest level of boredom (M = 1.57, SD = 0.76) of all the participants in Class 1. He felt somewhat bored in the first ten minutes dedicated to checking the homework assignment and explicating organizational issues (i.e., aims of the class, the activities to be included). The student reported no boredom (a self-rating of 1) with the onset of the first activity related to vocabulary practice (V) (i.e., filling out the gaps in sentences) as well as during two subsequent grammar Table 4.5 Mean and standard deviation values for individual members of Group 1 in both classes

Student

Class 1

Class 2

M (SD)

M (SD)

S1

2.36 (0.84)

1.93 (0.83)

S2

*

1.50 (0.65)

S3

3.64 (2.10)

*

S4

2.93 (0.92)

*

S5

2.79 (0.89)

1.86 (0.66)

S6

*

2.50 (1.74)

S7

2.29 (0.91)

1.57 (0.76)

S8

3.50 (1.09)

2.93 (1.44)

S9

1.57 (0.76)

*

S10

3.43 (1.28)

3.21 (1.58)

S11

2.36 (0.93)

2.36 (1.08)

S12

3.86 (0.95)

3.14 (1.56)

S13

5.71 (1.38)

*

Note *Indicates students’ absence

62

4 Findings of the Study 7

6 S1

Level of boredom

S3 5

S4 S5 S7

4

S8 S9 S10

3

S11 S12 2

S13

1 10

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

50

55

60

65

70

75

Minutes

Fig. 4.7 Changes in the level of boredom for individual members of Group 1 in Class 1 with a particular focus on S9 and S13 7

Level of boredom

6 S1 5

S2 S5 S6

4

S7 S8

3

S10 S11

2

S12

1 10

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

50

55

60

65

70

75

Minutes

Fig. 4.8 Changes in the level of boredom for individual members of Group 1 in Class 2, with a particular focus on S2 and S10

4.3 Self-reported Boredom Levels and Class Evaluations in Group 1

63

activities (G1 and G2) in which the participants were requested to read a short text and underline expressions related to the language of cause and effect as well as to read and complete a text with appropriate cause-and-effect words. The student started to experience some boredom during the third grammar activity (G3) which again revolved around the issue of the language of cause and effect and at the beginning of reading about “work experience program” (R) (a self-rating of 2 in minute 35) (see Fig. 4.7). Then a one-point increase and a one-point decrease in the self-reported level of boredom could be observed in minutes 40 and 45, respectively. This was the time when the students continued reading the text, started answering questions related to it and when the comprehension of text content was verified by the teacher. The speaking task involving the discussion of jobs that are the most valuable to society (S1) resulted in total disappearance of the experience of boredom and this situation was maintained until the end of the listening task (L) in which the participants were requested to listen to people discussing their occupations and answer comprehension questions (minutes 50–65). This was followed by a one-point increase in the intensity of boredom when the students started to converse about the most and the least interesting jobs (S2) (minute 70). Subsequently, this negative emotion disappeared completely at the end of the class, when the last beep was sounded and the last measurement was taken. S13 was the most bored member of Group 1 in Class 1. His overall self-reported boredom level equaled 5.71 on the 1–7 scale and can thus be regarded as rather high. The student also manifested variations in his experience of this negative emotion throughout the class in question, with frequent ups and downs in his self-ratings, which is evidenced in the overall value of standard deviation amounting to 1.38, being the highest in the entire group. In more specific terms, S13 felt extremely bored after the first ten minutes of the class which focused on going over the homework assignment and discussing organizational matters (see Fig. 4.7). His self-reported level of boredom fell quite noticeably at the end of the vocabulary activity (V) (a self-rating of 4.00 in minute 15), but then it started to increase during the grammar exercises (G1, G2 and G3) concerning the language of cause and effect and reached its highest level at the start of the reading task (R) (a self-rating of 7 in minute 30). This was followed by a one-point drop and a one-point rise, with the intensity of boredom leveling off until the end of the reading task (a rating of 7.00 in minute 45). The student started to exhibit less boredom during the speaking task (S1) devoted to the topic of jobs most valuable to society (a self-rating of 5.00 in minute 50) and the intensity of boredom remained at the same level for the first several minutes of the listening task (L) (a self-rating of 5.00 in minute 55). The rest of the listening task was perceived by the student as extremely boring, as evident in his self-rating of boredom which reached its maximum value on the grid (7.00 in minutes 60 and 65). The intensity of boredom fell quite dramatically during the speaking task (S2) in which the participants were requested to work in pairs and carry out conversations about the most and the least interesting jobs (a difference of 4.00 in self-ratings between minutes 65 and 75) (see Fig. 4.7). S2 was the least bored member of Group 1 during Class 2 (M = 1.50, SD = 0.65). The learner experienced a small dose of boredom in the first 15 min devoted to commenting on organizational issues and providing feedback on the results of a

64

4 Findings of the Study

language test (see Fig. 4.8). She reported feeling no boredom during the speaking task (S1), which involved a short discussion about inventions in minutes 20–25, but started to experience this negative emotion in the initial minutes of the reading activity about “unsuccessful” inventions (R + S) (a self-rating of 2.00 in minute 30). The intensity of boredom then decreased to the minimum level on the grid and stabilized at this level throughout the follow-up discussion of the “unsuccessful” inventions as well as the subsequent vocabulary activities dealing with a set of adjectives (V1 and V2) (minutes 35–50). This was followed by a small increase in boredom (a self-rating of 2.00 in minute 55) during the listening task (L) which focused on things people could not live without and was followed by a series of questions. This low level of boredom was maintained during the rest of the activity and also at the outset of the grammar exercise (G), that is, until minute 60. Afterwards, the feeling of boredom disappeared during the performance of a grammar activity (G) that dealt with modal verbs (minutes 65–70). The last five minutes of the class, dedicated to the completion of a speaking task (S2) in which the students tried to sell an invention, witnessed a rather sudden and unexpected increase in the student’s experience of boredom (a self-rating of 3.00 in minute 75). As indicated above, S10, on the whole, reported the highest level of boredom in Class 2 (M = 3.21), but this experience was also subject to major fluctuations, as shown in the pretty high standard deviation value (1.58). As illustrated in Fig. 4.8, the student displayed a sudden rise in his experience of boredom at the end of the organizational part of the class when the teacher finished discussing the outcomes of the language test (a difference of 3.00 between minutes 10–15). This was followed by a sudden drop in the self-reported intensity of boredom somewhere in the middle of the speaking activity performed in dyads and devoted to discussing inventions (S1) (a self-rating of 1.00 in minute 20). Although a one-point increase in his boredom level could be observed at the time of the next measurement (minute 25), the low level of boredom (a self-rating of 2.00) was maintained during the next activity which concerned reading and talking about “unsuccessful” inventions (R + S) (minutes 25–40). The subsequent vocabulary activities (V1 and V2) and the listening task (L) gave rise to quite a sharp increase in the intensity of boredom over the next 15 min, with the outcome that it reached its apex (a self-rating of 6.00) in minute 55. This was followed by a steady decrease in his experience of boredom during the final grammar (G) and speaking activities (S2), with a difference of four points between minutes 55 and 75 (see Fig. 4.8).

4.3.4 Participants’ Evaluation of the Classes The students’ post hoc evaluations of Class 1 and Class 2 in both groups can be hypothesized as an additional factor influencing the occurrence of boredom as well as the observed fluctuations in this respect. The evaluations for Group 1 are included in Table 4.6, where the participants’ responses on the sematic differential scale (e.g., interesting vs. boring) were converted into values on a 7-point Likert scale. As can

5.67

0.87

4.56

SD 1.59

1.17

SD 1.47

Class M 2

4.82

5.18

Class M 1

1.64

4.78

1.12

5.36

1.00

5.67

1.27

4.73

1.90

3.11

1.29

2.36

1.62

5.11

1.10

5.00

1.94

4.67

1.38

3.91

0.87

4.79

1.04

4.48

meaningless dull—exciting useless—useful unsatisfying—satisfying usual—unusual unappealing—appealing monotonous—absorbing Overall – meaningful

Table 4.6 Participants’ evaluation of Class 1 and Class 2 in Group 1

4.3 Self-reported Boredom Levels and Class Evaluations in Group 1 65

66 Table 4.7 Mean and standard deviation values for the evaluation of the classes by individual members of Group 1

4 Findings of the Study Student

Class 1

Class 2

M (SD)

M (SD)

S1

4.86 (1.86)

5.43 (2.07)

S2

*

5.43 (1.81)

S3

3.57 (1.62)

*

S4

5.29 (0.76)

*

S5

4.57 (0.79)

6.29 (0.76)

S6

*

3.29 (1.38)

S7

5.71 (0.95)

5.86 (0.38)

S8

4.14 (1.35)

3.86 (1.21)

S9

5.43 (1.27)

*

S10

3.29 (1.38)

3.43 (1.51)

S11

4.86 (0.69)

5.86 (1.07)

S12

4.14 (1.35)

3.71 (0.95)

S13

3.43 (2.57)

*

Note *Indicates students’ absence

be seen from these data, on the whole, Class 2 was viewed by the participants as less boring (M = 4.79) than Class 1 (M = 4.48), with the difference in the means between the two classes equaling 0.31. It should be pointed out, however, that this difference was marginal and, not surprisingly, failed to reach significance (p > 0.05). With respect to the specific dimensions of the evaluations, on the one hand, the students viewed Class 1 as useful (M = 5.36), meaningful (M = 5.18) and appealing (M = 5.00) but, on the other hand, they regarded it as pretty usual (M = 2.36). In contrast, Class 2 tended to be described as exciting, satisfying (both M = 5.67) and appealing (M = 5.11) but, again, quite usual (M = 3.11). It is also worth drawing attention to the fact that the standard deviation values were higher for Class 1 (SD = 1.04) when compared with Class 2 (0.87), with the difference of 0.17. Even though this difference was relatively small, it still indicates that the participants differed in their evaluation of the specific dimensions according to which the class was assessed. The patterns of individual variation with respect to the post hoc evaluations of classes taught in Group 1 become more transparent when we relate them to the selfratings of boredom provided by specific students. Since it does not seem warranted to include in this analysis all the students who participated in both classes, such examination will be confined here to the individuals who demonstrated the lowest and highest overall mean values of boredom, that is, yet again, S9 and S13 in Class 1 as well as S2 and S10 in Class 2. For S9, who manifested the least boredom, the evaluation of Class 1 equaled 5.43 (SD = 1.27) and was the second highest in the group (see Table 4.7). As illustrated in Fig. 4.9, he found the entire class and the activities it included to be highly meaningful, pretty useful, satisfying and absorbing, but, mirroring the tendency revealed for the whole group, also quite usual. As for S13, for whom the feeling of boredom was the most acute, his overall assessment of the

4.3 Self-reported Boredom Levels and Class Evaluations in Group 1

67

7

Level of boredom

6 meaningless – meaningful

5

dull – exciting useless – useful

4

unsatisfying – satisfying usual – unusual

3

unappealing – appealing monotonous – absorbing

2 1

S1

S3

S4

S5

S7

S8

S9

S10

S11

S12

S13

Fig. 4.9 Individual students’ evaluations of Class 1 (sematic differential scale converted into a 7-point Likert scale)

class amounted to 3.43, which was the second lowest score in Group 1. The relatively high value of standard deviation, which stood at 2.57, testifies to the existence of considerable inconsistency in his perceptions of Class 1 (see Table 4.7). To be more precise, even though the participant found the class to be highly monotonous, usual and quite unsatisfying, he also viewed it as very meaningful and appealing, showing that such disparate assessments are not mutually exclusive (see Fig. 4.9). When it comes to Class 2, S2’s overall evaluation of this class amounted to 5.43, which represents one of the moderate scores among the members of Group 1. This finding is admittedly somewhat surprising in view of the fact that this participant self-reported the lowest intensity of boredom in this class. Interestingly, the relatively high value of the standard deviation (SD = 1.81) indicated substantial variation in the learner’s opinions about the content of the class, the tasks and activities used as well as its overall progress. More specifically, she considered the class to be, on the one hand, very meaningful, unusual, exciting, satisfying and absorbing, but, on the other hand, regarded it as rather usual, again sharing the overall sentiments of the other members of the group (see Fig. 4.10). As regards S10, his overall evaluation of Class 2 equaled 3.43 points, being the second lowest mean score among his group members, a finding that was predictable to some extent, given that he proved to be the most bored in it. His assessment of the class under investigation was also far from unidimensional, as visible in a pretty high general value of the standard deviation (SD = 1.51). As can be seen in Fig. 4.10, in the view of the participant, the class was useless and usual; however, which is not easy to explain, it was simultaneously exciting and fairly satisfying.

68

4 Findings of the Study 7

Level of boredom

6

meaningless – meaningful

5

dull – exciting useless – useful

4

unsatisfying – satisfying usual – unusual unappealing – appealing

3

monotonous – absorbing

2

1

S1

S2

S5

S6

S7

S8

S10

S11

S12

Fig. 4.10 Individual students’ evaluation of Class 2 (sematic differential scale converted into a 7-point Likert scale)

4.4 Self-reported Boredom Levels and Class Evaluations in Group 2 Similar to the organization of Sect. 4.3, which focused on the results of quantitative analysis for Group 1, the following subsections are devoted to presenting Group 2’s overall variations in the intensity of boredom in Class 1 and Class 2, fluctuations in the experience of boredom in the two classes under investigation, the ways in which this negative emotion altered for individual participants and the students’ post hoc evaluations of the classes in question. As was the case in Sect. 4.3, the results are the product of quantitative analysis.

4.4.1 Overall Changes in Boredom Levels in the Two Classes Table 4.8 includes numerical data related to the mean and standard deviation values of boredom and Fig. 4.11 graphically shows the levels of boredom in Group 2 for Class 1 and Class 2, both in general and at 5-min intervals. As can be seen from these two data sources, the students experienced more boredom in Class 1 (M = 2.78) than in Class 2 (M = 2.02). This difference between the two classes was sizable, amounting to 0.76; it is thus not surprising that it reached statistical significance (p = 0.002) and the effect size was moderate (r = 0.59). The students also manifested some variation in their experience of boredom in the two class but it was rather low, as evident in the overall standard deviation values (see Table 4.8). The fluctuations

4.4 Self-reported Boredom Levels and Class Evaluations in Group 2

69

Table 4.8 Means, standard deviations, statistically significant differences and effect sizes for selfratings on the boredom grid in Class 1 and Class 2 taught in Group 2

Class 1

Class 2

Minutes

M (SD)

Statistical significance between minutes (Wilcoxon Signed Rank Test)

10

2.71 (2.06)

No statistically significant differences found

15

2.00 (1.41)

20

2.29 (1.38)

25

2.86 (1.35)

30

2.57 (1.51)

35

2.29 (1.38)

40

3.00 (0.82)

45

3.14 (1.68)

50

2.86 (1.86)

55

3.00 (1.73)

60

3.00 (2.31)

65

3.14 (1.95)

70

3.00 (2.08)

75

3.00 (2.38)

10

2.25 (1.16)

15

2.13 (1.13)

20

2.38 (1.06)

25

2.00 (0.53)

30

2.00 (0.76)

35

2.13 (0.35)

40

1.88 (0.83)

45

1.75 (0.71)

50

1.50 (0.53)

55

1.88 (1.13)

60

2.25 (1.04)

65

2.25 (1.04)

50 ↔ 60 (Z = 2.121, p = 0.034, r = 0.53) 50 ↔ 65 (Z = 2.121, p = 0.034, r = 0.53)

2.00 (1.31) 1.88 (1.13) Overall

Class 1

2.78 (0.36)

Class 2

2.02 (0.23)

Class 1 ↔ Class 2 (Z = 3.111, p = 0.002, r = 0.59)

in the boredom levels were slightly more visible in Class 1, which is evident in the fact that the lowest mean self-rating of boredom intensity equaled 2.00 (minute 15), while the highest amounted to 3.14 (minute 45 and minute 65), with a difference of 1.14. It should be noted, however, that the Wilcoxon Signed Rank Test did not find these differences to be statistically significant (p > 0.05). As for Class 2, the

70

4 Findings of the Study Class 1

Class 2

7

Level of boredom

6 5 4 3 2 1 10

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

50

55

60

65

70

75

Minutes

Fig. 4.11 Changes in the self-reported levels of boredom in Class 1 and Class 2 for Group 2

lowest level of boredom was detected in minute 50 (a self-rating of 1.50) and the highest could be observed in minute 20 (a self-rating of 2.38). The difference in the self-reported means amounted to 0.88 but, as was the case in Class 1, failed to reach statistical significance (p > 0.05). When it comes to the overall patterns of boredom in the two classes, the analysis provided evidence for the existence of differences as well (see Fig. 4.11). The reported experience of boredom in the first half of Class 1, that is from minute 10 to minute 40, can be characterized as quite dynamic in view of the fact that it was subject to much more abrupt changes (e.g., a change of 0.86 from minute 15 to minute 25, a change of 0.57 from minute 25 to minute 35) than the intensity of this negative emotion in the second part of the class (i.e., minutes 45–75) which can be described as pretty stable, with the reported levels of boredom oscillating around the value of 3.00. As regards Class 2, the students reported being more bored in the first twenty minutes and in minutes 60–65, but the self-reported values barely exceeded 2.00 in both cases. By contrast, the participants started to experience less boredom somewhere in the middle of the class (i.e., minute 40), with an upward trend starting to set in again in minute 50, which was followed by a steady fall from minute 65. On the whole, it is clear that while the patterns of boredom overlapped to some extent until minute 20, a gap appeared thereafter, which was largely maintained until the end of the respective classes.

4.4 Self-reported Boredom Levels and Class Evaluations in Group 2

71

4.4.2 Changes in Boredom Levels During Individual Classes As was the case with Group 1, the aim of the present subsection is to examine the changes in the self-reported levels of boredom as a function of the tasks and activities planned for the two classes under investigation. As illustrated in Fig. 4.12, the members of Group 2 were slightly bored in the initial minutes of Class 1 devoted to some introductory issues and provision of feedback on a homework assignment (O = organization, a mean self-rating of 2.71 in minute 10). The vocabulary activity (V) consisting in filling out gaps in pairs of sentences resulted in a drop in the intensity of this negative emotion (a change of 0.71 from minute 10 to minute 15) but the mean boredom levels subsequently started to rise during an activity (G1 = grammar) requiring the students to read the text which contained phrases used to indicate the relationships of cause and effect (a self-rating of 2.29 in minute 20), and to complete the text with appropriate words (G2 = grammar, 2.86, minute 25). This trend was carried over to the initial phase of the subsequent activity (G3) in which the students were instructed to listen to an actor and select words and expressions related to the language of cause and effect (the mean self-rating of 2.86 in minute 25). However, as the task was in progress, the students reported experiencing less and less boredom, with its level still being on the decrease in the first few minutes of the subsequent reading activity (R) involving reading the text about “work experience program” (the mean self-rating of 2.29 in minute 35). Somewhere in the middle of this task the participants reported a substantial increase in the intensity of boredom (a change of 0.71 from minute 35 to minute 40), followed by a less pronounced one at the end of

Fig. 4.12 Changes in the level of boredom reported in Class 1 in Group 2. Note O = organization, V = vocabulary, G = grammar, R = reading, S = speaking, L = listening, C = conclusion

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4 Findings of the Study

the task (a change of 0.14 from minute 40 to minute 45). In the speaking activity (S1) that followed, in which the students were requested to talk about jobs that are most valuable to society, a slight drop in the experience of boredom could be observed (a change of 0.28 from minute 45 to minute 50). The mean self-ratings of boredom then increased slightly, only to level off and remain at the same level (i.e., 3.00) for the remaining consecutive measurements (i.e., minutes 55, 60, 70 and 75), with the exception of minute 65 where a slight rise was detected (a change of 0.14 from minute 60 to minute 65). These rather low and stable boredom levels were recorded during listening (L) and speaking (S2) activities when the participants were familiarized with the stories of people talking about their jobs, answered comprehension questions, and were then requested to talk about the most and the least interesting jobs (see Fig. 4.12). When it comes to Class 2, the first phase (O = organization), approximately ten minutes in length, which was dedicated to the presentation of the aims to be achieved, the language tasks and activities to be covered, and the provision of feedback on the language test, witnessed a low level of boredom, barely exceeding the mean value of 2.00 (see Fig. 4.13). Subsequently, the reported experience of boredom decreased and increased slightly in minute 15 (the mean self-rating of 2.13) and minute 20 (the mean self-rating of 2.38), respectively, when the students were engaged in performing a speaking activity (S1) (i.e., discussing inventions in pairs). This was followed by a 0.38 decrease at the start of reading short texts about “unsuccessful” inventions (R + S). The reported level of boredom did not change during the follow-up task in which the participants talked about these inventions, although a slight rise was detected towards the end of this task (R + S, the mean self-rating of 2.13 in minute 35). The activities encompassing vocabulary practice (V1 and V2) (i.e., grouping adjectives into positive and negative and selecting the best adjectives to be used in a set of sentences) resulted in a continuous decrease in the experience of boredom (mean self-ratings of 1.88 in minute 40 and 1.75 in minute 45, respectively). The beginning of the listening activity (L) in which the students were asked to listen to a radio program where anonymous individuals were discussing things they could not manage without brought about the lowest level of boredom (the mean self-rating of 1.50 in minute 50). However, two increases in the levels of boredom were reported when the listening task was in progress (a change of 0.33 from minute 50 to minute 55) and when the students were required to answer questions related to the task (a change of 0.37 from minute 55 to minute 60). This boredom level (the mean self-rating of 2.25) did not change during the following grammar activity (G), which consisted in guessing the correct meaning of modal verbs and using them to complete a set of sentences, and then it kept falling during a role-play activity (S2) in which the participants’ task was to sell an invention (a change of 0.37 from minute 65 to minute 75).

Fig. 4.13 Changes in the level of boredom reported in Class 2 in Group 2. Note O = organization, V = vocabulary, G = grammar, R = reading, S = speaking, L = listening, C = conclusion

4.4 Self-reported Boredom Levels and Class Evaluations in Group 2 73

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4.4.3 Changes in Boredom Levels Within Individual Students Table 4.9 includes the mean and standard deviation values of self-reported boredom intensity for the students in Group 2 in Class 1 and Class 2, whereas Figs. 4.14 and 4.15 diagrammatically show the levels of boredom for individual students for the14 times when self-ratings were indicated on the boredom grid in response to a beep. As can be seen from these data, the learners differed quite considerably in their experience of boredom in the course of the two classes. For example, the mean value for individual participants in Class 1 and Class 2 ranged from 1.29 to 5.43 Table 4.9 Mean and standard deviation values for individual members of Group 2 in both classes

Student

Class 1

Class 2

M (SD)

M (SD)

S1

*

2.71 (0.83)

S2

5.43 (0.85)

*

S3

1.57 (0.65)

1.79 (0.70)

S4

*

1.71 (0.83)

S5

3.64 (1.39)

2.71 (0.99)

S6

1.86 (1.17)

2.36 (0.74)

S7

1.29 (0.61)

1.86 (0.95)

S8

3.57 (1.02)

1.86 (0.77)

S9

2.07 (0.73)

*

S10

*

1.14 (0.36)

Note *Indicates students’ absence

7

Level of boredom

6 S2

5

S3 S5

4

S6 3

S7 S8

2

S9

1 10

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

50

55

60

65

70

75

Minutes

Fig. 4.14 Changes in the level of boredom for individual members of Group 2 in Class 1, with a particular focus on S7 and S2

4.4 Self-reported Boredom Levels and Class Evaluations in Group 2

75

7

Level of boredom

6

S1

5

S3 S4

4

S5 S6

3

S7 S8 S10

2

1 10

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

50

55

60

65

70

75

Minutes

Fig. 4.15 Changes in the level of boredom for individual members of Group 2 in Class 2, with a particular focus on S10, S1 and S5

(a difference of 4.14) and from 1.14 to 2.71 (a difference of 1.57), respectively. As elucidated in one of the previous sections, it is neither possible nor warranted to trace the changes in the boredom levels of all students constituting Group 2. For this reason, only the self-ratings of those participants who exhibited the lowest and highest overall mean values of boredom in the course of both classes, namely S7 and S2 (Class 1) and S10, S1 and S5 (Class 2) will be subjected to closer examination. In general, S7 reported the lowest intensity of boredom (M = 1.29, SD = 0.61) in Class 1. In fact, she did not manifest any boredom in the first 20 min, which was the time when the focus was on checking homework, organizational issues, as well as the completion of the vocabulary exercise (V) (i.e., filling out gaps in sentences) and the first grammar activity (G1) (i.e., reading a short text and underlining expressions concerning the language of cause and effect). Her experience of boredom started to rise somewhat during the second grammar activity (G2) in which the students were requested to complete a text with appropriate words only to reach the value of 2.00 in minute 25 at the start of the third grammar exercise (G3) (i.e., listening to an actor and choosing the words and expressions comprising the language of cause and effect). No boredom whatsoever was reported with the onset of an activity devoted to reading a text about “work experience program” (R) but then the self-reported intensity of this negative emotion started to increase and reached its peak at the end of the task (a self-rating of 3.00 in minute 45). Subsequently, the level of self-reported boredom dropped by 2.00 during the speaking activity (S1) which focused on a discussion of jobs that are the most valuable to society (a self-rating of 1.00 in minute 50) and no

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boredom was reported from this point on until the very end of the class (i.e., during listening (L) and speaking (S2) tasks) (see Fig. 4.14). As regards S2, his overall self-reported boredom level was the highest of all the members of Group 1 and equaled 5.43. The participant also manifested some variation in his experience of this negative emotion throughout the class, as evident in the standard deviation value which equaled to 0.85. As can be seen in Fig. 4.14, the student felt very bored after the first ten minutes of the class (i.e., providing feedback on the homework assignment plus organizational issues). Afterwards, however, his reported intensity of this emotion dropped by one point after the vocabulary activity (V) (i.e., completing sentences with correct words) and the self-rating of 5.00 persisted throughout the following grammar activities (G1, G2 and G3) (i.e., completing a text with the words of cause and effect and identifying words and expressions of this kind used by an actor in a listening activity). The student’s level of boredom dropped by one point during reading a text concerning work experience program (R) (a self-rating of 4.00 in minute 35) only to rise again by two points when the students were asked to answer some questions related to the text (a self-rating of 6.00 in minute 45). The high self-reported experience of boredom remained constant during the following speaking task (S1) (i.e., talking about jobs most beneficial to society), which was performed in pairs. This was followed by a one-point decrease and then one-point increase of boredom in the first half of the listening task (L) (minute 55 and minute 60, respectively). This high level of boredom persisted until the end of this activity (a self-rating of 6.00 in minute 70). The speaking task (S2) performed in dyads at the end of the class (i.e., discussing the most and the least interesting jobs) turned out to be the most conducive to experiencing boredom for this student, since the self-rating reached the maximum level of 7.00 in minute 75. Of all the members of Group 2 who participated in Class 2, S10 experienced the least boredom overall and his self-reported levels of this academic emotion were not subject to major fluctuations, as evident in the mean and standard deviations values (M = 1.14, SD = 0.36). In fact, the student reported being only slightly bored in the initial phase of reading the texts about “unsuccessful” inventions (a self-rating of 2.00 in minute 25) as well as towards the end of the speaking component of this task (R + S), which involved discussing the inventions with a peer (a self-rating of 2.00 in minute 35) (see Fig. 4.15). In view of the fact that two individuals, that is, S1 and S5, both manifested the highest levels of boredom in Class 2, the self-ratings for both of them will be examined in some detail. As can be seen in Fig. 4.15, S1 was not particularly interested in the phase of the class devoted to checking homework and commenting on organizational issues (a self-rating of 3.00 in minute 10). The intensity of boredom was even higher after the next five minutes when the second measurement was taken (a self-rating of 4.00 in minute 15) but it fell rather abruptly by two points in minute 20 to remain at this level (a self-rating of 2.00) for the next 15 min (minute 35). This was the time when the students started to talk about inventions (S1) (i.e., the first speaking activity), read the text about “unsuccessful” inventions and then talked about them in pairs (R + S). The first and second vocabulary activities (V1 and V2), in which the students dealt with adjectives, resulted in a one-point increase in boredom intensity

4.4 Self-reported Boredom Levels and Class Evaluations in Group 2

77

(a self-rating of 3.00 in minute 40 and minute 45). Following this, once again, the student’s level of boredom dropped by one point (a self-rating of 2.00 in minute 50), and leveled off for the next ten minutes dedicated to listening to a radio program about people talking about the things that they regarded as the most important for them and answering comprehension questions (L). The subsequent grammar exercise focusing on modal verbs (G) turned out to be boredom-inducing since the intensity of this negative emotion started to grow and this trend held until the end of the exercise (a self-rating of 4.00 in minute 70). This relatively high level of boredom did not change during the last activity in which the students were asked to work in pairs and try to sell an invention (S2) (see Fig. 4.15). When it comes to S5, the intensity of boredom grew pretty quickly during the first activity, namely the conversation about inventions performed in pairs (S1) (a change in self-rating from 2.00 to 4.00 from minute 10 to minute 20). Subsequently, however, it started to fall when the students were asked to read about “unsuccessful” inventions and discuss their merits in pairs (R + S) (a change in self-rating from 4.00 to 2.00 in minutes 20–35). This level of boredom was maintained during the vocabulary activities concerning the usage of adjectives (V1 and V2) (i.e., grouping them into positive and negative as well as completing sentences with them) and the initial phase of the listening task (L) (minutes 35–50). This was followed by a sharp two-point increase in the intensity of boredom and a period of stability until the end of the grammar exercise related to modal verbs (G) (minute 65). The speaking activity focused on selling an invention (S2), which the students were asked to carry out in pairs and which was planned for the end of the class, triggered a substantial decrease in the student’s experience of boredom that in fact reached its minimum level (a change of four points from minute 65 to minute 75) (see Fig. 4.15).

4.4.4 Participants’ Evaluation of the Classes As mentioned in Sect. 4.3.4 related to the assessment of Class 1 and Class 2 by the members of Group 1, such evaluation can be considered as an additional factor helping us better account for the occurrence of boredom as well as the ebbs and flows of this negative emotion, and this applies in equal measure to the classes taught to Group 2. The numerical data included in Table 4.10 demonstrate that, in general, the participants regarded Class 1 as more boring (M = 4.65) when compared with Class 2 (M = 5.31), with the difference in the means between the two classes equaling 0.66 and not being statistically significant (p > 0.05). What is more, Class 1 was viewed by the participants as very useful (M = 5.57) and considerably meaningful, satisfying and appealing (all M = 5.43); at the same time, however, the said class was also perceived as quite usual for them (M = 2.14). Conversely, the students viewed Class 2 as greatly exciting (M = 5.63), satisfying (M = 5.50) and useful (M = 5.38). It should be noted, however, that the usual-unusual dimension received the lowest overall score (M = 4.88), which shows that what transpired during this class did not go beyond what was seen as ordinary and predictable. It is also interesting

Class 2

Class 1

5.25

1.28

SD

1.27

SD

M

5.43

M

meaningless—meaningful

1.30

5.63

1.21

5.14

dull—exciting

1.06

5.38

0.98

5.57

useless—useful

1.20

5.50

1.13

5.43

unsatisfying—satisfying

Table 4.10 Participants’ evaluation of Class 1 and Class 2 in Group 2 usual—unusual

0.64

4.88

1.68

2.14

unappealing—appealing

1.04

5.25

0.79

5.43

monotonous—absorbing

1.04

5.25

1.40

3.43

Overall

0.24

5.31

1.34

4.65

78 4 Findings of the Study

4.4 Self-reported Boredom Levels and Class Evaluations in Group 2

79

7

Level of boredom

6 meaningless – meaningful

5

dull – exciting useless – useful

4

unsatisfying – satisfying usual – unusual

3

unappealing – appealing monotonous – absorbing

2 1

S2

S3

S5

S6

S7

S8

S9

Fig. 4.16 Individual students’ evaluation of Class 1 (sematic differential scale converted into a 7-point Likert scale)

to note that the total value of standard deviations for Class 1 equaled 1.34 but it amounted to 0.24 for Class 2. This indicates that the students differed a great deal in their assessments of the classes under investigation (see Table 4.10). As was the case with Group 1, it is only feasible at this juncture to examine the evaluations of selected students in detail. For this reason, the focus here will be on S7 and S2, who reported the lowest and highest overall intensity of boredom in Class 1, and S10, who was the least bored in Class 2 and S1 and S5, who both experienced the most boredom in Class 2. In general, S7 evaluated Class 1 overall positively (M = 5.29) but the high value of the standard deviation (SD = 2.14) shows that she was not entirely unanimous in her assessment in terms of all the dimensions of the semantic differential scale. This is because, for example, she saw the class as highly meaningful and useful but, at the same time, perceived it as extremely usual (see Fig. 4.16). As far as S2 is concerned, he was not very positive about Class 1 (M = 3.71) and there was considerable inconsistency in how he evaluated this class (SD = 1.38) with regard to the different components of the sematic differential scale. More specifically, S2 judged the class as very usual and pretty monotonous but also found it to be quite meaningful and useful (see Fig. 4.16). As far as Class 2 is concerned, S10 was very positive (it was the second highest score in Group 2; see Table 4.11) and unanimous in his evaluations on different dimensions of the sematic differential scale (M = 6.29, SD = 0.76). This is evident in the fact that he regarded the class as highly exciting, satisfying, absorbing and quite unusual (see Fig. 4.17). Conversely, S1 and S5 were evidently less positive about the class in question (M = 3.86 and M = 5.29, respectively) and pretty uniform in their assessments of Class 2 (SD = 0.69 and SD = 0.76, respectively). As can be seen in Fig. 4.17, S1 found the class rather meaningless and dull but moderately meaningful

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4 Findings of the Study

Table 4.11 Mean and standard deviation values for the evaluation of the classes by individual members of Group 2

Student

Class 1

Class 2

M (SD)

M (SD)

S1

*

3.86 (0.69)

S2

3.71 (1.38)

*

S3

5.14 (0.90)

4.43 (0.79)

S4

*

6.43 (1.13)

S5

4.00 (1.83)

5.29 (0.76)

S6

6.29 (0.76)

5.71 (0.49)

S7

5.29 (2.14)

5.14 (0.38)

S8

3.71 (1.11)

5.29 (0.49)

S9

4.43 (2.07)

*

S10

*

6.29 (0.76)

Note *Indicates students’ absence

7

Level of boredom

6 meaningless – meaningful

5

dull – exciting useless – useful

4

unsatisfying – satisfying usual – unusual

3

unappealing – appealing monotonous – absorbing

2

1

S1

S3

S4

S5

S6

S7

S8

S10

Fig. 4.17 Individual students’ evaluation of Class 2 (sematic differential scale converted into a 7-point Likert scale)

and S5 regarded the class in question as mostly meaningful, useful and satisfying but not very appealing.

4.5 Factors Responsible for Changes in the Levels …

81

4.5 Factors Responsible for Changes in the Levels of Boredom in Group 1 and Group 2 The qualitative analysis of the data gathered by means of the narratives completed towards the end of each class as well as interviews with four volunteers revealed several factors responsible for the experience of boredom during the classes as well as the changes in the intensity of this experience. The application of the analytical procedures described in Sect. 3.6 of Chap. 3 allowed grouping these influences into two broad categories: (1) classes and language activities and (2) other. Each category, in turn, included several subcategories. When it comes to the first category, it encompassed the following five themes: (1) monotony and repetitiveness, (2) underor over-challenging language activities, (3) inactivity, (4) subject matter and (5) lack of interaction. As regards the second category (i.e., other), it included three subcategories: (1) self , (2) non-language related issues and (3) other courses. These categories are described and exemplified with relevant excerpts below. Classes and Language Activities When it comes to the factors evoking the feeling of boredom, its first subcategory referred to the feelings of monotony and repetitiveness. Some participants considered the entire classes to be conducted in the “same way” and/or they had the impression that the language tasks they were instructed to perform were repetitive and similar to the ones utilized in other previous classes or in other courses. The students emphasized the mundane, typical way of completing some language exercises or “monotony of tasks.” In addition, several students mentioned the language materials employed in the classes as a major source of boredom, mainly because, although different topics might have been introduced or touched upon, the way in which they were discussed or the resources used remained largely the same. Illustrative examples pertaining to monotony and repetitiveness are provided below1 : • The least interesting element in reading tasks were the monotonous ways of solving them. • The most boredom was caused by the repetitive tasks in each class. The form of the tasks photocopied from textbooks is not very encouraging. Monotony. Almost no variety when compared to other courses. I often have an impression that tasks are repeated. • It is common knowledge that during integrated skills we should cover all language skills but the type of tasks we perform is repeatable and does not contribute much. • (…) the issue of repeatability of tasks (…) e.g., listening tasks always have such a repetitive form (…) in each class (…) e.g., in listening classes (…) • The resources we use in the classes usually have different topics, not form. • The biggest feeling of boredom was caused by monotony, the same form of tasks.

1 These

and other excerpts are translations of the participants’ responses.

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4 Findings of the Study

When it comes to the second subcategory, that is the employment of under- or over-challenging language activities, some participants tended to be bored with those which they perceived as easy and undemanding. This is because they could perform them somewhat “automatically” or they approached them in tried-and-tested rather than creative and innovative ways, mainly because this is what they were accustomed to and such an approach did not require additional effort. On the other hand, quite predictably, some students claimed their experience of boredom stemmed from the excessively high challenge posed by the tasks, mainly in terms of the mastery of the TL. For example, one of the students reported feeling “frustrated” and “bored” in a situation when she did not know all the answers. Themes of this kind can be observed in the following responses: • During today’s classes, I felt very bored during tasks that were not a challenge for me and were performed automatically from memory. • Mainly listening tasks are not particularly absorbing and usually very easy. • (…) and then these tasks where this highest point is (…) listening tasks (…) we are accustomed to doing these types of tasks (…) less demanding (…) in listening tasks it is enough to locate an answer and it does not require any creativity (…) vocabulary and reading activities were demanding and difficult (…) they were demanding because I had to think (…) but also difficult (…) I did not know and I was not able to think of anything and I was also more bored. • (…) tasks in which I didn’t know all the answers made me feel frustrated and a little bored. When it comes to the last three subcategories, that is, inactivity, subject matter and the lack of interaction, several students reported being bored by having to wait for other group members to complete a specific activity, some participants pointed to uninteresting themes covered in the classes or uninspiring content of the language tasks, and a few individuals mentioned the format of the tasks and activities they were asked to perform, which by and large precluded opportunities for interaction in the TL. Representative excerpts from the narratives and interviews follow: • During today’s classes I most often experienced boredom between completed tasks, while some students in the group were still working and I was waiting for the next part of the class/next task. • I think that the experience of boredom was caused by quite boring, uninteresting texts in tasks. • The biggest boredom is caused by activities that do not involve us in interaction— listening. • There was too much time allotted for some of the activities, so when I did them quickly I got bored. The activities we performed individually also evoked a feeling of boredom because we didn’t interact with other peers. • The activities performed individually also cause boredom due to lack of interaction with other class members. • I didn’t like the topics of the tasks, so it was hard to avoid boredom.

4.5 Factors Responsible for Changes in the Levels …

83

Other There were only seven responses in total which represented the category of other. More specifically, four responses were related to the students’ own incapability to concentrate and a personality trait (“I’m not an enthusiastic person”), which can be regarded as representing the subcategory of self . In connection with this, it is also interesting to note that one participant openly pointed to her unique characteristics as an individual who tended to experience more boredom in the first phase of a class typically devoted to organizational issues as well as towards the end of a class when she was inclined to think more intensely about issues related to after-theclass activities. The student also commented on her own perception of listening tasks, describing them as “overall tedious” for her. As for another two answers, they indicated the influence of weather conditions or missing their daily dose of caffeine on their “bored” frame of mind, justifications which fall into the subcategory of non-language related issues. Finally, one individual explicitly blamed “the workload related to other courses” for her increased experience of boredom in the classes under investigation, a boredom-inducing factor falling into the last subcategory (i.e., the subcategory of other courses). Such issues are exemplified by the following excerpts: • I experience the most boredom in listening tasks, because I often don’t catch all the words and I can’t focus on listening tasks. This means that I stop paying attention to them and I start to get bored. • Well, sometimes if I just don’t drink a cup of coffee, for example, or have little less energy during the day, it’s hard for me to focus (…) • I experience a lot of boredom not because of the classes but because of fatigue caused by the workload and the amount of material I have to cover due to the end of the semester and the upcoming examination session. • The beginning of classes (…) the introductory part of the classes is so boring for me. It’s because this is about what classes are going to be (…) after that there is this part when I stat to focus so this level of boredom is low (…) listening is also very tiring, so after listening it’s like having a break (…) and in the end you are somehow distracted then because you know that it will be over soon (…)

4.6 Discussion Although the fluctuations in the levels of boredom and the causes of these fluctuations among advanced learners have been investigated in several studies conducted by the present authors (e.g., Kruk, 2016b; Kruk, 2019; Pawlak, Kruk, & Zawodniak, 2020; Zawodniak & Kruk, 2018b), the study reported below adopted a design that has not been previously employed. More specifically, it examined the experience of boredom in two groups of participants that followed the same lesson plans in the course of two consecutive classes, which allowed the researchers to keep some of the variables constant (e.g., themes discussed, tasks and activities used), thus placing different factors shaping this negative emotion in sharper focus. Keeping

84

4 Findings of the Study

this in mind, an attempt is made in the present section to address the four research questions formulated for the purpose of the present study (see Chap. 3, Sect. 3.2). The RQs are addressed one by one in the light of obtained empirical evidence and this is followed by the presentation of the limitations of the current research project.

4.6.1 RQ1: What Are the Differences in the Levels of Boredom in the Classes Taught in Both Groups? What Can They Be Attributed to? This RQ can primarily be addressed on the basis of the outcomes of the quantitative analysis of the students’ self-ratings of boredom in Class 1 and Class 2 in both groups as well as, to some extent, the participants’ post hoc evaluations of these classes. On the whole, as the indications of boredom at 5-minute intervals were made on a 7-point Likert scale, the fact that the means ranged from 3.13 in Class 1 taught in Group 1 to 2.02 in Class 2 carried out in Group 2 clearly demonstrates that the intensity of this negative academic emotion can be regarded as mostly moderate or low. After all, the highest mean value of the self-ratings (i.e., 3.13) did not even reach the midpoint on the scale, which indicates that the classes were overall quite engaging and involving. Obviously, one cannot entirely exclude the possibility that the participants might have been reluctant to openly admit that the things they were asked to do in class were boredom-inducing in front of the teacher who acted in the capacity of a researcher (i.e., one of the present authors). Therefore, their self-ratings could have been affected by the Hawthorne effect, a danger that always has to be reckoned with when conducting research in real classrooms and, to some extent inevitably, the price to be paid for ensuring high ecological validity that cannot be achieved in laboratory conditions. Although the participants in both groups followed exactly the same lesson plans, they were requested to work with identical resources, tasks and activities, and, not less importantly, they had the same instructor, the overall self-reported boredom levels differed considerably in Group 1 and Group 2. To be more precise, the average experience of this negative emotion turned out to be higher in both classes in Group 1 than in Group 2, with the caveat that only in the case of Class 1 did the difference in the mean self-ratings (0.35) reach statistical significance but even here the effect size proved to be small (r = 0.38). Moreover, substantial differences were revealed between specific measurement points between the two groups in both classes, but they proved significant only for Class 2. Still, it is surely an intriguing finding that such disparities should have been uncovered in the performance of an identical reading activity (i.e., “the work experience program”), a speaking task done in pairs (i.e., discussing inventions), or a listening activity (i.e., concerning things people could not do without). Another interesting observation is that higher levels of boredom, revealed in the means for both the entire class and also for multiple measurement points, often tended to go hand in hand with a smaller degree of individual variation,

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as indicated by lower SD values. This might imply that, when the intensity of boredom begins to grow, the experience does not apply in equal measure to all students, which may be related to their perceptions of specific classes, resources, activities or tasks but also to individual differences (IDs) (e.g., personality, learning styles, learning strategies, motivation, anxiety but also working memory; see e.g., Biedro´n & Pawlak, 2017; Dörnyei & Ryan, 2015; Pawlak, 2017, 2020a). This point will be elaborated upon below when addressing RQs dealing with individual students’ trajectories in experiencing boredom. The comparison of the levels of boredom in Group 1 and Group 2 in Class 1 and Class 2 can be augmented and enriched by the analysis of the post hoc evaluations of these classes by participants on a semantic differential scale. This, as will be recalled, was converted into a 7-point Likert scale, whereby a positive adjective, such as meaningful was accorded a higher score and a negative one, such as meaningless, lower. The outcomes of this analysis lend support to the findings based on the mean self-ratings of boredom, as, once again, the classes taught to Group 2 turned out to be more favorably assessed by the students (M = 4.65 and M = 5.31) than those in Group 1 (M = 4.48 and M = 4.79), even though the differences may have proved to be statistically insignificant. Moreover, the evaluations of the specific dimensions of these classes also quite clearly indicated that the students in Group 2 were more positive about the instructional activities included than those in Group 1, with the exception of usual/unusual and monotonous/absorbing categories for Class 1. If we assume, which is quite logical, that the more positive opinions about different aspects of the classes under investigation in these groups correspond to lower intensity of the experience of boredom, these results can be regarded as corroborating the mean self-reported indications provided above, thus showing that the students in Group 1 tended to be more likely to be afflicted by this negative emotion. These findings are not easy to interpret in the context of previous research for the reason that no prior study has attempted to investigate the levels of boredom in groups that followed exactly the same lesson plans. Obviously, some empirical evidence is available demonstrating that the intensity of boredom has a tendency to change from one class to the next (e.g., Kruk, 2016a, 2016b, 2019; Zawodniak & Kruk, 2018b) and similar findings have been reported with respect to other ID variables, such as motivation (e.g., Pawlak, 2012; Pawlak & Mystkowska-Wiertelak, 2018; Waninge, Dörnyei, & de Bot, 2014) as well as willingness to communicate (e.g., Mystkowska-Wiertelak & Pawlak, 2017; Pawlak et al., 2016). In all of these empirical investigations, however, comparisons were made between classes that had disparate foci, relied on different resources, and comprised different tasks and activities, which made it difficult to draw definitive conclusions about the contribution of internal and external factors to shaping the experience of boredom. In the present study, however, the research design makes it possible to gain clearer insights into, on the one hand, the role of specific aspects of the classes in question (i.e., task, activity, the mode of organization) and, on the other hand, the characteristics of the students, which could have impinged on the self-reported intensity of boredom. This is because, all things being equal (e.g., topic, task, mode, instructor), it becomes more straightforward to identify the components of integrated English classes that are more

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or less boredom-inducing, or to identify situations that are more prone to be affected by individual student profiles. In addition, given the design of the research project, the differences between the groups should mainly be ascribed to unique constellations of individual variables of the participants, their collective beliefs and previous experiences, specificity of group dynamics, the relationship with the teacher, or, it could be hypothesized, the instructors’ differential attitudes to the group members. Such issues will be tackled below when considering the responses to the remaining research questions.

4.6.2 RQ2: How Does the Experience of Boredom Change and What Patterns Can Be Identified in This Respect? The analysis showed convincingly that the experience of boredom is subject to fluctuations, both between classes and within the confines of a single class. It is clear, for example, that Class 1 proved to be more boredom-inducing than Class 2 for students in both groups, with differences in the mean self-ratings oscillating around 0.80, being significant and of moderate magnitude. This overall trend seems to indicate that there was something about the content, organization and progression of these classes that may have trumped the potential impact of individual student profiles. When we examine the two lesson plans, three explanations immediately come to mind: (1) the discussion of inventions could have been proved to be more involving than the somewhat mundane topic of jobs or success, not least because the students could have actually learned something new (knowledge- and language-wise) and this could have piqued their curiosity, (2) Class 1 was much more focused on grammar, particularly the language of cause and effect, whereas Class 2 included more speaking tasks and there was greater emphasis on vocabulary, perhaps such that was more varied and unknown to the students (i.e., related to inventions rather than the world of work), and (3) Class 1 may have been more monotonous because of the inclusion in its plan a lengthy reading activity that spanned 17 min. Obviously, one cannot entirely rule out the possibility that the levels of boredom were affected by the students’ disposition on the days when Class 1 and Class 2 were conducted (e.g., an upcoming test in another course or even the weather), or that group dynamics were different for one reason or another, but this scenario is unlikely in view of the fact that the same tendency was observed in the two groups. Fluctuations in the levels of boredom were also uncovered at a much smaller timescale, that which was constituted by the self-ratings of boredom at 5-min intervals when the classes were in progress. For one thing, many differences were observed between the consecutive measurements, both those preceding and following each other and those taken during different phases of the classes under investigation, with some of them reaching significance. For instance, in Group 1, such a substantial difference was detected in Class 1 at the end of the reading task in minute 45 and a speaking task about jobs perceived as the most and least interesting in minute 50, the

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intensity of boredom being lower in the latter case. In Group 2 in Class 2, in turn, the level of boredom at the beginning of the listening activity in minute 50 proved to be significantly lower than that reported in the grammar exercise on model verbs in minutes 60 and 65. Second, when these ups and downs in real-time indications of boredom are examined in terms of what transpired in the four classes in both groups at specific points in time, some general tendencies can be pinpointed. In particular, it seems that much depended on the activity being completed, its focus, repetitiveness, and the amount of time dedicated to it. On the whole, it was performance of speaking tasks, especially those carried out in dyads, that could be associated with, sometimes quite substantial, drops in the intensity of boredom, while grammar activities tended to amplify this negative emotion, which corroborates to some extent one justification for why Class 1 (i.e., more grammar-focused) was viewed as producing more tedium and thus more disengagement, than Class 2 (i.e., more speaking-focused). The feeling of boredom was also fueled by the inclusion of reading activities, specifically such that were too long, as well as, to some extent, listening tasks. It would also appear that boredom was more likely to set in when the students were requested to work individually than when they had the opportunity to interact with their peers, not only in pairs but also as the whole class. Even though the specific levels of boredom may have varied at particular points in time, these tendencies by and large overlapped in both groups. One thought-provoking difference was related to vocabulary exercises which seemed to amplify the intensity of boredom in Group 1 but had the opposite effect in Group 2. Since the students did not comment on this issue in the narratives or interviews, it can only be hypothesized that the members of Group 1 were already familiar with the adjectives taught in Class 2, they found the format of the activity monotonous, or the situation was simply the corollary of their general tendency to manifest heightened boredom levels. Moving on to more common patterns that were observed in the classes conducted for the purpose of this study in Group 1 and Group 2, the analysis also allows making several general observations. Some of these patterns are closely tied to the nature of the activities and tasks selected and the ways in which they were implemented and have already been discussed above. In addition, it is evident in all the four classes that although the initial indications of boredom may have varied, the intensity of this emotion tended to decline when the participants were actually asked to do something concrete. This quite clearly speaks to the fact that issues related to the organization of the class, the provision of feedback on homework assignments or the discussion of the results of a test were quite unlikely to boost students’ engagement. In most cases, a greater or smaller drop in the intensity of boredom also occurred at the end of the class, which may be more indicative of the relief that it was coming to a close and the anticipation of a break rather than the specific task or activity being concluded. As was mentioned above in response to RQ 1, even a cursory look at the trajectories of boredom shows that both the occurrence and extent of the increases and decreases in the self-reported levels of boredom were higher in Group 1 than in Group 2, which suggests a greater impact of individual variation among the students when the overall intensity of this academic emotion is higher. What should also be pointed out is that, despite certain negligible dissimilarities, the pattern of boredom for Class 1 in Group

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1 for the most part mirrors that in Group 2, although the mean self-ratings were higher for most measurements, the only exceptions being the start of the listening activity in minute 55 and the speaking activity in minutes 70 and 75. By contrast, in Class 2, the trajectories differed considerably between the two groups and there were a few occasions on which the self-ratings in Group 2 exceeded those in Group 2, such as when the students were discussing inventions (minutes 20–25) or towards the end, when another speaking activity was in progress (minutes 65–75). While it is not easy to explain this finding, it should be recalled that the intensity of boredom in Group 2 was overall lower, which reduced the scope of possible decreases and it remained quite stable as well. Also, since the degree of individual variation in Group 1 was higher, it can be assumed that the perceptions of just a few individuals may have disproportionately influenced these self-ratings. Yet again, it is not easy to relate the findings to the results of other studies because of the unique design in which two groups following the same lesson plans were compared. Still, the outcomes certainly add to the body of empirical evidence which shows that boredom tends to be in a state of flux over different timescales, both those representing minutes and those reflecting weeks or even months (e.g., Kruk, 2016a, 2016b, 2019; Kruk & Zawodniak, 2020; Pawlak, Kruk, Zawodniak, & Pasikowski, 2020; Zawodniak & Kruk, 2018a). They are also in line with the empirical evidence indicating that a host of ID factors, such as motivation, anxiety, willingness to communicate, or language learning strategies, are apt to change, whether such studies have been undertaken in naturally-occurring classes or under laboratory conditions (e.g., Cohen & Wang, 2018; Kruk, 2018, 2019; MacIntyre & Legatto, 2011; MacIntyre & Serroul, 2015; Mystkowska-Wiertelak & Pawlak, 2017; Pawlak, 2012; Pawlak et al., 2016). It is also noteworthy that the patterns of boredom identified in the present study were much less pronounced than those revealed in investigations of willingness to communicate, the flip side of boredom to some extent, such as those by Pawlak et al. (2016) and Mystkowska-Wiertelak and Pawlak (2017).

4.6.3 RQ3: What Are the Differences Regarding the Experience of Boredom for Individual Students? While the mean patterns of the intensity of boredom identified on the basis of the students’ self-ratings for an entire class or for specific points in time during this class are surely illuminating, they tend to mask or at least blur what is happening on an individual level. This observation clearly also applies to the four classes under investigation in Group 1 and Group 2, which is evidenced by the fact that mean selfratings for individual participants fell sometimes considerably above or below the group means. For example, in the case of Class 1, the intensity of boredom for the 13 participants in Group 1 ranged from 1.57 to 5.71, with the overall mean of 3.13, and for the 10 participants in Group 2, it varied from 1.29 to 5.43, with the mean calculated for the group as a whole standing at 2.78. While, due to lower levels of boredom,

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these disparities were smaller for Class 2, even a cursory look at the data indicates that the trajectories for individual students did not really match. Interestingly, such interindividual variation was accompanied by quite substantial intra-individual changes for many students, which is visible from the values of standard deviation and suggests that some participants tended to be more prone to boredom than others, irrespective of what might have transpired during the class. Additional evidence for the fact that the experience of boredom may have been at least to some extent idiosyncratic comes from the post hoc evaluations of the classes on the semantic differential scale, in which the students varied, at times quite considerably, in their assessments, and, at the same time, they oftentimes judged the copositive dimensions of a particular class differently. This latter finding is insightful in and of itself because it indicates that, for example, a class that might be perceived as meaningful, exciting, useful and appealing, can simultaneously be regarded as quite usual. On the other hand, a class that may be seen as satisfying does not have to be particularly absorbing. All of this only goes on to show that, as was pointed out in Chapter One, boredom is a multidimensional construct which is an outcome of a constellation of influences. As it was neither feasible nor warranted to meticulously examine individual trajectories of the experience of boredom for all the participants, such an analysis was confined to selected five students in both groups, those whose mean self-ratings of the intensity of boredom in Class 1 and Class 2 were the lowest (i.e., S9 and S2 in Group 1, and S7 and S10 in Group 2), and the highest (S13 and S10 in Group 1, and S2, S1 and S5 in Group 2). What should also be emphasized at this juncture is that, as was the case with overall comparisons of the means (see RQ1), the boredom levels reported by these participants by and large mirrored the evaluations they provided at the end of the class. In line with the general trends, some of the aspects of the classes were assessed higher than others and the dimension usual/unusual typically received lower scores. Looking more closely into the characteristics of these students obtained through the background questionnaire, we can see that participants manifesting the lowest intensity of boredom comprised one female and one male in each class, they had been learning English for 12–15 years, and three out of four received a 4.00 on the final examination and this is how they self-evaluated their TL proficiency, the only exception being S10 in Group 2 for whom these values equaled 3.00 in both cases. When it comes to the students exhibiting the most boredom, four out of five were male, their experience in learning English also ranged from 12 to 15 years but it was mainly 14 years or longer, and their TL mastery was somewhat lower and more varied, with S1, however, being one of three with highest grades on the endof-the-year examination in both groups. It is certainly not easy to point to general tendencies on the basis of these characteristics, although, overall, it would seem that the experience of boredom may be more acute for males and for lower-proficiency students. These assumptions, however, can only be tentative in view of the fact that the students’ perceptions could have been impacted by a host of external and internal variables, and in particular a variety of ID factors (e.g., beliefs, personalities, learning styles, learning strategies). When we examine the fluctuations of boredom intensity for the participants singled out for the current analysis in terms of the tasks and activities included

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in the four classes in question as well as the ways in which these classes were organized, somewhat more consistent patterns emerge. For one thing, even though there are obvious differences at some measurement times and, the periods of stability may differ, and the rises and falls may be at times more pronounced, it is interesting to note that, for most of these students, the trajectories of boredom by and large mirror those for the class as a whole, which indicates that these extreme cases are to some extent archetypical for Group 1 and Group 2. In other words, the changes in boredom intensity, albeit on a greater or lesser scale, occurred at similar measurement points to the group as a whole, being triggered by the completion of similar tasks and activities or the ways in which they were implemented. For example, even though S9 and S13 in Group 2 constituted two extremes with respect to the self-reported levels of boredom in Class 1, the intensity of this negative emotion began to climb during the lengthy reading task and started to fall on its completion when the focus was shifted to the speaking task devoted to discussing jobs deemed valuable to the society. Similarly, S2 in the same group experienced very little boredom in Class 2 but this experience began to increase during the listening task and grammar exercise, thereby being similar to the overall pattern. At the same time, however, there were also deviations from the general trend, as is evident in the fact that in Group 1 S2’s reported intensity of boredom shot up during the performance of a speaking activity (i.e., selling inventions) at the end of Class 2, which clearly contradicts the general pattern, whereas in Group 2 S10’s boredom increased in minute 25 when its overall mean started to drop, or that this feeling basically disappeared from the middle of the class onwards, which is inconsistent with the behavior of the group as a whole. Second, it is also possible to draw some conclusions by examining the situations in which the intensity of boredom differed the most between those reporting its overall highest and lowest levels. For example, it could be hypothesized that more passive tasks such as listening may be more likely to induce boredom for individuals who are on the whole more inclined to manifest this negative emotion throughout the class, perhaps because they are expected to perform them individually, which might intensify disengagement. Similar assumptions could be ventured about activities squarely focused on grammar, which may not be inherently engaging, or even speaking tasks, some of which might presumably pose an excessive cognitive or linguistic challenge. It should be stressed, however, that these explanations are somewhat speculative and should thus be taken with circumspection since, as explained above, the participants’ individual trajectories must be seen as an outcome of an array of variables for which no empirical evidence was collected in this study. In a word, the analysis provided evidence for considerable variation in the experience of boredom, both between and within individuals and, very tentatively, suggested that gender, proficiency, task type or classroom arrangement may be among factors responsible. Findings of this kind by and large corroborate the results of research projects examining boredom in L2 classes, such as those by Kruk (2019), Pawlak, et al. (2020a, 2020), and Zawodniak and Kruk (2018). In fact, the present discussion echoes to some extent the assessment offered Pawlak et al. (2020, p. 16), who write: “that group patterns may often be acutely different from the individual trajectories of boredom self-reported by students and that such trajectories are shaped

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by a myriad of individual and contextual factors which conspire to make learners more or less bored at different stages of a language class”. Not surprisingly perhaps, similar conclusions have been reached by a number of researchers investigating other ID factors from a micro-perspective in real classrooms (e.g., motivation, WTC), notably Mystkowska-Wiertelak and Pawlak (2017), Pawlak (2012), or Pawlak et al. (2016).

4.6.4 RQ4: What Influences Are Responsible for the Changes in Boredom Levels? The discussion of this last research question strives in a sense to pull all the threads together by drawing upon what has been said above in regard to the levels of boredom and their fluctuations at both the general and individual levels, as well as the analysis of the interviews and narratives, also attempting to relate the findings to previous research and relevant theoretical positions. As can be seen from the analysis of the self-ratings on the boredom grid and evaluations of the four classes taught in Group 1 and Group 2, which, it should be stressed one more time, focused on the same themes and followed exactly the same lesson plans, this negative emotion tended to be amplified when mundane, well-known topics were reintroduced, in activities placing emphasis on receptive skills, particularly reading, especially when excessive time was allotted to their performance. Heightened experience of boredom was also associated with repetitive grammar exercises, initial phases of the classes, activities that were completed individually, as well as gender and attainment, with males representing lower proficiency levels being more susceptible. By contrast, speaking tasks, especially those that involved pair work and provided opportunities to get to know new, interesting information and develop TL resources, some vocabulary activities as well as greater variety and good pacing were more conducive to lower levels of boredom. As shown in Chapter Three, all of these factors fall into one of the two broad categories identified in the interviews with the four selected students and the narrative responses to the last part of the in-class boredom questionnaire, that is, classes and language activities. They are also to a greater or lesser extent connected with one or more of the five specific subcategories: (1) monotony and repetitiveness, as indicated by contribution of the format of the activities (e.g., in the case of reading or listening), the materials employed (e.g., photocopies of coursebooks), or the topics covered (i.e., jobs and success), (2) under- or over-challenging language activities, which could be exemplified for some participants by having to respond to predictable and overly easy listening comprehension questions or, conversely, to perform a speaking task for which they may not have known requisite vocabulary, (3) inactivity, which set in when finishing a task way ahead of others, as could have been the case with the lengthy reading task in Class 1, (4) subject matter, which can be conceived broadly as the leading theme of a class (e.g., the world of work) or more narrowly as the contents of the tasks and exercises performed, and (5) lack

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of interaction, which may be assumed to have triggered higher levels of boredom in Class 1. When it comes to the second category identified in qualitative data, that is other, the influences identified through the boredom grids and class evaluations mainly correspond to its first subcategory, that is, self . This is because, apart from personality that was hinted at by two of the students, the occurrence of boredom and fluctuations in its intensity must have also been impacted by an array of other ID factors, both those that could be directly taken account of in this study (e.g., gender or proficiency) and those whose contribution can only be hypothesized (e.g., overall motivation, willingness to communicate, aptitude, working memory, beliefs, learning styles, learning strategies, self-efficacy), not to mention a myriad of possible combinations of such ID variables. While it is not possible to connect these with the self-ratings of boredom or class evaluations, the participants also wrote about two other influences that were comprised in the category of other, namely, non-language related issues, like disposition on a given day, and other courses, which was related to things happening in other components of the BA program. On the whole, the influences on the experience of boredom listed above resemble those teased out in earlier studies of this academic emotion in L2 contexts (e.g., Kruk & Zawodniak, 2018; Pawlak et al., 2020; Zawodniak et al., 2017; Zawodniak & Kruk, 2018a). They reflect as well many of those that Mystkowska-Wiertelak and Pawlak (2017) hypothesized in their model of factors that may affect the dynamic changes of willingness to communicate and, presumably, other ID variables in naturallyoccurring classes. Quite conspicuous by their absence, however, are references to the direct role of the teacher in shaping boredom (see Chapman, 2013; Kruk & Zawodniak, 2017, 2018, 2020; Zawodniak et al., 2017). One would also have expected more comments on the importance of interlocutors (e.g., their level, attitude), group dynamics, as well as specific properties of the task (e.g., amount of planning time). Such factors, however, may not have been given enough consideration because of the format of the classes, which did not include many, varied speaking tasks and did not require copious interaction with peers. In addition, comparisons could not be made, for example, between different levels in the BA program or different instructors. Still, it is possible to relate many of the identified causes of boredom and changes in its levels to the tenets of some of the models and theories that have been put forward in educational psychology. They could be explained in particular with reference to the under-stimulation model (Larson & Richards, 1991), since some aspects of the four classes apparently failed to generate interest and engagement, the forced effort model (Pekrun et al., 2010), as monotony, repetitiveness and lack of challenge all evidently took their toll, as well as the control-value theory of achievement (Pekrun, 2006), because both appraisals of control and appraisals of intrinsic and attainment value surely played a part in shaping boredom intensity. While the analysis failed to produce direct evidence that boredom may have served as a catalyst for future engagement, as predicted by the dimensional model (Pekrun et al., 2010), thus assuming the status of searching boredom, this can be indirectly inferred if we consider the fact that, on some occasions, the onset of a new, distinct activity, such as a speaking task following a listening activity, did trigger a drop in the intensity of boredom. Finally, the results reported here can be related to some degree to complex dynamic systems

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theories (CDST, Larsen-Freeman, 2016; Larsen-Freeman & Cameron, 2007), which have been applied to research into some ID factors in recent years (e.g., Dörnyei, MacIntyre, & Henry, 2015; Hiver & Al-Hoorie, 2019). After all, it is evident that factors shaping the experience of boredom, whether individual and contextual in nature, did enter into intricate interactions at very different time scales, producing periods of change and stability, both for entire groups and individual students. This said, this is surely not the only theoretical perspective applicable, something that could be seen as a “silver bullet”, and forcing the descriptive apparatus of CDST on the experience of boredom in order to understand its occurrence and the changes it undergoes is as valuable as the employment of other models and theories, such as those referred to earlier.

4.6.5 Limitations Although the findings of the study surely contribute to our understanding of how the intensity of boredom changes in naturally-occurring classes at advanced proficiency levels as well as shedding light on the causes of such changes, the research project, like any other, is not free from a number of limitations. First, achieving ecological validity (e.g., Peng, 2014) inevitably comes at the price of reduced control over a number of variables. This is because while it is possible to keep some things constant, such as the content, format and procedures of the classes under investigation in this study, there are many others that are bound to remain unpredictable because intact groups comprise students with wide-ranging individual profiles which differently respond to contextual factors and interact with them in unpredictable ways. Second, due to logistical reasons (e.g., class schedule, constraints of time and space), it was not feasible to interview all of the participants or to examine in depth their trajectories of self-reported boredom vis a vis the activities and tasks completed in the classroom. Third, although different studies have availed themselves of this kind of methodology, it could be argued that having to respond to regular beeps may change the ways in which a class would normally proceed, which can jeopardize the validity of the collected data. Fourth, no information was gathered concerning individual characteristics of the students, such as their beliefs about how integrated skills classes should be conducted, personality, learning styles, language learning strategies, motivation, anxiety or willingness to communicate, even though such data could have shed invaluable light on the intensity of boredom. Fifth, while the study differs from previous empirical investigations in that it examined patterns of boredom in two distinct groups taught according to identical lesson plans, a question could be posed as to the extent to which it genuinely furthers our understanding of this concept. After all, while the role of some influences may have become more transparent (e.g., task types or the amount of time dedicated to specific activities), we are still left with a number of bits and pieces that are difficult to be put together to produce a complete, picture of this negative emotion and its changes. Sixth, no information was obtained on more general predispositions of participants regarding boredom, both

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in general and in practical English classes, which points to some weaknesses of the macro-perspective when applied in isolation. These considerations will definitely need to be heeded in future research projects focusing on boredom, an issue that will be elaborated upon in the conclusion.

4.7 Conclusion The present chapter was devoted to reporting the findings of the study conducted among 23 Polish university students which sought to explore the nature of boredom in the course of four regularly-scheduled classes and uncover causes responsible for its fluctuations. Its strengths lie in the fact that it was conducted in real classrooms, rather than under laboratory conditions, and that the classes in two groups followed identical lesson plans, which allowed greater insights into the role of other class components in inducing boredom. It was shown, among other things, that not only did boredom levels alter substantially from one class to the next, but also that they were subject to change within a single class or the tasks and activities it included. Moreover, the results revealed that average group data may often be insufficient to detect the changes in boredom levels within individuals. The analysis also confirmed, yet again, that the experience of boredom is an outcome of a complex interaction of internal and external variables that may be subject to change over times. This surely goes to show that boredom is yet another piece of a jigsaw puzzle of the intricate interplay of influences shaping classroom interactions as well as the opportunities for learning and teaching that arise in the classroom. Clearly, the study is not without weaknesses which will offer a basis for the consideration of directions for future research in the concluding part of the book. The conclusion will also use the results reported above as a point of departure for making some tentative suggestions on how the experience of boredom can be prevented and combatted in the L2 classroom.

Chapter 5

Conclusions, Directions for Future Research and Pedagogical Implications

The present monograph has been dedicated to the experience of boredom, an academic emotion that is pervasive in educational contexts, including such that involve the learning and teaching of additional languages, but at the same time it has been sidelined by both SLA researchers and foreign language teachers. This is because, on the one hand, there are other, somewhat related, ID variables that have been traditionally the focus of empirical investigation, such as anxiety, motivation or willingness to communicate. Moreover, there has been a marked tendency in the last decade or so to shift the focus to positive emotions involved in the process of L2 instruction, such as enjoyment, hope, joy, pride or well-being (e.g., Dewaele & MacIntyre, 2014; MacIntyre & Mercer, 2014; MacIntyre & Vincze, 2017). On the other hand, boredom is so much inherent in any educational setting that it is seen as something natural, predictable and perhaps even inevitable, with the effect that it is often not regarded as a viable object of empirical investigation in its own right or seen as a dimension of interaction in the L2 classroom that could be effectively dealt with. This publication constitutes, to the best knowledge of the authors, the first attempt to address boredom in L2 learning and teaching in the form of a book dedicated in its entirety to this fascinating subject. Accordingly, the first two chapters focused on the definitions and types of boredom, the theoretical perspectives derived from educational psychology that have striven to account for the occurrence of this negative emotion, as well as the empirical investigations that have examined it both with respect to different subjects taught in school and the few that have explored it in the context of L2 instruction. The remaining two chapters were devoted to the discussion of the methodology and findings of a research project that was aimed at tapping into the nature of boredom and fluctuations in its intensity in the course of two classes based on identical lesson plans taught to two groups of Polish university students majoring in English. In line with the results of previous empirical investigations that have embraced such a micro-perspective, it was discovered, among other things, that boredom was subject to fluctuations within a single task, an entire class and from one class to the next, which could be attributed to the nature of the task in hand, monotony © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 M. Pawlak et al., Boredom in the Foreign Language Classroom, Second Language Learning and Teaching, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-50769-5_5

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and repetitiveness, the chance to interact with others, the stage of the class or some individual characteristics and dispositions. It was also revealed that the individual trajectories of boredom may often considerably deviate from patterns charted for entire groups, and they were affected differently by a host of internal and external variables. Even though the research project provided surely invaluable insights into the experience of boredom in the course of naturally-occurring classes at advanced levels, thus augmenting the existing empirical evidence in this respect, it is not exempt from some weaknesses and is limited in some respects. Therefore, there is a clear need for further empirical investigations of boredom, such that would adopt different perspectives and draw on a variety of theoretical positions. As regards the microperspective, it is important, for example, to conduct studies that would be longitudinal in nature, spanning the period of a semester or an entire academic year, as well as using more detailed information about participants, related in particular to a range of ID factors, such as motivation, willingness to communicate, personality, learning style or the use of language learning strategies. Such in-depth knowledge of the individual profiles of the students would without doubt help us better understand the emergence of boredom and changes it undergoes over time. Equally importantly, if we want to avoid a situation in which successive studies carried out with different groups in different contexts leave us numerous insights which are difficult to connect and interpret, it might make sense to use the same lesson plan with many groups, which would allow detailed statistical analyses, perhaps also taking into account some student and teacher characteristics. When it comes to the macroperspective, it is necessary to design valid and reliable research instruments that would allow us to tap into boredom in different contexts, a good example being the development of the Boredom in Practical English Language Classes Questionnaire – Revised (Pawlak et al., 2020). Armed with such tools, researchers could gather data about the experience of boredom and other ID variables from large samples, which could enable a better understanding of the antecedents of this emotion as well as offering a basis for developing models predicting its role in the process of L2 learning and determining its links to attainment. Irrespective of whether the microor macro-perspective is embraced, research on boredom could also seek to shed light on this complex academic emotion in terms of various theoretical perspectives, both those emanating from educational psychology and SLA (control-value theory, CDST, sociocultural theory, etc.). The important caveat, though, is that no single theory, model or hypothesis should be perceived as offering the best explanation of why people are inclined to feel bored and what causes them to experience it with different intensity as the time passes. Another interesting line of inquiry could be comparing the experience of boredom in the case of different additional languages that an individual might be learning since it is clear that different motives or strategies in the learning of L2, L3 or L4 could have a bearing on how this negative emotion manifests itself. As is the case with other ID variables, it is also warranted to probe deeper to see how boredom is affected by different TL skills and subsystems, an issue that can be approached from a micro-perspective but could be much better understood if skill-specific scales were developed.

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The findings of the study reported in the empirical chapter of this book allow making some pedagogical recommendations, which, however, should be viewed with circumspection until more corroborating empirical evidence is forthcoming. First, it would seem that, whenever possible more emphasis should be placed on speaking skills, particularly in tasks that allow unfettered interaction among learners which are performed in groups and involve topics that create opportunities for learning new things, both in terms of content and language. Second, even if the emphasis has to be laid on skills and subsystems that are inherently more conducive to boredom, it is crucial to that they are made more interesting by choosing an engaging topic, reducing monotony and repetitiveness, and planning classes in such a way that such activities or tasks are not lumped together in a specific part of a class or, even worse, occupy most of the available time. After all, grammar activities do not have to always follow the same format, they could encourage the use of the TL features taught in communication, they can be contextualized and based on interesting materials, and they can be dispersed over time. Third, timing seems to be of pivotal importance since having students work on the same activity for lengthy periods of time, particularly if it is not highly captivating or is performed individually (e.g., reading) may inevitably raise the intensity of boredom for some students. Even when this happens, teachers should be ready to terminate the task if signs of boredom from many students become transparent but also make sure that it is followed by a much more engaging task, thus capitalizing on what has been described as searching boredom (Goetz et al., 2014; see Sect. 1.4.2. in Chapter 1). Fourth, it is of crucial significance to plan tasks and activities that pose an appropriate level of challenge for students, irrespective of skills or subsystems that they may be intended to hone. In fact, as shown in the present study, having to do things that are over- or under-challenging was reported by students as a factor intensifying their boredom and there are grounds to assume that difficulty has to be interpreted not only in linguistic but also in cognitive terms as contents included in different tasks and the degree of processing information required. We are confident that the book will provide an important point of reference for anybody interested in the experience of boredom in the process of L2 teaching and learning, be they theorists, researchers, materials designers or practitioners. On the one hand, the overview of previous research and the investigation conducted for the present volume may inspire further research endeavors which are urgently needed to expand our understanding of this emotion. On the other hand, the insights obtained from the analysis of the data may be important for better planning classes at advanced levels and improving the resources that are employed during such classes. While there has always been a gap between research and teaching practice, the study of boredom surely has the potential to bring the two worlds closer together with the intention of increasing the effectiveness of L2 instruction.

Appendix A

The background questionnaire (translated from Polish) Age: I am …………………………… years old. Sex: Female / Male (circle) Year of study: …… Group: …… How long have you been learning English? ……………………………………. What grade did you receive on the end-of-the-year examinaƟon in English?. ……………… How do you assess your English proficiency on a scale from 2 (fail) to 5 (very good)? ……

© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 M. Pawlak et al., Boredom in the Foreign Language Classroom, Second Language Learning and Teaching, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-50769-5

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Appendix B

The in-class boredom questionnaire (translated from Polish) Part I Name ....................................................................... Group ...................................................................... Date ........................................................................

Part II Please fill out the grid below indicating the level of your boredom at a particular moment in response to a beep. Please use a scale from 1 (not bored at all) to 7 (very bored).

© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 M. Pawlak et al., Boredom in the Foreign Language Classroom, Second Language Learning and Teaching, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-50769-5

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Boredom level

10 min

15 min

20 min

25 min

30 min

35 min

40 min

45 min

50 min

55 min

60 min

65 min

70 min

75 min

102 Appendix B

Appendix B

103

Part III What do you think of the class? Please mark your responses with an x in between one of the seven spaces which best represents your feelings of the class. Meaningless

___:___:___:___:___:___:___

Dull

___:___:___:___:___:___:___

Meaningful Exciting

Useless

___:___:___:___:___:___:___

Useful Satisfying

Unsatisfying

___:___:___:___:___:___:___

Usual

___:___:___:___:___:___:___

Unusual

Unappealing

__:___:___:___:___:___:____

Appealing

Monotonous

___:___:___:___:___:___:___

Absorbing

Part IV Please write a few sentences related to the experience of boredom during the class. ............................................................................................................................................................ ............................................................................................................................................................ ............................................................................................................................................................ ............................................................................................................................................................ ............................................................................................................................................................

Appendix C

The semi-structured interview (example questions translated from Polish) 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8.

Did you experience boredom in the class today? Why? Which language activities/tasks were the most boring for you? Why? What language resources did you find the most boring today? Why? When did you feel the most bored? Why? Which mode of classroom organization was the most boring for you? Why? Which part of the class did you find the most boring? Why? Did you try to find a way of coping with boredom? What was it? Do you think you were more or less bored than your fellow students? Why?

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