EFL students’ emotional reactions to class leaderboards

Abstract

This article presents a study examining the emotional responses of English as a foreign language (EFL) students towards class leaderboards. A mixed methods research design was employed to answer three research questions that aimed to determine the emotions students felt when they saw their leaderboard ranking online, the reasons why they felt those emotions, and the relationship between choosing an emotion and performance in the following week. The 14-week study occurred at a Japanese university with 26 EFL students. The results of the study showed that the positive emotions determined and enjoyment were noticeably more frequently chosen than any of the other emotions. The positive emotions enjoyment, determined, pride, and hope were more frequently reported for high and middle leaderboard ranked participants, and the negative emotions shame, hopelessness, and anxiety were more frequently reported for low leaderboard ranked participants. The most common reasons for choosing each emotion were also determined. Correlations were found between choosing a positive emotion and attaining a maximum score in the following week and choosing a negative emotion and not attaining a maximum score in the following week.