Iraqi EFL Students' Perspectives on Tolerance for Ambiguity

الملخص

      This study examines Iraqi EFL students' views on ambiguity tolerance, an important affective aspect in language learning.  EFL environments often face uncertainty due to lexical, syntactic, and cultural difficulties. This study addresses a gap in the literature by directly investigating the Iraqi student perspective.  A descriptive research approach was used to assess students' cognitive and emotional responses to uncertain, unfamiliar, and unpredictable situations using a 20-item Likert-scale questionnaire derived from previous models.  The University of Baghdad College of Education for Women's English Department gave the instrument to 87 fourth-year students.

    In general, participants had moderate to high ambiguity intolerance.  Unpredictability, ambiguous rules, and imprecise information made students uncomfortable, frustrated, and uneasy.  Most intolerance was connected with unpredictability and a preference for organized surroundings with clear solutions.  The research also showed that social and cultural ambiguity reduced intolerance.  Sample standard deviations indicated significant individual variation.  The study found that this intolerance for ambiguity affects learning, adaptation, and stress.  It suggests using clear instructions, systematic support, and explicit communication to help students manage ambiguity, improving learning conditions and maximizing their precision and reliability in well-defined tasks.