System 116 (2023) 103074 0346-251X/© 2023 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Contributions of foreign language writing emotions to writing achievement Chengchen Li a, b, * , Li Wei b , Xiaojun Lu c a School of Foreign Languages, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, China b UCL Institute of Education, University College London, UK c University of Nottingham, Ningbo, China A R T I C L E INFO Keywords: Foreign Language Writing Enjoyment Scale Foreign Language Writing Boredom Scale young learners writing emotions anxiety positive psychology ABSTRACT Emotions have received scant attention in L2 writing research except anxiety, leaving their role largely unclear. This study was designed mainly to examine the contributions of anxiety, enjoyment, and boredom to writing achievement. We also aimed to develop and validate in- struments to measure foreign language writing enjoyment and boredom. Two sub-studies were conducted among three groups of junior secondary EFL learners in China (N 1 = 310; N 2 = 326; N 3 = 1036). In Study 1, the Foreign Language Writing Enjoyment and Boredom Scales were devel- oped based on the responses from Group 1 to open-ended questions. Both scales were adminis- tered to Groups 2 and 3. Group 3 also flled in the questionnaires for criterion variables (i.e., second language writing anxiety, foreign language anxiety, enjoyment, boredom, and burnout). Reliability and validity tests confrmed the sound psychometric properties of the two scales (e.g., internal consistency, construct/convergent/discriminant/criterion validity, and measurement invariance). In Study 2, we further obtained data on the English writing achievement of Group 3 operationalized as scores in two writing profciency tests and an end-term exam, and self-ratings for writing profciency. Regression analyses show that boredom had the strongest negative effects on writing achievement, followed by the positive effects of enjoyment and the insignifcant effects of anxiety. 1. Introduction Writing is an intellectual, goal-oriented, and interactive process that draws on an individual’s cognitive ability and is affected by a range of affective variables including emotion, motivation, and attitude (Hayes, 1996). A plethora of studies have examined the role of cognitive abilities (e.g., aptitude and working memory) in L2 writing, while attention to emotion is scarce and limited to anxiety. However, an individual is not a passive task recipient, information processor, or writing machine without emotions or only with the emotion of anxiety. Instead, writers are emotionally responsive to writing tasks and experience diverse emotions, both positive and negative ones. In addition, it makes sense that writers bring their emotional resources to writing tasks and rely on them, especially positive emotions, to energize themselves to be agentic and adaptive in meeting the cognitive demands and linguistic challenges involved (Li et al., 2023). Inspired by the control-value theory (Pekrun, 2006), which was introduced to the feld of SLA in the positive psychology era (e.g., Dewaele & Li, 2020; Li, 2018), emotions are argued to be fundamental in L2 writing for their immediate relevance * Corresponding author. School of Foreign Languages, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, China. E-mail address: lichengchen@hust.edu.cn (C. Li). Contents lists available at ScienceDirect System journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/system https://doi.org/10.1016/j.system.2023.103074 Received 8 March 2023; Received in revised form 4 May 2023; Accepted 23 May 2023