Reframing English Achievement in Blended Learning: Flow Experience as the Core Psychological Mechanism in Chinese University EFL Classrooms

HRMARS - The widespread adoption of blended learning in higher education has reshaped English as a Foreign Language (EFL) instruction in China, yet its effectiveness in improving academic achievement remains inconsistent. Increasingly, research suggests that technological integration alone is insufficient to account for learning outcomes, highlighting the need to examine learners’ internal psychological processes. This study investigates the psychological mechanism underlying English achievement in blended university EFL classrooms by integrating student-related factors, teacher-related factors, and flow experience within a unified quantitative framework. Using a cross-sectional survey design, data were collected from 640 non-English-major undergraduate students enrolled in blended College English courses at Chinese universities. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was employed to examine the direct and indirect relationships among the study variables, with English achievement operationalized through College English Test Band 4 (CET-4) scores. The results indicate that flow experience is the strongest direct predictor of English achievement. In contrast, student-related factors and teacher-related factors do not exert significant direct effects on CET-4 performance when flow experience is taken into account. Mediation analysis further reveals that flow experience fully mediates the relationships between both student-related and teacher-related factors and English achievement. These findings suggest that English achievement in blended EFL contexts is primarily driven by learners’ psychological engagement rather than by instructional or individual conditions alone. By empirically validating flow experience as a central psychological mechanism linking learning conditions to academic outcomes, this study contributes to a more nuanced understanding of blended learning effectiveness. The findings also offer practical implications for the design and evaluation of blended English instruction in higher education, emphasizing the importance of fostering sustained engagement, concentration, and learner control to enhance academic performance.