Investigating Factors Causing Anxiety in Speaking English of Thai University Students: The Case of Students in English Program at HCU

Abstract

This study aimed to investigate the factors contributing to students’ anxiety in speaking English and the types of communicative situations that the students experienced anxiety. Thirty third-year undergraduate students studying in English Program, Huachiew Chalemprakiet University participated in the study. Student Questionnaire with closed-ended questions were used to collect the quantitative data. The findings revealed that the participants perceived limited vocabulary knowledge of students as the main factor of their anxiety in speaking English. Other important sources of anxiety were speaking English with peers and other interlocutors, losing confidence when making mistake and worry about bad English accents. The findings also reveal that the participants experienced varied degree of anxiety when getting involved in different communicative situations. The most anxious situation was when they are expected to respond and could not escape from communication. Making English presentations in classrooms and speaking English with no preparation were also the situations they felt anxious at a high level. In students’ perceptions, when speaking with native speakers of English and losing confidence because of making mistakes in speaking were the situations the students were anxious at a moderate level. Pedagogical implications and conclusion are discussed in this paper.