Investigating the Levels and Factors of English Language Speaking Anxiety in Online Classroom

Abstract

Speaking anxiety is commonly faced by second language or foreign language students who view English speaking skills as the most challenging language skill to acquire. This group of students also believes that their performance in English oral communication is not as good as others. Although online learning has replaced traditional classrooms, speaking anxiety is still prevalent among our students.  This study aims to determine the level of speaking anxiety among Malaysian undergraduates and also to identify its factors in an online classroom setting. A set of questionnaires has been adapted from The Foreign Language Speaking Anxiety Scale (FLSAS) by Huang (2004), and distributed to 81 undergraduate students from Universiti Teknologi MARA Cawangan Kelantan. The collected data was analysed using statistical analysis. The findings of this study revealed that Malaysian undergraduates experience English language speaking anxiety to a certain level and three main factors were identified. This study will benefit the undergraduates and the educators, to be more sensible of the level of speaking anxiety and may prevent this issue from worsening since the influential factors have been highlighted.