engleski

The Relationship Between Shyness, Willingness to Communicate, and Foreign Language Anxiety

Foreign language anxiety (FLA) is a psychological phenomenon which may be a barrier to learning a foreign language. It is characterized by uncomfortable feelings of nervousness and tension while using a foreign language in every aspect (speaking, listening, reading, and writing) or attending the foreign language classroom. Traits such as communication apprehension, fear of negative evaluation, lack of self-esteem, shyness, and a low level of willingness to communicate have been identified as potential causes of foreign language anxiety. The main objective of this thesis was to examine the level of shyness, willingness to communicate, and foreign language anxiety among future teachers and to find if there is a relationship between foreign language anxiety and two traits: the level of shyness and willingness to communicate. The sample included 71 participants. The participants were first, third, fourth, and fifth-year students enrolled in one of the study programmes at the Faculty of Teacher Education in Zagreb: the Primary Teacher Education with English or German Language (study programme 835) and the Primary Teacher Education (study programme 903). The participants were asked to complete an anonymous online questionnaire which was divided into four parts: general information, the McCroskey Shyness Scale, the Willingness to Communicate (WTC) Scale, and the Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety Scale. The first part was used to collect general information about the participants. The second part measured their level of shyness, the third part measured the level of willingness to communicate and the last part measured their level of foreign language anxiety. For calculating the correlation between the variables, Spearman’s rho test was used. The results indicate that there is no relationship between shyness and willingness to communicate nor foreign language anxiety and shyness, but there is a correlation between foreign language anxiety and willingness to communicate.

foreign language anxiety, shyness, willingness to communicate

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