A Study Of Chinese English Learners' Willingness To Communicate Inside And Outside The Classroom

This dissertation presents an empirical study of Chinese EFL learners' willingness to communicate in English inside and outside the classroom.On the basis of previous theories and empirical evidence concerning willingness to communicate in L2,the author develops a theoretical framework of the present study.It is generally assumed that willingness to communicate inside and outside the classroom is directly or indirectly influenced by psychological,situational and trait-like factors.Based on this hypothesis,three research questions were specifically designed:(1) the general tendency and characteristics of students' willingness to communicate inside and outside the classroom,(2) the effects of background variables(i.e.,gender,grade, major,College English teaching reform program,English speaking motivation, anxiety,self-perceived communicative competence,attitude toward speaking English, self-perceived English proficiency and English communication frequency) on students' willingness to communicate inside and outside the classroom,and(3) the students'perceptions of factors contributing to students'willingness to communicate inside and outside the classroom.In order to test the hypothesis and answer the research questions,both quantitative and qualitative approaches were employed.Regarding the quantitative approach,a survey was conducted with participation of 537 non-English major freshmen and sophomores from 3 universities in Shandong Province.L2 WTC inside and outside the Classroom Inventory which was specifically developed for the present study is composed of three parts:(1) Background Questionnaire(2) Willingness to Communicate outside the Classroom Scale,and(3) Willingness to Communicate inside the Classroom Scale.With respect to the qualitative approach,open-ended and closed questions,semi-structured interview schedule and focused essay technique were adopted.Five hundred and thirty seven students answered open-ended and closed questions.Nine participants who had attended the quantitative survey were selected and interviewed.In addition,using stratified random cluster sampling,ninety eight sophomores from University A completed the focused essay.The major findings of the present study are summarized as follows:First,with regard to the general tendency,results indicate that Chinese non-English major students'willingness to communicate inside and outside the classroom lies between "probably not willing" and "probably willing",and their willingness inside the classroom is a little higher than that outside the classroom. Outside the classroom,students are more willing to speak English with acquaintances and foreigners than with strangers and Chinese;In addition,they prefer to talk in pairs rather than in groups.Moreover,they are most willing to speak English in dorms or on occasions where they need to use it for authentic communication.Inside the classroom,students are more willing to speak English when they find tasks are less cognitively demanding.Moreover,they are less willing to communicate in English in front of the class,and reluctant to speak English when they come across tasks which have not been frequently practiced before.They are least willing to communicate in English with their teachers in front of the class when they doubt their course contents.Second,with respect to the effects of background variables,results show that females,freshmen and students majoring in social sciences are more willing to communicate both inside and outside the classroom than males,sophomores and natural science students.It has also been found that students'L2 communication anxiety has a significant negative effect on their willingness to communicate inside and outside the classroom.Students' L2 speaking motivation,self-perceived communicative competence,self-perceived L2 proficiency,attitude toward speaking L2 and L2 communication frequency have a significant positive effect on their willingness to communicate inside and outside the classroom.Moreover,students have higher motivation to speak English,more positive attitude and more actual use of English inside the classroom than outside the classroom.Regarding gender, females have significantly higher motivation to speak L2 inside the classroom,higher perceptions of L2 proficiency and more positive attitudes toward speaking an L2 both inside and outside the classroom than their male counterparts,but male students have more actual use of the L2 inside the classroom than females.With respect to grade, freshmen have significantly higher motivation to speak an L2 inside the classroom, lower L2 anxiety outside the classroom,higher perceptions of communicative competence and L2 proficiency,more positive attitudes toward speaking an L2 and more actual use of the L2 both inside and outside the classroom than sophomores. Concerning major,students majoring in social sciences have significantly higher perceptions of communicative competence and L2 proficiency,more positive attitudes toward speaking an L2 inside and outside the classroom,and spend more time on English learning outside the classroom than those majoring in natural sciences,but they have significantly higher L2 anxiety outside the classroom.With regard to college English teaching reform program,although no significant differences in both L2 WTCI and WTCO have been found,students involved in it have significantly higher perceptions of English communicative competence,more actual use of English inside the classroom,and spend more time on English learning outside the classroom than those not involved in it,but they have significantly more negative attitude toward speaking English inside the classroom.Third,regarding the students'perceptions of influencing factors,qualitative results demonstrate that psychological,situational and trait-like factors directly or indirectly affect students' willingness to communicate inside and outside the classroom either through independent operation or through interaction with other factors.Moreover,variables in the same layer of factors can either interact on one another or interplay with those from other layers of factors.To be more specific,students'willingness to communicate inside the classroom is affected by self-perceived communicative competence,L2 communication anxiety, L2 speaking motivation,self-perceived L2 proficiency,attitude toward speaking an L2,topics,teachers'evaluation,teaching methodology,teachers'responses,medium of instruction,teacher support,students'L2 proficiency,gender,grade,major,number of students in language classrooms,peer comparison,prior experiences,peer support, classroom interaction,teacher-student relationship,classroom arrangement,classroom activity,task difficulty,face-protected orientation,insider effect,a submissive way of learning,and personality types(i.e.,introversion and extroversion). Except for situational factors,variables influencing students'willingness to communicate outside the classroom are the same as those affecting their willingness to communicate inside the classroom.It has been found that interlocutors,topics and L2 communication situation comprise situational factors.The interlocutor component consists of L2 proficiency,gender,grade,major,attitude/responses,social support, number of interlocutors involved in a conversation,L2 fluency,prior experiences, beliefs about L2 speaking,native speakers of the target language,and relative familiarity.The topic component includes interest,sensitivity,background knowledge and personal experience.The L2 communication situation component is composed of authentic situation,when asked for help,when an interlocutor speaks fwst,and simulated authentic task.On the whole,most results of the quantitative and qualitative study are consistent with earlier findings in L2 WTC research.However,many unique findings reflecting students'actual L2 communication in the Chinese EFL context have also been identified.Based on these findings,two tentative models,Pyramid Model of Variables Influencing L2 WTC inside the Classroom and Pyramid Model of Variables Influencing L2 WTC outside the Classroom,are constructed and discussed.The results of the present research contribute theoretically,methodologically and pedagogically to SLA and L2 pedagogy.Theoretically,based on the quantitative and qualitative results,the researcher constructed two models influencing L2 WTCI and WTCO,and identified the main factors influencing Chinese English learners' willingness to communicate inside and outside the classroom and their interaction. This will contribute to the future construction of a cross-cultural theory of willingness to communicate.Methodologically,the researcher integrated quantitative and qualitative approaches and developed an inventory to investigate L2 learners' willingness to communicate inside and outside the classroom.This might be the initial attempt to apply focused essay technique to the Chinese SLA research and the first efforts of the L2 WTC instrument localization.Pedagogically,L2 instructors were suggested to consider the influencing factors and to make an endeavor to enhance learners'willingness to communicate inside and outside the classroom.It also had implications for L2 curriculum designers,textbook writers and college English teaching reform in particular.Due to the limited objective conditions,the participants were confined to non-English majors from three universities in the same province,and the data originated from the participants'self-reports.Therefore,the findings need to be confirmed and complemented in future studies with different participants and methods like experimental design,observation and stimulated recall etc.In addition,this tentative study concentrated on the speaking mode,and thus the focus of future studies need to examine students'L2 WTCI and WTCO in listening,writing and reading modes.