EFL learners worldwide find it difficult to acquire proficiency in speaking English, due to various barriers that impact their speaking skills, one of which is hesitation. The aim of this study was to examine the psychological and sociocultural factors that might lead to hesitation during speaking English among Saudi EFL learners. A mixed-method…

This purposive sampling, quantitative study employed the Model of Student's Motivation framework to explore the impact of the TikTok application on enhancing students' speaking abilities. It involved four classes of mixed-ability one-year programme (PST) students, 2023/2024 Session at Pahang Matriculation College, Malaysia divided into two main…

Contextualised in the AI--supported English-speaking learning, this study examined the roles of AI affordances in influencing EFL learners' emotional, cognitive, and behavioural speaking engagement, and explored the moderating roles of gender and learner types (on-campus vs. on-job) in influencing AI-supported English-speaking engagement. Data…

This study investigates using the concept of norms whether English-Thai interpreters regard direct speech as an appropriate interpreting style in simultaneous interpreting. It also explores whether gender-specific linguistic terms in Thai, which consist of first-person pronouns and formality-marking particles (FMPs), affect the interpreter to…

Self-efficacy in language learning have been attracting interest recently. The construct is said to be a reliable predictor of language performance. This study is aimed at explaining the relationship of self-efficacy and speaking proficiency of male and females. It was administered to investigate whether self-efficacy correlates to speaking…

Recent evidence suggests that deaf children with CIs exposed to nonnative sign language from hearing parents can attain age-appropriate vocabularies in both sign and spoken language. It remains to be explored whether deaf children with CIs who are exposed to early nonnative sign language, but only up to implantation, also benefit from this input…

Proficiency in speaking is essential for effective communication; however, anxiety serves as a significant barrier that negatively impacts oral performance, particularly in EFL contexts. This study addresses this issue by investigating speaking anxiety among English as a Foreign Language (EFL) students in Afghanistan, where limited research exists…

Nonnative English speakers are often judged based on their accent, but accent is perceived as well as produced. Race, gender, and religion interact to create complex and nuanced figures of personhood (Agha, 2005) impacting teachers' perceptions of students. Teachers' individual differences, including language proficiency, exposure to language, and…

Since the Korean pronoun system does not specify gender indication, Korean speakers of English tend to have difficulties when they use English pronouns. This paper explores how absence of obligatory gender marking in Korean affects gender errors in the production of English. Gender pronoun errors made by Korean learners of English were analyzed…

In the current second language pedagogy, understanding factors that contribute to learners' willingness to speak English in classrooms is fundamental for teachers. The aims of this present study are (1) to find out the extent to which Indonesian EFL learners are willing to speak English in classrooms and (2) to investigate the factors that…

The objectives of this study are firstly to explore students' self-assessment on four language competence: linguistic, sociolinguistic competence, discourse competence, and strategic competences, secondly to find out whether there is any significant influence of students' length of language learning toward their self-assessment of communicative…

This study examined the level of L2 speaking anxiety among school teachers undertaking a master's degree at the International Islamic University Malaysia and sought to determine if the anxiety level would differ by gender, school location and teaching subject. A convenience sample of 290 teachers completed a 12-item survey on L2 speaking anxiety…

Discourse markers (DMs) as linguistic devices have a significant role in the coherence of conversation--a speakers' fluency. With the growing use of English worldwide, it is of great importance to focus on DMs as an essential part of communication which provides discourse coherence. This study was conducted to develop a description of spoken…

This study investigated primary teachers' knowledge of pronunciation instruction, and its manifestation in classroom practices in Korean EFL contexts. To this end, the questionnaire data collected from 47 teachers were quantitatively analyzed. The emerging themes from 5 teachers' interviews were qualitatively analyzed, based on content analysis.…

The factors that influence rater scoring have been a subject of great interest to researchers in second language assessment. However, the research on the impact of test-takers' speech profiles (e.g., a jagged or a flat profile reflecting analytic subscores) on raters' scoring behaviors remains to be seen. To investigate the role of speech profiles…