BANKING ACADEMY FACULTY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE ---------- GRADUATION THESIS AN INVESTIGATION ON THE WILLINGNESS TO COMMUNICATE IN ENGLISH OF ENGLISH-MAJORED STUDENTS AT BANKING ACADEMY Student : NGUYEN XUAN THO Class : K23ATCA Academic Year : 2020-2024 Student ID : 23A7510127 Advisor : DR. HOANG QUOC THINH Hanoi, May 2024 CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY I declare that the graduation thesis entitled “An investigation on the willingness to communicate in English of English-majored students at Banking Academy” is the work conducted by me under the guidance of Dr. Hoang Quoc Thinh The results from the work belong to my research. The contributing information derived from other sources is entirely cited and mentioned in the thesis reference.
Signature Tho Hanoi, May 2024 i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS At the moment I write this part, I have finished my last, thus, important journey at Banking Academy, which is filled with new exciting experience and also hardships. To be frank, I could not end up where I currently am without the unstinting support of many kind and excellent individuals. From the bottom of my heart, I want to send my sincere thanks to my respectable supervisor, Dr. Hoang Quoc Thinh.
It is fair to say that he plays the most important role in my success to complete the thesis because I definitely could not have gone this far but for his detailed guidance, constructive comments, and, especially, great patience for my shortcomings as I had absolutely no clues about what I should do at the beginning. Besides, I would like to show my deep appreciation to all the lecturers of the Faculty of Foreign Languages for all the knowledge I have learned from them during my four years at university. I would like to express my great gratitude to my parents. It is impossible to repay all the sacrifices and efforts they have made for me to be able to be here.
It is impossible to not extend my special thanks to all my beloved friends as they have created a lot of unforgettable memories and made my youth meaningful. ii TABLE OF CONTENTS CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY .ii TABLE OF CONTENTS.iii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS. v LIST OF TABLES. vi LIST OF FIGURES.
2 CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW. The definition of WTC. WTC in Second language (L2). Factors Affecting Students’ Willingness to Communicate.
Studies on WTC in EFL context conducted in Asia countries. Studies on WTC in EFL context conducted in Vietnam. 7 CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY. Locale of the study.
Data gathering procedure. Population and Sample description. Reliability and Validity. 15 CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION.
FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION OF WILLINGNESS TO COMMUNICATE. Findings of WTC – In Class. Findings of WTC – Outside Classroom. Findings of WTC – Digital Settings.
FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION OF FACTORS AFFECTING ATC STUDENTS’ WILLINGNESS TO COMMUNICATE. Findings and discussion of students’ Communication Anxiety. Perceived Communication Competence. Motivation to learn English.
THE IMPACT OF TESTED FACTORS ON THE WILLINGNESS TO COMMUNICATE IN ENGLISH OF ATC STUDENTS. Willingness to communicate during class. Willingness to communicate outside classroom. Willingness to communicate on digital settings.43 iv LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS Abbreviation Meaning WTC Willingness to Communicate L1 First Language L2 Second Language EFL English as a Foreign Language FLCA Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety SPCC Self-perceived Communication Competence v LIST OF TABLES Table 1 Construction of the questionnaire .11 Table 2 Data From The Questionnaire Coding Frame.
12 Table 3 The Reliability Scale of WTC - Inside classroom. 16 Table 4 Students' WTC Inside the Classroom. 16 Table 5 The Reliability Scale of WTC - Outside Classroom. 18 Table 6 Students' WTC Outside the Classroom.
18 Table 7 The Reliability Scale of WTC - Digital Settings. 19 Table 8 Students' WTC in Digital Settings. 20 Table 9 The Reliability Scale of Communication Anxiety. 21 Table 10 Students' Perspective on Communication Anxiety.
22 Table 11 The Reliability Scale of Perceived Communication Competence. 23 Table 12 Students' Perspective on Perceived Communication Competence. 24 Table 13 The Reliability Scale of Motivation to Learn English. 25 Table 14 Students' Perspective on Motivation to Learn English.
26 Table 15 The Reliability Scale of Learners' Beliefs. 27 Table 16 Students' Perspective on Learners' Beliefs. 27 Table 17 The Correlation between WTC-IC and Individual Variables. 29 Table 18 The Correlation between WTC-OC and Individual Variables.
29 Table 19 The Correlation between WTC-DS and Individual Variables. 30 vi LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1 Individual Variables affect WTC of English-majored students at Banking Academy .7 Figure 2 L2 WTC model in Chinsese EFL classroom .45 vii ABSTRACT Title: The willingness to communicate in English of ATC students, the influencing factors, and proposed strategies to improve the level of WTC. Author: Nguyen Xuan Tho Keywords: Banking Academy of Vietnam, Faculty of Foreign Languages, English as a Foreign Language, Willingness to Communicate, EFL. Hoang Quoc Thinh Summary of the thesis: Willingness to Communicate has long been an vital topic in second language (L2) acquisition as a numerous number of studies on WTC have been conducted around the globe ever since the invention of this term.
However, there is a modest amount of studies investigating this aspect in Vietnam. The present study was conducted at Banking Academy in Hanoi, Vietnam. The study aims to find out the frequency to use English to communicate of English-majored students and the extent of influence that established individual factors have on the WTC level in order to propose some possible strategies that can be applied to encourage ATC students to use more English to communicate. There are 115 ATC students participating in this study.
Questionnaire surveys was the data collection method. The findings revealed that ATC students have an average frequency to communicate in English. In addition, students’ WTC was affected by three out of four tested individual factors and communication anxiety has the greatest impact on ATC students’ willingness. Finally, several solutions were suggested based on the findings to help students tackle some issues at hand to improve their WTC and, ultimately, English proficiency.
1 CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION This chapter presents the reason why the topic of Willingness to Communicate is studied, the aim of the research, the research questions, the scope, the significance and the structure of the study. Rationale of the study In the context of globalisation, English, the main lingua franca, has been gaining more and more non-native users. Therefore, the increased use of English have improve the English proficiency significantly, especially in Vietnam. According to the English Proficiency Index in 2023 (EF), Vietnam ranking globally and in Asia is 58 and 7, respectively.
However, many Vietnamese who possess advance English proficiency having difficulty trying to make it count in practical situations such as daily conversations. In other words, a high level of proficiency in English does not ensure that learners will perform well or communicate frequently in the target language. Taking the fact that English is the most used foreign language in Vietnam into account, there should be an urgent need to address this issue and further utilize Vietnamese excellence in gasping English and the authorities have been working on that through the Nation Foreign Language Project in 2020, the Ministry of Education promoted the importance of communication in studying languages. Willingness to communicate in L2 has long been proven as a decisive factor that determines the success of L2 acquisition.
This importance has attracted many researchers to conduct deeper investigation into this field in order to gain more knowledge on what variables affect individuals and develop more effective language learning methods. Despite this worldwide popularity, very few researches have been conducted in Vietnam concerning the willingness to communicate of Vietnamese EFL students, which makes Vietnamese miss out the chance to improve the communication proficiency in English and the following numerous benefits. The necessity for studies on Willingness to Communicate in Vietnam is even more urgent as the witnessed frequency of using English to communicate of Vietnamese is not high enough compared to other countries, especially in the environment where English is expected and should be the main mean of communication such as university campus and EFL classes. 2 In the Faculty of Foreign Languages at Banking Academy, English is the main languages used as the major subjects studied by ATC students through 4 years of university are in English.
In every EFL classes, English is and should be used for the majority of the time in order to create an English-like environment which encourages the genuine use of what they have learnt. However, the students seem to underutilize this environment to practice their speaking as most of them use English mostly to study while when they chatting with their friend during or after the class, they prefer to use their mother tongue. Therefore, this study is an attempt to explore and explain the reason behind the lack of English communication of ATC students. Research Aim The study’s ultimate aim is exploring the Willingness to Communicate in English of English-majored students at Banking Academy and the influence of psychological elements on this.
Research Question This study attempts to answer two main questions: 3. To what extent are English-majored students at Banking Academy willing to use English to communicate? 3. To what extent do the four main individual variables affect ATC students’ Willingness to Communicate? 4. Significant of the Study Investing the Willingness to Communicate of students is vital to promote more use of English in daily communication.
Many scholars agree that communication is the key attribution of the language acquisition process. Therefore, this study is conducted with the intention to benefit all the stakeholders. First, students may understand the importance of using English to communicate in a daily basis, what obstacles prevent them from using English more often, and how to overcome these. This may lead to a significant improvement of English proficiency.
Second, teachers could also be advantageous as the lessons will be more successful and effective with the increasing engagements of students. Moreover, the institutional bodies could find the findings helpful for the development of educational programme. Last but not least, this study 3 might contribute to the general study on Willingness to Communicate in Vietnam, which is underdeveloped. So, the findings might be valuable for further studies in this field.
The scope of the Study. This study mainly focuses on measuring the level of Willingness to Communicate of English-majored students at Banking Academy. The participants are current ATC students. The study was conducted within a period of one and a half months, from April 20, 2024 to May 3, 2024.
The structure of the Study. This study includes five chapters. This chapter explains the rationale for undertaking this research, the research question, the aim, the scope and significant of the study. Chapter 2: Literature Review.
This chapter presents an overview of theories and prior studies on the Willingness to Communicate. This chapter provides information about participants, the research methods, the data collection instruments, and the data analysis. Chapter 4: Findings and Discussion. This chapter exhibits the results and discuss the findings.
Chapter 5: Conclusion, Implication and Recommendation. 4 CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW This chapter presents some relevant literature on Willingness to Communicate, followed by the theoretical framework which guides the present study. The definition of WTC In 1985, McCroskey and Baer, based on the early work on unwillingness to communicate of Burgoon (1976), tried to explain why some people talk more than others proposed the concept of willingness to communicate as a stable predisposition toward communication when free to choose to do so. After that, several studies had been conducted to investigate the factors responsible for the variation of WTC among individuals.
WTC in Second language (L2) In the early 1990s, researches started to apply the findings gained from the development of research on WTC in first language (L1) to the area of second language (L2) acquisition.