Willingness to Communicate in English By Non-English Department Students: A Qualitative Study

Abstract

Research related to Willingness to Communicate (WTC) in English has been conducted in many countries, such as Japan, China, Morgantown and New York, Canada and Australia. Recent studies have found that WTC is influenced by numerous factors, such as L2 proficiency, attitude or motivation, L2 communication beliefs, and international posture. Found that the complex, dynamic, and non-linear interaction between language, environmental, and individual elements is what causes participants' L2 WTC to form. Found that Korean and Taiwanese EFL students reported the lowest ratings for WTC in the class due to peer-induced L2 speech anxiety, group cohesiveness, and accuracy-oriented teaching pedagogy. Previous research has focused on the English language education sector, but few studies have examined students in other fields of study. This research will focus on students majoring in non-English education and interview instruments, as they are required to speak English for work demands, study abroad, and other purposes that use English as an international communication. This research recruited 6 students from non-English majors at a private university in Malang City, East Java, Indonesia. Structured interviews were used to obtain data, and they were conducted using participants' national language data. The length of each interview varied between 30 and 45 minutes, and follow-up inquiries were made. The interview questions were taken from previous research and included a Communicative Self-Confidence Component, Situational Context Component, Topical Enticement Component, and Learning Responsibility Component. The interviews' findings were recorded on audio and verbatim transcribed. The writer translated the interview into English before analyzing the transcript. Five theme analysis techniques were used to examine the data, such as listening to speech data, shaping speech data, communicating speech data with interpretive intent, reproducing or (re)constructing speech data, and establishing data credibility. The participants in the study were asked to examine and comment on the interview data to confirm the validity of the study. To keep the data safe, the writer used ethical considerations and informed the participants that their participation was voluntary. The findings show that there are factors that influence their English, including personal factors, limited linguistic mastery, teaching style and social context. They significantly said that the existence of these factors made them reluctant to speak English. When asked about speaking English they mostly use Indonesian. That the reason is because they are also students who are not majoring in English so they think it's only natural in that case. The use of Indonesian is still often used even though in class they have to use English. In this case the teaching materials used by lecturers also affect their willingness to communicate in English speaking in English class, while supporting teaching materials for students are rarely used by lecturers. Finally, students prefer to speak English when their lecturers do not make them so tense that their courage will emerge and they will be more active in speaking English. The above facts call for the attention of the lecturers to be even better in teaching English to students who are not majoring in English. Students and lecturers must have the principle that every lesson will experience problems if it is not properly mastered. Curriculum and lecturer teaching materials for students are also very influential for their English. In addition, to earn better results, the next researcher must collect data with a wider sample of participants, especially from public universities and from different faculties and departments than before. Keywords: Willingness to Communicate in English, EFL students, ELT