JAPANESE UNIVERSITY STUDENTS’ WILLINGNESS TO USE ENGLISH
WITH DIFFERENT INTERLOCUTORS
A Dissertation
Submitted to
the Temple University Graduate Board
in Partial Fulfillment
of the Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF EDUCATION
by
Christopher Weaver
January 2010
Dissertation Examining Committee: David Beglar, CITE/Language Arts Steven Ross, CITE/Language Arts Mark Sawyer, CITE/Language Arts Andrew Jones, Jissen Women’s University Yoko Kozaki, Mukogawa Women's University
i
©
by
Christopher Weaver
2010
All Rights Reserved
ii ABSTRACT
Japanese University Students’ Willingness to Use English
With Different Interlocutors
Christopher Weaver
Doctor of Education
Temple University, 2010
Willingness to communicate (WTC) arose out of the search for a construct to explain why some people are more likely to speak in a particular communication situation than others facing the same situation (MacIntyre, Dörnyei, Clément, &
Noels, 1998). This study investigated the extent to which 1,789 Japanese university students’ willingness to speak and write in English to a Japanese student, an international student, a Japanese teacher of English, and a foreign teacher of
English varied inside an EFL classroom. Using the L2 WTC Questionnaire
(Weaver, 2005), it was found that the students’ level of L2 WTC varied significantly according to their level of self-perceived ability to speak and write in
English.
At the group level, students in the highest self-perceived speaking ability group were more willing to speak in English to an international student or a foreign teacher of English. In contrast, students in the lowest self-perceived ability speaking group were more willing to speak in English to a Japanese student or a
Japanese teacher of English. At the individual level, the average student from the
iii different self-perceived ability groups displayed distinctive patterns of willingness to speak in English to the different types of interlocutors. For example, the average student from the low self-perceived ability group was more willing to speak in
English to an international student or a foreign teacher of English in speaking situations/tasks requiring a limited or controlled use of English. In terms of writing, the average student from the high self-perceived ability group was not willing to write in English to a Japanese student when the writing task required a certain level of personal information. Students’ responses to the Open-ended L2 WTC
Questionnaire also revealed a number of factors that mediated their willingness to use English with different types of interlocutors.
Collectively, the findings of this study not only highlight the interpersonal nature of L2 communication, but also provide important insights into how different types of interlocutors can help maximize students’ level of L2 WTC, which might in turn lead to further advancements in their level of L2 communicative competence.
iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
First, I would like to thank Dr. David Beglar, Dr. Andrew Jones, and Robert
Weaver for their critical comments and encouragement on earlier versions of this manuscript. Additional thanks are due to Dr. Yoko Kozaki, Dr. Mark Sawyer, and
Dr. Steven Ross for agreeing to be members of the dissertation committee and helping refine the final report of this. I would also like to thank all the other important people in my life that poked, prodded, and pleaded with me to complete this study, as well as the people who have helped divert my attention to other worthy projects in the interim. The resulting divergent paths have led me to a deeper understanding and appreciation of the intricacies involved conducting research, which can be only thought as a life long pursuit that attempts to enlarge the circumference of the metaphorical circle of knowledge. The only trouble lies in the Socratic lesson: the more I know, the less I know.
v TABLE OF CONTENTS
ABSTRACT...... iii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS...... v
LIST OF TABLES...... xiii
LIST OF FIGURES ...... xvi
CHAPTER
1. INTRODUCTION ...... 1
The Background of the Issue ...... 1
Statement of the Problem...... 3
Purposes of the Study...... 4
Significance of the Study ...... 4
The Audience for the Study ...... 5
Delimitations...... 5
Organization of the Study...... 6
Conclusion...... 7
2. LITERATURE REVIEW ...... 8
Introduction...... 8
The Willingness to Communicate Construct...... 8
Willingness to Communicate in a Second Language ...... 9
Evolving Definitions of L2 Willingness to Communicate ...... 11
L2 WTC and Volition in a Language Classroom...... 12
Empirical Studies of L2 WTC...... 13
vi Confirming the Relationship Between WTC and L2 Use...... 14
Clarifying the Importance of the Different Components in the L2 WTC
Construct...... 15
Self‐perceived Communicative Competence ...... 16
Communicative Anxiety ...... 19
Communicative Context and L2 WTC ...... 19
Expanding the L2 WTC Model...... 20
A Dynamic Situational‐based Account of WTC ...... 22
Gaps in L2 WTC Research ...... 24
Overuse of the Original WTC Measure...... 24
Lack of L2 WTC Studies Involving Language Skills Other
than Speaking ...... 27
Grouping Variables Used in L2 WTC Research ...... 28
Potential Interlocutor Effect on L2 WTC ...... 29
Potential Motives Underlying Learners’ WTC with Specific
Groups of People ...... 30
Desire to Communicate with a Specific Person Inside an EFL
Classroom...... 32
Intercultural Communication and L2 WTC...... 33
Divergent Perceptions of Language Teachers...... 34
Summary of the Gaps in L2 WTC Literature...... 35
Research Questions...... 36
Conclusion...... 38
3. MATERIALS...... 39
vii Developing the L2 WTC Questionnaire ...... 39
Developing the Openended L2 WTC Questionnaire...... 45
Conclusion...... 46
4. PIOLT STUDY OF THE L2 WTC QUESTIONNAIRE ...... 48
The Use of Questionnaires in WTC Research...... 48
The Rasch Measurement Model ...... 50
Treatment of the Participants’ Questionnaire Responses Using
Rasch Measurement Model ...... 50
Dealing with Logit Measures...... 52
The Pilot Study...... 54
Determining the Appropriate Rasch Model to Analyze the L2
WTC Questionnaire ...... 54
Evaluating the Number of Points on the Rating Scale for the
L2 WTC Questionnaire...... 59
Evaluating the Number of Points on the Self-perceived L2
Ability Rating Scale for the L2 WTC Questionnaire...... 61
Speaking Situations/Tasks Item Fit ...... 62
Self-perceived L2 Ability to Speak in English Item Fit ...... 66
Writing Tasks Item Fit...... 70
Self-perceived L2 Ability to Write in English Item Fit ...... 70
Rasch Item Difficulty of the L2 WTC Questionnaire Items...... 70
Rasch Item Difficulty of the Speaking Situations/Tasks ...... 70
viii Rasch Item Difficulty of the Self-perceived L2 Ability to
Speak in English Situations/Tasks...... 75
Rasch Item Difficulty of the Writing Tasks...... 78
Rasch Reliability and Sensitivity of the L2 WTC
Questionnaire Items ...... 84
Examining the Dimensionality of the L2 WTC Questionnaire ...... 86
Examining the Dimensionality of the Speaking and the
Writing Subsections of the L2 WTC Questionnaire...... 90
Examining the Dimensionality of the Self-perceived L2
Ability to Speak and Write Situations/Tasks...... 96
Conclusion...... 98
5. METHODOLOGY ...... 99
Participants ...... 99
Group Assignments ...... 101
Materials ...... 103
The L2 WTC Questionnaire and Reliability Estimates for
Its Subsections...... Error! Bookmark not defined.
Procedure...... 107
Administration of the L2 WTC Questionnaire...... 107
Administration of the Open‐ended L2 WTC Questionnaire ...... 108
Analyses ...... 109
Estimating Item Difficulty on the L2 WTC Questionnaire...... 110
The Use of Profile Analysis ...... 111
ix The Use of Content Analysis on the Open‐ended L2 WTC
Questionnaire ...... 112
Coding and Analyzing the Open‐ended L2 WTC
Questionnaire ...... 113
The Research Questions Revisited ...... Error! Bookmark not defined.
Conclusion...... 119
6. RESULTS ...... 120
Results of the L2 WTC Questionnaire ...... 120
Checking the Profile Analysis Assumptions ...... 120
The Willingness to Speak Profile Analysis...... 129
Willingness to Write in English Profile Analysis...... 134
Results of the Openended L2 WTC Questionnaire ...... 139
Perceived Level of L2 Competence...... 140
The Classroom Environment ...... 142
Social Distance ...... 144
International Posture...... 147
Mode of Communication...... 149
The Focus of Teachers’ Feedback ...... 150
Summary of the Results ...... 151
Conclusion...... 153
7. DISCUSSION...... 154
Key Points Arising from the L2 WTC Questionnaire ...... 154
The Interaction Between Self‐perceived L2 Communicative
x Competence and L2 WTC ...... 155
The Interlocutor Effect on Students’ Willingness to Use
English ...... 157
The Interlocutor Effect on Students’ Willingness to Speak in
English ...... 157
The Interlocutor Effect on Students’ Willingness to Write in
English ...... 159
The Interlocutor Effect on the Average Students’ L2 WTC...... 159
The Interlocutor Effect on the Average Students’ Willingness
to Speak in English ...... 160
The Interlocutor Effect on the Average Students’ Willingness
to Write in English...... 164
The Effect Size of the Interlocutor Effect on Students’
L2 WTC ...... 165
Key Points Arising from the Openended L2 WTC Questionnaire ...... 167
Conception of Oneself as an L2 User ...... 168
Conception of One’s Interlocutor as an L2 User ...... 169
Conception of the L2 Interaction...... 172
Implications for Language Instruction...... 175
The Interlocutor Effect on Students’ Willingness to Speak ...... 175
The Interlocutor Effect on Students’ Willingness to Write...... 178
Pedagogical Choices Within an EFL Context...... 180
Conclusion...... 181
8. CONCLUSION...... 182
xi Summary of the Findings ...... 182
Limitations ...... 184
Use of the Questionnaires ...... 184
The Language Classroom as the Communicative Context for
a L2 WTC Study...... 186
Refining the Notion of Interlocutor...... 187
Selection of the Student Participants ...... 188
Student Participant Groups ...... 189
L2 Willingness to Communicate from the Other Perspectives ...... 190
Variability of L2 Willingness to Communicate over Time...... 191
Articulating the Interlocutor Effect in the L2 WTC Model...... 191
Final Conclusions...... 192
REFERENCES ...... 193
APPENDICES
A. L2 WTC QUESTIONNAIRE ...... 208
B. OPEN-ENDED L2 WTC QUESTIONNAIRE...... 212
xii LIST OF TABLES
Table Page
1. The Speaking Situations/Tasks on the L2 WTC Questionnaire ...... 41
2. The Writing Tasks on the L2 WTC Questionnaire...... 44
3. The Relationship between Students’ Level of L2 WTC and the Level of
L2 WTC Required by a Speaking or Writing Task/Situation...... 53
4. The Match Between the Rating Scale and Partial Credit Category
Threshold Estimates...... 58
5. Category Frequencies, Average Measures, Thresholds, and Category Fit
for L2 WTC Rating Scale ...... 60
6. Category Frequencies, Average Measures, Thresholds, and Category Fit
for Self-perceived L2 Communicative Competence Rating Scale ...... 61
7. Rasch Fit Statistics for the Speaking Situations/Tasks on the L2 WTC
Questionnaire ...... 64
8. The Number of Students with Extreme Positive or Negative
Standardized Residuals for Item s2 and s3 ...... 66
9. Rasch Fit Statistics for the Self-perceived Ability to Use English in the
Speaking Situations/Tasks on the L2 WTC Questionnaire...... 67
10. The Number of Students with Extreme Positive or Negative
Standardized Residuals for Item sa2 and sa3...... 68
11. Rasch Fit Statistics for the Writing Tasks on the L2 WTC
Questionnaire ...... 68
xiii 12. Rasch Fit Statistics for the Self-perceived Ability to Use English in the
Writing Tasks on the L2 WTC Questionnaire ...... 69
13. Rasch Item Difficulty Estimates for the Speaking Situations/Tasks on
the L2 WTC Questionnaire...... 71
14. Rasch Item Difficulty Estimates for the Self-perceived Ability to
Speak in English Situations/Tasks...... 76
15. Rasch Item Difficulty Estimates for the Writing Tasks on the L2 WTC
Questionnaire ...... 79
16. Rasch Item Difficulty Estimates for the Writing Tasks on the L2 WTC
Questionnaire ...... 82
17. Reliability Estimates for the L2 WTC Questionnaire Subsections...... 86
18. The Factor Loadings of the Standardized Residuals of the L2 WTC
Situations/Tasks ...... 87
19. The Factor Loadings of the Standardized Residuals for the Speaking
Situations/Tasks on the L2 WTC Questionnaire ...... 92
20. The Factor Loadings of the Standardized Residuals for the Writing
Tasks on the L2 WTC Questionnaire...... 93
21. The Factor Loadings of the Standardized Residuals of the Self-
perceived L2 Ability Situations/Tasks...... 95
22. The Academic Year and Gender of the Participants in Each Self-
perceived Ability to Speak in English Group ...... 102
xiv 23. The Academic Year and Gender of the Participants in Each Self-
perceived Ability to Write in English Group...... 103
24. Reliability Estimates for the L2 WTC Questionnaire Subsections...... 107
25. Descriptive Statistics for Students’ Willingness to Speak in English to
Four Types of Interlocutors Inside an EFL Classroom...... 125
26. Descriptive Statistics for Students’ Willingness to Write English to the
Four Types of Interlocutors Inside an EFL Classroom...... 128
27. Profile Analysis for Students’ Willingness to Speak in English to
Different types of Interlocutors by Self-perceived Ability Group...... 129
28. Students’ Willingness to Speak in English by Self-perceived
Ability Group...... 131
29. Level of L2 Willingness Required of the Speak English in 16
Situations/Tasks to the Four Types of Interlocutors...... 132
30. Profile Analysis for Students’ Willingness to Write in English to
Different Types of Interlocutors by Self-perceived Ability Group ...... 135
31. Students’ Willingness to Write in English by Self-perceived Ability
Group ...... 136
32. Level of L2 Willingness Required to Write the 16 Tasks in English to
the Four Types of Interlocutors...... 138
33. The Main Factors Influencing Students’ L2 WTC with the Four Types
of Interlocutors...... 139
34. Summary of the Results...... 152
xv LIST OF FIGURES
Figure Page
1. Schematic representation of the variables influencing WTC...... 10
2. Variables moderating the relation between desire to communicate (DC) and
WTC in the Chinese classroom...... 21
3. A preliminary construct of situational willingness to communicate...... 23
4. Differences in the rating scale and partial credit model estimates
measured in WITs...... 57
5. The probability curves for the L2 WTC 4-point Likert rating scale...... 60
6. The probability curves for the self-perceived L2 ability 4-point
Likert rating scale...... 62
7. Wright map of the 16 speaking situations/tasks...... 72
8. Wright map of the self-perceived ability to speak in English
situations/tasks...... 77
9. Wright map of the 17 writing tasks on the L2 WTC Questionnaire...... 81
10. Wright map of the self-perceived ability to write in English tasks...... 83
11. Principal component analysis of the standardized residuals of the L2 WTC
Questionnaire items...... 88
12. Scatterplot of the Pearson correlation between the separate calibrations of
students’ willingness to speak and write in English...... 91
13. Principal component analysis of the standardized residuals of the L2 WTC
Questionnaire items...... 97
xvi 14. Example of a student identification tag for the Open-ended L2 WTC
Questionnaire...... 113
15. Histogram for the low self-perceived ability students’ willingness to speak in
English to Japanese students...... 127
16. Profiles for willingness to speak in English to different types of interlocutors by
self-perceived speaking ability group...... 131
17. Profiles for willingness to write English to different types of interlocutors by
self-perceived ability group...... 136
18. Three realms of influence mediating students’ WTC with different interlocutors
inside an EFL classroom...... 167
19. Continua of target language proficiency and professional preparation...... 170
xvii CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION
In this chapter I first describe the context of the study and then progress to the central issue addressed in this study: the interpersonal nature of language learning inside an English as a foreign language (EFL) classroom. I introduce the willingness to communicate model (WTC) as a construct that seeks to explain why some individuals are more likely to engage in communication compared to other people. The focus of this study is then defined in more specific terms as an investigation of the potential influence that different types of interlocutors have upon Japanese university students’ willingness to speak and write in English inside of an
EFL classroom. The potential theoretical and pedagogical benefits of this study along with the intended audience and delimitations of this study are then briefly discussed. Finally, a summary of the chapter is provided.
The Background of the Issue
In EFL contexts, the language classroom represents the primary opportunity for language learners to use and advance their current level of communicative competence in a second language (L2). In Japan, the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology
(MEXT) has undertaken a number of initiatives attempting to maximize opportunities for
Japanese students to learn English as a foreign language. These initiatives range from promoting
English education in elementary schools (MEXT, 2001) to requiring in-service training for
Japanese teachers of English teaching in junior and senior high schools. The Council of Local
Authorities for International Relations in coordination with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs
1 (MOFA) and MEXT has also implemented the JET program, which places over 5,000 people annually from countries such as the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, and Canada into junior and senior high school English classrooms across Japan as assistant language teachers (MOFA, 2006). There are also over 1,825 full-time contract or tenured foreign teachers of English teaching at Japanese universities (Eigo nenkan 2004 [Kenkyusha yearbook of
English], 2005), in addition to the numerous other foreign teachers of English who are working part-time at a number of different universities. Collectively, these different initiatives combined with the efforts of English teachers influence not only Japanese students’ experiences within the language classroom, but also the types of opportunities they have to learn English.
At the center of instructed language learning settings is what transpires between individuals. As a result, there is a need for a greater understanding of how different types of interlocutors influence the potential for L2 use and L2 learning. The interpersonal nature of communication is central to explanations of second language acquisition such. This interactional nature is highlight by proposals such as the interactional hypothesis (Long, 1996), which proposes that language development arises from the negotiation of meaning between interlocutors. Underlying the interactional hypothesis are two important conditions. First, the language learner has entered into a communicative exchange with another person or group of people. Second, the language learner is either using language (preferably the L2) or paying attention to the use of language. These conditions also form the basis for other productive- orientated explanations of second language acquisition such as “talk in order to learn” (Skehan,
1989) and the pushed output hypothesis (Swain, 1993). Yet, the question remains concerning what factors prompt language learners to enter into a communicative situation that potentially requires them to use a second language with another person or group of people.
2 Statement of the Problem
The question why some individuals are more likely to communicate in particular situations when others are not is central to the willingness to communicate model. The WTC model conceptualizes L2 use as being the result of a number of complex factors that directly or indirectly influence language learners’ communicative behavior. Many of these factors relate to issues that also interest theorists and researchers investigating L2 motivation. The WTC model can thus be viewed as a hybrid model that brings together a broad range of linguistic and psychological variables. The focus of the WTC model, however, is narrow in scope. Unlike models of motivation, which can cover an extended period of time, WTC involves the relatively small time frame that precedes an opportunity for L2 use. Although this time frame might seem fleeting, the decision of whether or not to use the target language is important, especially in an
EFL classroom.
A reluctance to use the target language, for example, has led some teachers to characterize their learners as being reticent (e.g., Sato, 1990; Tsui, 1996). Researchers interested in the L2 WTC model have thus spent a considerable amount of effort trying to identify the types of factors that influence language learners’ level of willingness to communicate. Some of these factors are situation specific, such as the number of people engaged in the act of communication
(e.g., Cao & Philp, 2006) and the language learners’ self-perceived level of L2 communicative competence (e.g., Baker & MacIntyre, 2000; MacIntyre, Baker, Clément, & Donovan, 2002).
Other factors, such as an interest in foreign people and their culture, are more general (e.g.,
Yashima, 2002; Yashima, Zenuk-Nishide, & Shimizu, 2004). Yet, one factor requiring further examination is the potential influence that different types of interlocutors have upon learners’ willingness to use their L2 in a language classroom. An interlocutor, for example, can either
3 encourage or discourage L2 use (e.g., Dörnyei & Kormos, 2000; Toohey, 2000). What remains uncertain is the extent to which learners’ level of L2 WTC varies with different types of interlocutors within an instructed language learning situation.
Purposes of the Study
This study is designed to not only determine the extent to which Japanese university students’ level of willingness to use English with different types of interlocutors varies inside an
EFL classroom, but also to identify which types of factors mediate language use between
Japanese university students and their potential interlocutors in instructed language settings. The scope of this study extends beyond previous L2 WTC research in that Japanese university students’ level of willingness to speak in English and their level of willingness to write in
English are examined. The final aim of this study is to determine the extent to which students’ self-perceived L2 ability influences their willingness to speak and write in English to different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom.
Significance of the Study
This study has a number of theoretical and practical benefits. In terms of theory, understanding the extent to which different types of interlocutors influence learners' willingness to use their L2 helps provide a more comprehensive account of the situational factors that compose the WTC model. In addition, this study has the potential to reveal the relative importance of different situational factors within a language classroom in relation to students’ level of L2 WTC. From a practical perspective, this investigation has the potential to identify the different types of opportunities and challenges that interlocutors present to language learners.
4 This information can in turn inform pedagogical decisions that might help students maximize and develop their level of L2 WTC further. Unfortunately, WTC researchers have so far provided teachers with few concrete recommendations on how to increase their students’ level of
L2 WTC other than suggesting the need for a learning environment that increases students' self- perceived L2 communicative competence while lowering their level of L2 communicative anxiety. This gap between the L2 WTC research and the language classroom is surprising considering the pedagogical implication that accompanied the original heuristic L2 WTC model.
Its architects argued that WTC should be a prominent goal for instructed language teaching
(MacIntyre et al., 1998).
The Audience for the Study
The potential theoretical and practical benefits of this study should be of interest to a broad audience including WTC theorists and researchers as well as school administrators and teachers who are interested in developing their students’ level of L2 WTC. Gaining a deeper understanding of the factors that mediate Japanese students’ willingness to use English is equally important for policy makers at MEXT who are striving to reform foreign language instruction in order to prepare Japanese students to be active participants in the ever-expanding global community.
Delimitations
This study and its potential contributions to WTC theory and pedagogical practices arise from a specific post-secondary English as a foreign language program for science students, which might not be representative of other English language programs offered in Japan.
5 Moreover, the participants in this study are Japanese students who are attending a fairly competitive national university. The participants might thus have different life histories compared to other EFL learners, especially concerning the purpose of learning English as a means of gaining admission into the university (Weaver & Sato, 2008). These students’ experiences and expectations of learning English might also differ from ESL learners who potentially have more opportunities to use English. As a result, caution must be taken when generalizing the results arising from this particular sample to others in different contexts.
In terms of the study’s methodology, the operationalization of the willingness to communicate construct using the L2 WTC Questionnaire (Weaver, 2005) and an Open-ended L2
WTC Questionnaire inevitably influence what can be learnt about students’ willingness to speak and write in English to different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom. This study is thus best thought of as another empirical-based piece of the WTC construct puzzle, as it attempts to explain individual’s use of language within specific communicative situations with different types of interlocutors.
Organization of the Study
In Chapter 2, the theoretical framework of the study is presented along with a review of the relevant literature. Chapter 3 provides a detailed description of the development of the two questionnaires used to address this study’s research questions. In Chapter 4, a pilot study conducted to investigate the psychometric properties of the L2 WTC Questionnaire is described.
Chapter 5 details the methodology of the study and the results of the study are described in
Chapter 6. Chapter 7 offers a discussion of the results along with the introduction of an interpersonal account of L2 willingness to communicate. Finally, Chapter 8 consists of a
6 summary of the study’s findings, a discussion of the limitations of the study, and suggestions for future research.
Conclusion
In this chapter I have outlined the context and the central issue addressed in this study. In the next chapter, I frame the study within current WTC theoretical and empirical work and outline the specific research questions formulated to address the central issue investigated in this study.
7 CHAPTER 2
LITERATURE REVIEW
Introduction
In this chapter I review the theoretical and empirical motivations of the study. First, the willingness to communicate construct is introduced by examining its roots in L1 communication theory. Then the introduction of the WTC model is expanded to explain its application to second language use. This discussion involves not only the evolving definition of L2 WTC, but also the role of volition in communication settings such as foreign language classrooms. Following this, the three main themes that have driven empirical studies of L2 WTC are reviewed, and then the shortcomings of current L2 WTC research are identified in order to articulate the research gaps addressed in this study. The chapter closes with the specific research questions posed in this study and a brief explanation of the potential theoretical and pedagogical benefits arising from the answers to these questions.
The Willingness to Communicate Construct
The willingness to communicate construct was developed in response to the need to explain why some people are more likely to speak than others in a particular communication situation. This issue was initially addressed in Burgoon’s (1976) Unwillingness to Communicate scale, but was articulated from a more positive perspective later on in McCroskey and
Richmond’s (1990) Willingness to Communicate scale. McCroskey and Richmond argued that communication is a volitional act and people are free to choose how they behave in a particular situation. In other words, communication behavior is a cognitive choice, which is influenced by
8 people’s level of WTC. The opposite is true of people who are less willing to communicate.
McCroskey and Richmond, however, acknowledged that the role of cognition fluctuates considerably. For example, everyday mundane communication situations such as greetings are a largely routine behavior requiring little cognitive effort. However when people encounter unfamiliar situations or they deviate from their habitual actions, cognition comes to the forefront.
McCroskey and Richmond (1990) also argued that when deciding whether or not to initiate a conversation with another person, people’s choices are largely consistent across different communication situations. This consistency arises from the influence that an individual’s personality exerts over his or her willingness to communicate. McCroskey and
Richmond went so far as to say that personality might be “the determining factor” of an individual’s communication behavior (1990, p. 21). As such, willingness to communicate in one’s first language (L1) is conceptualized as a relatively stable trait. This stability, however, does not deny that situational factors can also influence how individuals behave. McCroskey and
Richmond pointed out that if someone is feeling under the weather on a particular day or runs into a person that they recently argued with, they might be less inclined to communicate.
According to McCroskey and Richmond, these situational factors do not disprove the existence of an overall pattern of willingness to communicate.
Willingness to Communicate in a Second Language
Applying the idea of WTC to second language use has resulted in a few changes to the construct, especially concerning the role of personality. MacIntyre, Clément, Dörnyei, and
Noels’ (1998) heuristic pyramid model (see Figure 1) identified a large number of linguistic and psychological variables that they thought influence learners’ level of L2 WTC. According to this
9 model, variables sharing similar characteristics are grouped together and organized along a proximal-distal line. Situational-based variables such as Desire to Communicate with a Specific
Person and State Communicative Self-Confidence appear just below Willingness to
Communicate; whereas, the more stable trait-like variables such as Intergroup Climate and
Personality are located at the bottom of the model. This organization suggests that situational- based variables have a more immediate influence upon second language users’ willingness to communicate as opposed to the more stable trait-like variables, which play a more important role in McCroskey and Richmond’s (1990) conceptualization of L1 WTC.
Figure 1. Schematic representation of the variables influencing WTC. From “Conceptualizing Willingness to Communicate in a L2: A Situated Model of Confidence and Affiliation,” by MacIntyre, P., Clément, R., Dörnyei, Z., and Noels, K., (1998). Modern Language Journal, 82, 547.
10 Evolving Definitions of L2 Willingness to Communicate
Traditionally, WTC has been defined as a construct that accounts for differences existing between individuals’ willingness to initiate verbal interactions in their L1. However, empirical studies of this construct have indicated that WTC influences other types of communication behavior. For example, individuals who have higher levels of willingness were more likely to volunteer to participate in experiments (MacIntyre, Babin, & Clément, 1999; Zakahi &
McCroskey, 1989). A few studies also suggest that WTC predicts individuals’ communication behavior once an interaction has commenced in terms of how much people say (Dörnyei &
Kormos, 2000) as well as the duration of an oral interaction (Yashima et al., 2004).
The introduction of WTC to explain L2 use has also broadened the scope of this construct to include all four of the language skill areas: speaking, writing, listening, and reading. To reflect this broader conception, L2 WTC has been extended beyond verbal interactions to involve a learner’s “readiness to enter into discourse at a particular time with a specific person or persons, using a L2” (MacIntyre et al., 1998, p. 547). This definition also takes into consideration the temporal nature of WTC and the potential influence that interlocutors have upon learners’ WTC.
More recent definitions of L2 WTC have become even more comprehensive. Kang’s
(2005) definition of situational WTC is an example of how detailed the definition of WTC has become. From her perspective, willingness to communicate entails “an individual’s volitional inclination towards actively engaging in the act of communication in a specific situation, which can vary according to interlocutor(s), topic, and conversation context, among other potential situational variables” (p. 291).
These evolving definitions of L2 WTC ultimately reflect the difference between L1 and
L2 communication. In L1 communication, communicative competence is usually assumed and
11 thus WTC has been conceptualized as a relatively stable trait. In contrast, L2 communication is potentially influenced by a learner’s developing level of communicative competence, which creates the need for a willingness to communicate construct composed of situational factors influencing L2 use.
L2 WTC and Volition in a Language Classroom
One important consideration underlying the different conceptualizations of L2 WTC is the role of volition. MacIntyre (1994), among others, pointed out that WTC might not predict language use in situations where individuals have a limited amount of freedom over their communication behavior. An example of such a situation is when someone asks a question.
Because the act of asking a question involves allocating who should take the next turn in the interaction (Schegloff, 1992), the recipient of the question has relatively little control over his or her communication behavior. As a result, WTC might have little explanatory value in this type of communication situation. The restrictions inherent in this type of interaction also cast doubt on the usefulness of the WTC construct in classroom-based research, considering that some researchers (e.g., Trosborg, 1994) have found that a relatively rigid allocation of turns is afforded to second language learners in this social context. Interactions between teachers and students, for example, are sometimes conventionalized in a question, answer, and response turn sequence
(Ohta, 1999). Classrooms also have relatively defined roles for teachers and students where students are expected to use the L2. This expectation on the surface threatens the volitional requirement underlying the willingness to communicate construct.
Yet, it must be remembered that there is a difference between expectations and actual communicative behavior. Within a language classroom, students are usually expected to use the
12 L2, but the extent to which that expectation is met defines an area where students can make the cognitive choice whether or not to use the L2. Clearly, there are a number of situations within a language classroom where students are expected to use the L2 and thus their level of L2 WTC might not be a significant mediator of their communicative behavior. WTC research conducted in classrooms, however, has illustrated that willingness to communicate relates to various aspects of student behavior. Chan and McCroskey (1987), for example, found that the majority of university students who actively participated in their lecture courses also had high levels of L1
WTC. In terms of L2 WTC, Yashima, Zenuk-Nishide and Shimizu (2004) found that Japanese high school students with higher levels of L2 WTC reported more frequent use of English inside their EFL classroom in Japan and a higher likelihood of asking questions and volunteering answers in class during an intensive three-week language program in the United States. Dörnyei and Kormos (2000) found a significant positive relationship between L2 WTC and the number of speech turns Hungarian secondary school students took in a dyadic argumentative task. L2 WTC also had a significant positive relationship with the number of words uttered by students who thought that an argumentative task helped improve their English abilities. Collectively, the findings of these classroom-based studies suggest that WTC can mediate students’ communication behavior in settings where the volitional nature of communication might be constrained.
Empirical Studies of L2 WTC
Over the past ten years, there has been a sizable amount of research concerning L2 WTC.
These investigations have primarily addressed three interrelated areas of research. The first area involves confirming the relationship between WTC and L2 use. The primary purpose of this line
13 of research has been to empirically establish the main tenet of actional theory (Ajzen, 1988), which argues that situational factors and personal predispositions or traits primarily determine one’s decision to engage in purposeful activity such as initiating a conversation with another person. The second area of L2 WTC research has been conducted to determine the relative importance of the different psychological and linguistic variables that compose the L2 WTC construct. Considering that learners are in the process of acquiring a second language, the majority of the research completed is this area has been focused upon self-perceived communicative competence and communication anxiety. The third research area is a relatively recent development in L2 WTC research in which researchers have begun to examine students’
L2 WTC in different communication contexts. These investigations have in turn led to suggestions about other learner factors that should be incorporated into the L2 WTC construct and proposals for a more dynamic situated-based conception of willingness to communicate.
Confirming the Relationship Between WTC and L2 Use
The extent to which WTC influences learners’ L2 use has been the focus of a number of empirical investigations. These investigations have largely been conducted by utilizing structural equation modeling and/or correlation analysis in an attempt to confirm the predictive relationship between WTC and L2 use. A relatively strong positive relationship between learners’ level of L2
WTC and their reported frequency of L2 use has been found in a number of different contexts and student populations, including adult Anglophone students taking introductory conversational
French lessons in Ottawa, Canada (Clément, Baker, & MacIntyre, 2003); Anglo and
Francophone students attending a bilingual university in Ottawa, Canada (MacIntyre & Charos,
1996); Japanese high school students learning English in a study abroad program in the United
14 States (Yashima et al., 2004); and Japanese students pursuing a undergraduate or a graduate degree at a university in Hawaii (Hashimoto, 2002). It must be remembered, however, that all of these studies rely upon learners’ reported L2 use rather than their actual L2 use.
Researchers who have examined the relationship between students’ level of L2 WTC and their actual L2 use in instructed language learning settings have produced mixed results. As previously mentioned, Dörnyei and Kormos (2000) found a statistically significant positive correlation between 44 Hungarian high school students’ level of L2 WTC and their verbal output in a discussion task. In contrast, Cao and Philp (2006) did not identify a clear relationship between L2 WTC and the communication behavior of a group of eight ESL learners in New
Zealand. These students’ willingness to use English, however, did vary significantly across different communication contexts inside the classroom. Students were most willing to speak when participating in group or pair work and less willing when the opportunity to speak in front of the whole class arose (i.e., volunteer an answer or ask the teacher a question).
Collectively these different empirical studies reveal a fairly consistent relationship between L2 WTC and L2 use. Yet, closer examinations of actual L2 behavior within language classrooms suggest that various situational factors influence students’ level of WTC. This finding is at the center of the second issue driving L2 WTC research, clarifying the relative importance of the different components that comprise the L2 WTC construct.
Clarifying the Importance of the Different Components in the L2 WTC Construct
In an attempt to determine the relative importance of the different variables composing the L2 WTC construct, researchers have examined both immediate and distant variables.
Because L2 users are typically in the process of acquiring the target language, most L2 WTC
15 researchers have focused upon the more immediate situational variables such as State
Communicative Self-Confidence, which involves self-perceived L2 competence and a lack of communication anxiety.
Self-perceived Communicative Competence
MacIntyre and colleagues originally conceptualized the self-perceived communicative competence as “the feeling that one has the capacity to communicate effectively at a particular moment” (1998). This feeling of confidence arises from a combination of previously encountering a particular communicative situation and having the needed knowledge and skills to successfully communicate in that situation. One’s willingness to communicate might, however, decrease when individuals encounter a novel communicative situation where they lack the required knowledge and skills.
From this conceptualization of L2 communicative competence, previous experiences in particular communicative situations coupled with the perception of having the knowledge and skills required for successful L2 use are the two main factors underlying the development of self- perceived L2 communicative competence. As a result, the relationship between L2 WTC and the feeling of L2 communicative competence is somewhat cyclical in that individuals’ level of L2
WTC leads individuals to participate in particular L2 communicative situations and perceived success in those situations leads to stronger feelings of L2 communicative competence and higher levels of L2 WTC. Yet, the importance of the individuals’ determination of success in a particular L2 communicative situation should not be overlooked. It is individuals’ evaluation of the extent to which they possess the necessary knowledge and skills to successfully use their L2 in a particular communicative situation that also influences their level of L2 communicative
16 competence as well as their level of L2 WTC. In sum, self-perceived L2 communicative confidence, L2 WTC, and the self-evaluation of necessary knowledge and skills are mutually dependent upon each other in a complex interaction that potentially leads to development in L2
WTC and self-perceived L2 communicative competence. However, it is also possible for individuals to experience higher levels of L2 communicative anxiety when they perceive that they were not successful in a particular L2 communicative situation.
Self-perceived L2 communicative competence appears to play a more influential role for language learners who are studying the target language as a foreign language or who are at the beginning stages of their foreign language studies. Baker and MacIntyre (2000), for example, found a positive relationship between self-perceived L2 communicative competence and willingness to speak French for 124 nonimmersion students (r = .72), but not for 71 French immersion students. Drawing on Harley’s (1990) work, Baker and MacIntyre explained that the nonimmersion students’ level of L2 willingness to communicate was mediated by their level of self-perceived L2 communicative competence because they had not had the same exposure to the target language as immersion students. Yashima (2002) found a similar relationship between self-perceived L2 communicative competence and L2 WTC with 297 Japanese first-year university students. Although their level of communicative anxiety significantly correlated with their level of L2 WTC (r = -.39), self-perceived communicative competence accounted for the largest correlation between the students’ willingness to speak in English (r = .56) and the other situational variables they examined.
A similar relationship between students’ level of self-perceived L2 communicative competence and their level of L2 WTC was also found in two studies involving Japanese high school students (Yashima et al., 2004). In the first study, the researchers found that 166 Japanese
17 high school students’ self-perceived L2 communicative competence had a stronger significant relationship with their L2 WTC (r = .53) than their level of communicative anxiety (r = -.25). In the second study, the researchers found that only self-perceived L2 communicative competence had a statistically significant relationship (r = .46) with L2 WTC for 60 Japanese high school students preparing for a yearlong study-abroad program in the United States.
Going beyond correlations, MacIntyre, Baker, Clément, and Donovan (2003) entered self-perceived L2 communicative competence and communication anxiety information into a regression equation to test whether or not they predicted L2 WTC. They found that only self- perceived communicative competence showed a significant regression coefficient (ß = .61, t =
3.3, p < .002) for 32 Canadian university students who had studied French as a second language.
Using structural equation modeling, MacIntyre and Charos (1996) found a similar relationship with 92 adult learners who possessed only a minimal competency level of French. In this particular study, the coefficient predicting students’ reported use of French was larger from self- perceived L2 communicative competence (.60) than it was from student’s level of L2 willingness to communicate (.16). Matsuoka (2005) found a similar finding in a study that used structural equation modeling to examine the relationship between an objective measurement of 180
Japanese university nursing students’ L2 communicative competence as defined by the
Computerized Assessment System for English Communication (JIEM, 2004), their level of L2
WTC, and their level of self-efficacy (i.e., a combination of the students’ level of motivational intensity and their self-perceived L2 communicative competence). The coefficient predicting the students’ L2 competence was slightly larger from self-efficacy (.36) compared to the students’ level of L2 willingness to communicate (.31). Together these studies thus suggest that self-
18 perceived L2 communicative competence influences students who have had a limited exposure to the target language.
Communicative Anxiety
Communicative anxiety, in contrast, seems to play a more influential role than self- perceived L2 communicative competence for language learners who are presently studying or have studied in a language immersion or an intensive language program. For example, some
French immersion students in Baker and MacIntyre’s (2000) study reported that their teachers made them feel nervous and inadequate, which in turn lowered their willingness to speak French.
MacIntyre et al. (2003) also found that L2 communication apprehension and not self-perceived
L2 communicative competence had a significant regression coefficient (ß = -.56, t = 3.1, p <
.005) in relation to L2 WTC for 27 Canadian Anglophone students who had previously studied
French in intensive language programs. The level of L2 proficiency expected to be achieved in immersion or intensive language programs thus seems to heighten the importance of communication anxiety as a factor underlying students’ willingness to use their second language.
Communicative Context and L2 WTC
The third issue driving L2 WTC research involves determining which contextual factors influence individuals’ level of willingness to use their L2. One factor that has attracted some interest is the opportunity for L2 use in different communication contexts. MacIntyre and Charos
(1996), for example, found a statistically significant positive correlation (r = .63) between frequency of L2 contact and L2 WTC for 92 Canadian Anglophone learners, who were just beginning to study French as a second language. Using structure equation modeling, Clément,
19 Baker, and MacIntyre (2003) did not find a similar relationship between frequency of L2 contact and L2 WTC for 130 Canadian Anglophone students attending a bilingual university in Ottawa,
Canada. However, they did find a data-driven coefficient predicting L2 WTC from the quality of
L2 contact (.11) for 248 Francophone students attending the same university. Clément and his colleagues attributed the difference between the Anglophone and Francophone students to ethnolinguistic vitality. Ethnolinguistic vitality is the relationship between different social groups in a specific communicative context in terms of their relative socioeconomic status and the number of members belonging to each social group. It also influences the behavior of individuals and their tendency to act as a member of a group with a distinct identity. In the case of the
Francophone students studying at a bilingual university, their L1 (i.e., French) had a lower level of linguistic vitality because English was predominately the language of communication. As a result, the Francophone students felt more pressure to communicate in their L2 compared to
Anglophone students who felt less of a need to communicate in French. This finding thus suggests that L2 WTC researchers must not only take into consideration learners’ level of L2 proficiency, but also the vitality of the learners’ L1 and L2 within a given communicative context.
Expanding the L2 WTC Model
As the context of L2 WTC research broadens beyond investigations of Canadians studying either English or French as their second language, there have been a number of suggestions regarding other learner factors that should be included in the WTC model. One of the most researched suggestions is international posture, which Yashima (2002) defined as an
“interest or favorable attitudes toward what English symbolizes” (p. 57). This orientation in turn
20 has been found to be a significant predicator of L2 WTC for Japanese high school and university students (Yashima, 2002; Yashima et al., 2004). Interestingly, international posture was found to be a more important predictor of reported use of English for 166 Japanese high school students than L2 WTC (Yashima et al., 2004). Although these findings suggest that international posture might be a valuable addition to the WTC construct, it might also be considered a refinement to pre-existing factors such as intergroup motivation or intergroup attitudes, which have been largely informed by the language learning situation in Canada (e.g., Clément, 1980, 1986).
The argument for a WTC construct that is more responsive to different learning contexts can also be found in Wen and Clément’s (2003) Chinese conceptualization of willingness to communicate. In an attempt to more closely reflect English language instruction in China, they proposed a culturally informed refinement of the relationship between learners’ desire to communicate and their willingness to use English in an EFL classroom (shown in Figure 2).
Figure 2. Variables moderating the relation between desire to communicate (DC) and WTC in the Chinese classroom. From “A Chinese conceptualisation of willingness to communicate in ESL” by Wen, W., & Clément, R. (2003). Language, culture, and curriculum, 16(1), 25.
Wen and Clément argued that the Chinese educational context is distinctive in that it is heavily influenced by Confucianism and the collective is emphasized. As a result, Chinese EFL
21 students’ level of L2 WTC can be mediated by a complex interaction of factors including societal context, personality factors, motivational orientations, and affective factors. Similar to the work on international posture (Yashima, 2002; Yashima et al., 2004), the Chinese conception of the WTC model involves refining and restructuring relationships between different factors outlined in MacIntyre et al.’s (1998) original heuristic L2 WTC model. However, this re- conceptualization for the Chinese EFL context has yet to be empirically confirmed.
A Dynamic Situational-based Account of WTC
A more refined conceptualization of L2 WTC has also arisen from an empirical study that has distinguished itself from previous WTC research. The vast majority of WTC research has utilized questionnaires as the primary means of determining learners’ willingness to communicate. In sharp contrast, Kang (2005) used a number of qualitative research techniques to determine what situational factors influenced four Korean male students’ level of willingness to participate in an English conversation partner program in the United States. The combined use of semi-structured interviews, video and audio recordings of the participants’ use of English in the conversation sessions, and stimulated recall sessions in which participants reflected upon what situational factors influenced their level of L2 WTC allowed Kang to triangulate her data and propose a more dynamic and situational-based account of WTC (see Figure 3).
Similar to Wen and Clément’s work, this conceptualization emphasizes the relationship between learners’ desire to speak and their willingness to do so. Kang’s additions and refinements, however, arise from her detailed analysis of a particular communication situation
(i.e., the English conversation partner program). According to her conceptualization, a number
22
Figure 3. A preliminary construct of situational willingness to communicate. From “Dynamic emergence of situational willingness to communicate in a second language” by Kang, S., (2005). System, 33(2), 288.
23 of situational variables, such as the topic, interlocutor(s), and conversation context, along with three interacting psychological antecedents, precede the emergence of situational WTC. The challenge thus arising from Kang’s study is determining the relative importance of the different situational-based factors and confirming the relationship between those factors and L2 WTC.
The growing importance of communicative context in L2 WTC research also suggests the need for further investigations of other situational-based factors that might be salient for language learners who have the opportunity to use their L2 in other communicative contexts.
Gaps in L2 WTC Research
Despite the significant strides that have been made in L2 WTC research, there are a number of issues that need to be addressed. These issues involve how WTC has been operationalized and the limited focus that has characterized the majority of L2 WTC research.
Overuse of the Original WTC Measure
Kang’s (2005) research highlights one of the most significant shortcomings of L2 WTC research. Most studies have utilized the original WTC measure designed by McCroskey and
Richmond (1987). Although this practice facilitates the comparison of WTC studies, this measure of WTC is limited to verbal interactions in four types of communication contexts (i.e., dyads, group, meeting, and public speaking) with three types of receivers (i.e., friend, acquaintance, and stranger). These very general communication situations ultimately reflect
McCroskey and Richmond’s underlying belief that WTC is a function of people’s personality, which is hypothesized to remain relatively stable across different communicative situations.
Consequently, McCroskey and Richmond’s WTC measure might not be sensitive enough to detect situational factors that can influence individuals’ level of L2 willingness (e.g., Cao &
24 Philp, 2006). If this is the case, its use in much of the L2 WTC literature is a cause for concern considering that there might be a mismatch between McCroskey and Richmond’s WTC measure, which is global in nature, and MacIntyre et al.’s heuristic model of L2 WTC, which represents an attempt to capture a number of situational factors that potentially influence learners’ willingness to use their L2.
There are, however, a growing number of researchers who have begun to utilize WTC measures designed for specific communicative contexts. One of the first was MacIntyre, Baker,
Clément, and Conrod’s (2001) use of the L2 WTC measure, which is composed of a number of different communicative situations that could occur inside or outside of a language classroom.
McCroskey and Richmond’s original WTC scale, however, heavily influenced some of the speaking situations to the point that some items designed to measure Canadian high school students’ willingness to speak French inside of a language classroom lacked face validity. For example, items such as “talking to a friend while standing in line” and “a stranger enters a room you are in, how willing would you be to have a conversation if he talked to you first?” seem to be at odds with other items that are firmly situated in the classroom such as “speak to your teacher about your homework assignment” or “speak in a group about your summer vacation.”
The desire to design a more situation sensitive L2 WTC measure was also advanced by
Sick (2001, October), who investigated the variability of 248 Japanese high school students’ willingness to speak and write in English over time. Sick’s L2 WTC measure is composed of 41 tasks that could potentially occur in a high school English classroom (e.g., “make a speech to the class about a movie or TV show that you saw”) or in daily life in Tokyo (e.g., “tell a foreigner the time if he asked you”). The results of the study, however, indicated that there were no significant differences in the students’ willingness to perform 41 communicative tasks after
25 studying English for a year. Yet, the relatively low correlation between (r = .45) pre- and post- levels of WTC suggested that there was a great deal of variability amongst learners with some increasing their willingness and others feeling no change or even a decrease in their willingness to use English. In a partial replication of this study, Okayama, Nakanishi, Kuwabara, and Sasaki
(2006) found a similar null result with 85 Japanese first-year university students who had completed a semester-long English course. Exploratory follow-up analyses did, however, reveal some pre-post L2 WTC gains depending upon the students’ field of study. The mixed results of these studies might ultimately reflect a disconnect between Sick’s L2 WTC measure and what actually occurred in the learners’ classrooms. In other words, there was no guarantee that the students participating in these studies had the opportunity in their respective language courses to engage in the different speaking and writing tasks featured in Sick’s L2 WTC measure. As such, this lack of experience might have undermined any attempt to measure the effect of language instruction on students’ level of willingness to communicate in English.
One study that addressed this issue of designing a L2 WTC questionnaire composed of communication situations that students encountered inside their EFL class is Weaver’s (2007) investigation of the relationship between task familiarity and L2 WTC. The researcher designed a WTC measure to assess 307 Japanese university students’ willingness to engage in twelve speaking tasks that they performed a number of times during a semester-long compulsory
English oral communication course. Using a profile analysis, a pre-post oral communication course comparison of the students’ level of L2 WTC indicated a statistically significant increase in their willingness to engage in different speaking tasks along with statistically higher levels of self-perceived L2 competency and L2 communicative anxiety. The combination of increased levels of L2 WTC, self-perceived L2 competency, and L2 communicative anxiety, however, is
26 somewhat at odds with the findings of other WTC researchers. Most studies suggest that WTC increases when learners’ level of L2 communicative competence increases and their level of communicative anxiety decreases. One possible explanation for increased levels of anxiety might be that the act of engaging in the different tasks heightened learners’ awareness of the demands inherent in the twelve speaking tasks as well as any difficulties that they might have experienced performing them.
Another example of a situation specific measure of L2 WTC is Fushino’s (2008) 12-item
Willingness to Communicate in L2 Group Work scale designed to measure Japanese university students’ willingness to use English in situations such as, “I want to ask questions in English if a group member says something unclear to me.” Fushino found that after one semester of English instruction, 200 Japanese university students with high levels of self-perceived L2 proficiency were statistically more willing to use English in group work situations compared to 401 Japanese university students with low levels of self-perceived L2 proficiency.
Collectively, the results of these studies not only provide more fine-grained accounts of the L2 WTC construct, but they also highlight the need for more situational-informed measures of L2 willingness to communicate that are designed for specific communicative contexts.
Lack of L2 WTC Studies Involving Language Skills Other than Speaking
Another limitation associated with the use of McCroskey and Richmond’s (1987) original
WTC measure is that it is only focused on spoken interactions. MacIntyre et al. (1998), however, have argued that the L2 WTC model can be extended to include other skills such as reading, listening comprehension, and writing. One attempt to do so is MacIntyre, Baker, Clément, and
Conrod’s (2001) survey of 79 ninth grade students in Canada. They found that these students’
27 willingness to speak, write, read, and comprehend French inside and outside of the classroom overlapped substantially. Yet, when analyzing the effect of social support on L2 WTC, the researchers found that the students were more willing to speak and write French inside of their classroom. This finding led MacIntyre and his colleagues to suggest that the classroom might provide a more controlled and secure location where students feel more comfortable publicly displaying their level of L2 competence.
Wang (2004) attempted to further clarify the relationship between WTC and L2 writing with a small-scale investigation of 20 university students studying Chinese as a foreign language in Australia. She found a significant positive correlation (r = .51) between students’ willingness to speak in Chinese and their L2 writing proficiency, which was measured with a midterm writing test featuring a variety of question formats such as translations, sentence re-ordering, and a short essay on a given topic. This finding lends support to the idea that L2 productive skills are interrelated to some extent. Yet what remains to be investigated is the amount of willingness students have within a classroom setting to write in their L2. This question is important if the language classroom is to be a place that not only facilitates second language development through its use, but also cultivates learners’ willingness to use their L2 when the opportunity arises.
Grouping Variables Used in L2 WTC Research
The Canadian sociopolitical context has guided the vast majority of L2 WTC researchers interested in determining the extent to which willingness varies amongst different populations of
L2 users. A number of researchers have compared Canadian Anglophone and Francophone’s level of L2 WTC in a variety of different communication contexts (e.g., Baker & MacIntyre,
28 2000; MacIntyre et al., 2001; MacIntyre et al., 2002, 2003). The comparison of male and female students’ level of L2 WTC has been another grouping factor that has interested some researchers
(e.g., Baker & MacIntyre, 2000; MacIntyre et al., 2002). Yet considering the important role that self-perceived communicative competence has upon L2 WTC, there have been few investigations examining the extent to which willingness varies among L2 users with different levels of self-perceived L2 communicative competence. One possible reason is that the relationship between self-perceived L2 competence and actual L2 competence is complex and has been found to be mediated by students’ level of language anxiety (MacIntyre, Noels, &
Clément, 1997). This line of research, however, is needed in order to provide a deeper understanding of the relationship between self-perceived L2 communicative competence and L2
WTC.
Potential Interlocutor Effect on L2 WTC
Considering the number of studies that have been focused on different situational factors underlying learners’ L2 WTC, there have been relatively few investigations examining how learners’ desire to communicate with a specific individual influences their level of willingness.
One possible explanation for this gap in the L2 WTC literature is MacIntyre, Dörnyei, Clément and Noels’ (1998) suggestion that this situational factor is the temporal manifestation of interindividual and intergroup motivation. As a result, most researchers that have considered learners’ desire to communicate with a specific person have done so by focusing upon the more enduring motivational factors in the L2 WTC model. MacIntyre, Baker, Clément and Conrod
(2001), for example, found statistically significant positive correlations between students who wanted to study French to make Francophone friends and their willingness to use French inside
29 and outside of their language classroom. Yashima and her colleagues (2002; 2004) also found a similar positive relationship between Japanese high school and university students’ interest in intercultural friendships and their willingness to use English as a foreign language.
Learners’ desire to communicate with people from a target language group, however, can be influenced by the quality of the interaction between language groups (Dörnyei & Csizér,
2005). Clément, Baker and MacIntyre (2003), for example, found that the quality of L2 contact was a significant data-driven predictor of Francophone university students’ willingness to use
English. However, the quality of L2 contact was not a predictor for the Anglophone students’ willingness to use French. In addition to ethnolinguistic vitality, Schumann’s (1978) conception of social distance also provides an explanation for these contradictory findings. Social distance involves the extent to which learners become members of a target-language community, which in turn influences the quantity and quality of L2 interactions available to language learners. Similar to the work of Wen and Clément (2003) and Kang (2005), there is a further need to further identify factors that potentially underlie language learners’ willingness to use their L2 with interlocutors within a specific communication context.
Potential Motives Underlying Learners’ WTC with Specific Groups of People
MacIntyre et al. (1998) suggest that affiliation and control motives, which also influence interindividual and intergroup motivation, mediate individuals’ willingness to communicate with specific people. Affiliation is a motive in which individuals often experience a connection with people who are in close physical proximity; people they encounter frequently; physically attractive people; and those who share many similar traits with them. This motive thus seems especially relevant to L2 use as illustrated by the number of studies in which the role of
30 interindividual and intergroup motivation in the WTC model has been examined. Kang (2005), for example, noted that one of her male Korean students was especially willing to speak English with an attractive female conversation partner. However, affiliation can also lead to a decrease in learners’ level of willingness. For example, the four participants in Kang’s study reported lower levels of WTC when other Korean students participated in the same conversation session because they did not want to display their non-fluent English speaking skills in front of their peers. Wen and Clément (2003) suggested that the fear of losing face can also be a concern for
Chinese learners of English. Yet in some cases, peers can provide social support for L2 use.
MacIntyre et al. (2001) found that Canadian junior high students who had a best friend’s or other friends’ support to learn French were significantly more willing to use French outside of their language class. Interestingly, this form of social support however did not lead to more willingness to use French inside their language classroom.
The second motive underlying learners’ WTC to speak to specific groups of people is control. The control motive is a communicative behavior that “aims at limiting the cognitive, affective, and behavioural freedom of the communicators” (MacIntyre et al., 1998, p. 550).
Control also includes interlocutors’ ability to either encourage or discourage the flow of communication with the use of non-verbal cues and verbal content. MacIntyre and Donovan’s
(2004) study of 95 Canadian university students is currently one of few empirical investigations in which this aspect of the WTC model has been examined. Their study revealed a positive relationship (r = .37) between the students’ L1 WTC and their desire for control over a communicative situation and its participants. They also found a positive relationship (r = .43) involving the students’ level of self-perceived communicative competence and the control motive. These findings thus suggest that desire for control is a motive underlying communication
31 and that higher levels of self-perceived communicative competence arise from attempts to exert control over others. The relationship between willingness to use an L2 with a specific group of people and motives such as affiliation and control, however, remains relatively unknown and requires further empirical investigation.
Desire to Communicate with a Specific Person Inside an EFL Classroom
Because the desire to communicate with a specific individual has been studied through the broader underlying influences of interindividual and intergroup motivation, the extent to which learners’ level of L2 WTC varies with specific interlocutors in a particular communication context remains uncertain. This more focused question is important considering that for many
EFL learners, the language classroom provides the primary opportunity for them to use and develop their current level of L2 competence. Within this communicative context, individuals often have clearly defined roles, a fact that has generated a sizable amount of research focused on the nature of teacher-student (e.g., Chaudron, 1988; Pica & Doughty, 1985) and student- student interactions (e.g., Pica, 1994; Watanabe, 1993). Researchers have also been interested in the types of opportunities for L2 development that these interactions afford to students (e.g.,
Ohta, 2001; Swain & Lapkin, 2000).
Another aspect of classroom interaction that has attracted some interest is students’ beliefs about their interlocutors. For example, researchers investigating attribution theory found that a group of British junior high school students attributed their success and failure to learn
French to the type of support they received from their peers (Williams & Burden, 1999).
Similarly, Ushioda (2003) found that even well-motivated learners could be reluctant to use
French as second language in front of their peers due to the fear of sounding silly or being
32 labeled a “nerd.” The negative effects of peer pressure were also found with Chinese learners of
English in Hong Kong (Tsui, 1996). Taken together, these findings suggest that peers and their attitudes towards L2 learning can influence students’ L2 WTC in an instructed language learning setting. This possibility thus needs to be further examined.
Intercultural Communication and L2 WTC
An increasing number of students pursuing their post-secondary education overseas have also led to a number of researchers to investigate intercultural communication in different educational contexts. In terms of willingness to communicate, Kassing (1997) suggested the possibility of individuals having a high level of willingness to communicate with people within their cultural group, but feeling hesitant in intercultural settings. In partial support of this proposition, Lin and Rancer (2003) found that ethnocentrism and intercultural communication apprehension were two significant influences upon 324 American students’ intention to participate in an intercultural dialog program offered at their university.
Within EFL classrooms in Japan, intercultural exchanges are often mediated by a host of different factors. For example, Weaver (2002, November) found that international students were frustrated in their English classes because they felt that Japanese university students would frequently interact only with their close friends, thus making it difficult for international students to communicate with Japanese students whom they did not know well. Another source of frustration was that teachers and Japanese students often performed important language functions, such as comprehension checks and requests for clarification, in Japanese, rather than in English.
These frustrations thus highlight some of the challenges that can potentially undermine the occurrence of intercultural communication in Japanese EFL classrooms. What remains uncertain
33 is the extent to which Japanese university students are willing to communicate with international students in English.
Divergent Perceptions of Language Teachers
The sheer number of people learning English as a foreign language in the world has also led to an overwhelming need for language teachers. In order to meet this need, an estimated 80% of the world’s language teachers are nonnative English speakers (Canagarah, 1999). This substantial population of language teachers has become a focal point for researchers interested in teacher education (e.g., Braine, 1999; Brutt-Griffler & Samimy, 1999; Carrier, 2003), the social identity of being a language teacher (e.g., Amin, 1997; Armour, 2004; Tang, 1997; Weisman,
2001), and the pedagogical practices of teachers (e.g., Lazaraton, 2003). Recognition of nonnative English teachers’ contributions to instructed language learning settings has also led to a critical review of language ownership (e.g., Higgins, 2003) and the articulation of the native speaker fallacy (Cook, 1999).
The distinction between native and nonnative English teachers from the students’ perspective has also generated several empirical investigations. Lasagabaster and Sierra’s (2002) study of 87 ESL students in Spain revealed a general preference for native English teachers.
Students’ preferences, however, varied according to the nature of the teacher-student interaction.
For example, these students preferred native teachers for information about pronunciation, speaking, vocabulary, and cultural knowledge. Nonnative teachers, on the other hand, were trusted sources for grammar instruction and assessment. Shimizu (1995) also found a similar split in 1,088 Japanese college students’ responses to a large-scale survey. The students characterized foreign English teachers’ classes as being “cheerful and fun” whereas Japanese
34 English teachers’ classes were viewed as formal and unengaging. The students did, however, report that they felt more comfortable asking questions in a class taught by a Japanese teacher of
English and these classes were easier to understand. Collectively, these studies suggest that student motivation and beliefs vary depending on whether they are taught by nonnative and native English teachers. The extent to which these different types of teachers influence students’ willingness to use their L2 within a language classroom, however, requires further investigation.
Summary of the Gaps in L2 WTC Literature
McCroskey and Richmond’s (1990) original conception of WTC has not only strongly informed the L2 willingness to communicate construct, but in some cases it has limited the scope of L2 WTC research. As a result, there are a number of gaps in the L2 WTC literature that need to be addressed to provide a more fine-grained account of L2 WTC in specific communicative situations. These gaps include methodological issues such as the use of McCroskey and
Richmond’s measure of WTC in L2 communicative situations that increasingly involve numerous factors over and above the four communicative contexts and three types of receivers included on that instrument. The use of the McCroskey and Richmond’s WTC measure has also led to numerous investigations about students’ willingness to speak, but few investigations examining the other language skill areas such as writing in a L2.
Another area in the L2 WTC literature needing further investigation is the role of self- perceived L2 communicative competence and L2 WTC. While numerous researchers have found a positive relationship between self-perceived L2 communicative competence and L2 WTC (e.g.,
Baker & MacIntyre, 2000; Yashima, 2002; Yashima et al., 2004), there have been relatively few
35 studies examining how L2 users who have different levels of self-perceived L2 communicative competence differ in terms of their level of L2 WTC.
Finally, the role of the interlocutor is another gap that requires further examination.
Previous L2 WTC research (e.g., Cao & Philp, 2006; Kang, 2005) has suggested that interlocutors influence students’ L2 willingness in ESL learning situations. A systematic investigation of how different types of interlocutors influence students’ willingness to use their
L2 within an instructed language learning situation would further clarify the relative importance of this situational-based factor in the L2 WTC construct.
Research Questions
Building upon the contributions of previous L1 and L2 WTC research, the primary aim of this study is thus to examine the extent to which the most immediate situation-based factors in
MacIntyre et al.’s (1998) WTC model (i.e., State Communicative Self-Competence and Desire to
Communicate with a Specific Person) influence Japanese university students’ willingness to communicate inside an EFL classroom. This inquiry involves not only students’ willingness to speak in English, but also their willingness to write in English. The research questions pertaining to students’ willingness to speak in English are:
1. To what extent does Japanese university students’ level of willingness to speak in English
inside an EFL classroom vary according to their level of self-perceived L2 communicative
competence?
2. To what extent does Japanese university students’ level of willingness to speak in English to
different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom vary regardless of their level of self-
perceived L2 communicative competence?
36 3. To what extent does Japanese university students’ level of willingness to speak in English to
different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom vary according to their level of self-
perceived L2 communicative competence?
The research questions investigating students’ willingness to write in English are:
4. To what extent does Japanese university students’ level of willingness to write in English
inside an EFL classroom vary according to their level of self-perceived L2 communicative
competence?
5. To what extent does Japanese university students’ level of willingness to write in English to
different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom vary regardless of their level of self-
perceived L2 communicative competence?
6. To what extent does Japanese university students’ level of willingness to write in English to
different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom vary according to their level of self-
perceived L2 communicative competence?
The answers to these research questions can help provide a more complete account of the most immediate situational factors found in MacIntyre et al.’s heuristic pyramid WTC model.
This information will also help clarify the extent to which these situational factors influence
Japanese university students’ willingness to use English inside an EFL classroom. Equally important is identifying the factors mediating students’ desire to communicate with different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom. Ideally, this information will inform pedagogical practices that will advance the development of students’ level of willingness to use English, which in turn might lead to opportunities for L2 learning inside EFL classrooms.
37
Conclusion
In this chapter I reviewed the relevant theoretical and empirical research that motivated the research questions. The questionnaires developed to address this study’s research questions are described in detail in the next chapter.
38 CHAPTER 3
MATERIALS
In this chapter I provide a detailed description of the development of the two questionnaires used to measure students’ L2 WTC with different types of interlocutors inside an
EFL classroom. The first questionnaire is composed of 17 speaking situations/tasks and 17 writing tasks that Japanese university students are likely to encounter in their EFL classroom.
The second questionnaire is open-ended, thus allowing respondents to identify factors that influence their willingness to use English with different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom. Finally, a summary of the chapter is given.
Developing the L2 WTC Questionnaire
The development of the L2 WTC Questionnaire started as an extensive list of speaking and writing situations/tasks that typically occur in English classes at the university. This list was first compiled through a series of interviews with students, Japanese teachers of English, and foreign teachers of English. Then, an examination of the textbooks used in various English courses at the university also contributed several more communication situations/tasks to the list.
Next, a group of teachers and students rank ordered the speaking and writing situations/tasks according to the frequency in which they engaged in these tasks/situations in their English class.
Tasks/situations that were specific to particular classrooms and/or teachers were then eliminated from the list. The underlying goal was to ensure that the L2 WTC Questionnaire featured tasks/situations that students had previously completed in English class or they would have little trouble imagining completing in their English class.
39 The next step involved selecting tasks/situations according to the amount of willingness that they required of students. The selection criterion involved choosing tasks/situations that in which a majority of Japanese university students would be very willing to use English and other situations/tasks in which only the most willing students’ would be willing to use English. The goal of this selection process was twofold. The first goal was to assemble speaking and writing tasks/situations that could define a broad continuum of L2 WTC. The second goal was to have a
L2 WTC measure that could distinguish students who have different levels of willingness to speak and write in English from each other.
Underlying this selection process was the idea that the amount of verbal or written output required by a particular communication situation or task would mediate students’ level of willingness to use English in EFL classrooms. As such, it was hypothesized that students would be more willing to use English in situations/tasks that required limited amounts of output in contrast to situations where extended use of English is required. A number of other factors, such as the amount of support provided to students in a particular a communication situation/task, can also mediate students’ level of willingness to communicate. For example, students’ might be more willing to write an essay in English if they are provided with an outline detailing what they need to write. The content of communication is also another factor that mediates students’ level of L2 WTC (e.g., Kang, 2005). Topics in which students have substantial knowledge might increase their level of willingness to communicate in English.
The third step in the L2 WTC Questionnaire development process involved selecting specific situations/tasks involving different aspects of speaking and writing in English that occur in EFL classrooms. This selection process was informed by two empirical studies of Japanese high school (Sick, 2001, October) and university students’ (Weaver, 2003, March) willingness to
40 use English inside and outside an EFL classroom. The end result of this process was 17 speaking tasks/situations on the L2 WTC Questionnaire roughly divided into three types of speech (see
Table 1).
Table 1. The Speaking Situations/Tasks on the L2 WTC Questionnaire Item Speaking Task or Situation s1 Greet someone in English. s2 Say ‘thank you’ in English when someone lends you a pen. s3 Sing a song in English. s4 Give directions to your favorite restaurant in English. s5 Tell someone in English about the story of a TV show you saw. s6 Read out a two-way dialogue in English from the textbook. s7 Translate a spoken utterance from Japanese into English. s8 Interview someone in English asking your own original questions. s9 Interview someone in English asking questions from the textbook. s10 Do a role-play in English at your desk (e.g., ordering food in a restaurant). s11 Do a role-play standing in front of the class in English (e.g., ordering food in a restaurant). s12 Give a short speech in English about your hometown with notes. s13 Give a short self-introduction without notes in English. s14 Ask someone in English to repeat what they just said in English because you didn't understand. s15 Ask the meaning of a word you do not know in English. s16 Ask someone how to pronounce a word in English. s17 Ask someone in English how to say a phrase you know how to say in Japanese but not in English.
The first type of speech featured in the speaking subsection of the L2 WTC Questionnaire is interactional, which is primarily focused on the social needs of the interlocutors (Richards,
1990). Examples of interactional speech are item s1, “Greet someone in English” and item s2,
“Say ‘thank you’ when someone lends you a pen.”
The second type of speech is transactional, which is primarily focused on the transmission of information between interlocutors. An example of transactional speech tasks/situations in the L2 WTC Questionnaire is item s5, “Tell someone in English about the
41 story of a TV show you saw last night.” Students’ use of transactional speech results from two types of tasks. The first type is communicative tasks where students use language with an emphasis on meaning to achieve a communicative objective (Bygate, Skehan, & Swain, 2001).
Item s4, “Give directions to your favorite restaurant in English” is an example of a communicative task in the L2 WTC Questionnaire. The second type is pedagogical tasks where the focus is upon the types of operations/interactions learners are required to undertake (Willis,
1996). Item s7, “Translate a spoken utterance from Japanese into English” is an example of a pedagogical task in the L2 WTC Questionnaire.
An additional point of interest accompanying transactional speech was the influence that different pedagogical techniques had upon students’ level of L2 WTC. For example, items s8 and s9 investigate whether giving students the freedom to ask their own original questions versus asking questions originating from a textbook influences their level of WTC. Items s10 and s11 examine the impact of students’ physical location in the classroom. Foster and Skehan (1997), for example, found that verbal performances at the front of the classroom were less fluent and more prone to errors. These items were designed to determine the extent to which physical location in the classroom influences students’ level of L2 WTC. Another point of interest was the impact of having access to written notes to alleviate the cognitive load students face when they have to speak for an extended period of time (Weaver, 2007). Items s12 and s13 examine this pedagogical technique in the context of giving a speech.
The third type of speech is classroom English, which involves utterances used to resolve a variety of difficulties that arise in verbal interactions (Dörnyei & Thurrell, 1994). The L2 WTC
Questionnaire features phrases that help students manage verbal interaction. For example, item s14, “Ask someone in English to repeat what they just said in English because you didn't
42 understand,” is a request for repetition, which is an important discourse feature in the negotiation of meaning and the attainment of comprehensible input (Long, 1983). There are also direct appeals for help concerning specific features of the language found in item s15, “Ask the meaning of a word you do not know in English,” and item s17, “Ask someone in English how to say a phrase you know how to say in Japanese but not in English.” These requests serve as the potential beginning of a language-related episode where students are focused on how the language works (Swain & Lapkin, 2001).
The writing subsection of the L2 WTC Questionnaire (see Table 2) encompasses two types of writing. The first writing type draws upon students’ personal experiences. The writing tasks vary in length from “a descriptive paragraph in English about a Japanese cultural event”
(item w1) to longer texts involving “a short report describing your hometown in English” (item w2) and “an explanation in English about why you wanted to enter this university” (item w3).
The duration of writing was also another factor of interest ranging from a one time activity of writing “instructions in English for how to make your favorite dish” (item w5) to an extended writing activity such as keeping “a diary about your daily life in English” (item w6). The personal writing tasks also involved a number of different discourse purposes such as introducing oneself in English (item w7), explaining university life in Japan (item w8), and convincing someone to buy a CD (item w9). The possibility that different mediums of writing influence students’ level of WTC was another point of interest. For example item w10 asked about writing “a postcard in English describing your last holiday” and item w11 involved writing
“an email in English describing your favorite website.”
The second type of writing task was orientated more towards the mechanics and/or the different components of academic writing. The academic tasks ranged in length from a cause and
43 effect paragraph (item w13) to a short report about a journal article (item w14). They also involved different discourse purposes such as expressing agreement (item w15) and disagreement (item w16). The use of translation (item w17) to teach writing (Kobayashi &
Rinnert, 2002) was also included in the L2 WTC Questionnaire.
Table 2. The Writing Tasks on the L2 WTC Questionnaire Item Writing Tasks w1 Write a descriptive paragraph in English about a Japanese cultural event (i.e., summer festival or holidays like New Year's). w2 Write a short report describing your hometown in English. w3 Write an explanation in English about why you wanted to enter this university. w4 Write an account in English of your about future goals after graduating from the university. w5 Write instructions in English for how to make your favorite dish. w6 Write a diary about your daily life in English. w7 Write a self-introduction in English. w8 Write a one page explanation about university life in Japan in English. w9 Write an essay in English trying to convince someone that they should buy your favorite singer's CD. w10 Write a postcard in English describing your last holiday. w11 Write an email in English describing your favorite website. w12 Write a comment in English about what you think about your English class. w13 Write a paragraph in English describing the cause and effect of something (i.e., how more cars cause global warming). w14 Write a short report in English about an article or book you read. w15 Write your opinion in English agreeing with a person's point of view. w16 Write your opinion in English disagreeing with a person's point of view. w17 Translate a sentence from Japanese to English.
The final step of the development process involved two Japanese EFL instructors independently translating the L2 WTC Questionnaire from English into Japanese. They then compared and combined their translations to ensure that the wording of the items and the scales sounded natural and appropriate. The Japanese phrase “yaru darou (I will do that)” was used as the prompt to measure students’ level of willingness to use English inside an EFL classroom.
Interestingly there have been a number of other Japanese translations for L2 WTC. Yashima
44 (2002) was the first to investigate L2 WTC in the Japanese context with a Japanese version of the original McCroskey and Richmond (McCroskey & Richmond, 1987) WTC scale. As a result, the Japanese phrase “kanarazu communication suru (definitely be willing to communicate)” was used to measure Japanese university students’ general propensity to use English in very generally defined communicative situations. As later L2 WTC scales became more specific in nature, the
Japanese translation of WTC also became more refined. Sick (2001, October) used “shitai (want to)” and Fushino (2008) opted for “suru tsumorida (be willing to)” in an attempt to direct respondents’ attention to specific communication situations requiring the use of English. The L2
WTC Questionnaire is designed with the similar goal of having respondents to their level of willingness to use English in a variety of specific speaking and writing tasks/situations. The decision to use the Japanese phrase “yaru darou (I will do that)” was based upon students’ feedback that “shitai (want to)” and “suru tsumorida (be willing to)” sounded a bit too formal.
As such, the L2 WTC Questionnaire was designed in order that students would feel at ease indicating their level of L2 WTC.
Developing the Open-ended L2 WTC Questionnaire
Although the L2 WTC Questionnaire is an economical means of investigating the possibility of an interlocutor effect upon Japanese university students’ willingness to use English inside an EFL classroom, this data collection technique is limited to the speaking and writing tasks/situations that make up the questionnaire. There, however, might be other factors that mediate students’ communication behavior with different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom.
45 In order to broaden the scope of this study, an open-ended questionnaire written in
English was developed to provide students with the freedom to express their personal experiences about their willingness to use English with different types of interlocutors inside an
EFL classroom (see Appendix A). The L2 WTC Open-ended Questionnaire was also designed to help students reflect upon the following points: (a) previous and more recent experiences using
English with different types of interlocutors, (b) the unique opportunities and challenges that different types of interlocutors present to them, (c) the relationship between WTC and their desire to communicate with different interlocutors, and (d) the relationship between WTC and their level of self-perceived communicative competence to use English.
Because the L2 WTC Open-ended Questionnaire was administered as an assignment in a required English writing course for first-year students, the questionnaire needed to have some kind of pedagogical value. The participating teachers requested that responses to the L2 WTC
Open-ended Questionnaire be written in English so that completing the questionnaire would provide students with an opportunity to write in English. From the students’ perspective, the L2
WTC Open-ended Questionnaire had to provide a forum where students would be comfortable conveying their experiences about being willing to communicate in English with different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom. As such, special attention was paid to explaining the general purpose of the research to the students and ensuring them that their responses to the L2
WTC questionnaire would be handled in a manner that would protect their identities.
Conclusion
In this chapter I explained the development of the L2 WTC Questionnaire and the L2
WTC Open-ended Questionnaire used to address this study’s research questions. A pilot study
46 conducted to investigate the psychometric properties of the L2 WTC Questionnaire is described in detail in the next chapter.
47 CHAPTER 4
PILOT STUDY OF THE L2 WTC QUESTIONNAIRE
This chapter begins with a review of three issues that WTC researchers need to consider when using a questionnaire to determine individuals’ level of willingness to communicate. The chapter continues with an overview of the Rasch measurement model and an explanation of how this model can be utilized to evaluate the L2 WTC Questionnaire. Then a pilot study involving
500 Japanese university students that examined the psychometric properties of the L2 WTC
Questionnaire is described. Finally, a summary of the chapter is given.
The Use of Questionnaires in WTC Research
A majority of L1 and L2 WTC researchers have relied upon questionnaires as the primary data collection technique in their studies. As such, it is important that the questionnaire is designed, implemented, and analyzed in a manner that provides a valid and reliable measure of willingness to communicate. This goal entails three interlocking issues. The first issue is carefully writing the statements respondents read in order to reflect upon their level of willingness to communicate. This issue was discussed in the previous chapter in terms of how the 17 speaking and 17 writing situations/tasks were selected to compose the L2 WTC
Questionnaire.
The second issue involves deciding the manner in which respondents will be required to express their level of willingness to communicate. L1 and L2 WTC researchers have typically used Likert scales with a different number of response options and labels. Unfortunately unlike other areas of L2 research, there has not been much reflection on the part of L1 and L2 WTC
48 researchers concerning the optimal number of points for a Likert scale (e.g., Juffs, 2001) and/or the appropriate labels for the different points on a scale (e.g., J. D. Brown, 2001; Mackey & Gass,
2005).
The third issue entails how WTC researchers analyze the responses given to a questionnaire. From a Rasch measurement perspective (Rasch, 1960/1980), responses collected with a Likert scale cannot be considered a true reflection of respondents’ level of endorsement.
The basis of this argument is that Likert scale data are only a count of observed behavior, which is ordinal level data (Wright & Linacre, 1989). As such, this level of data is a form of ranking, which in the context of this study can be used only to order students on the basis of them being more or less willing to use English. Ordinal data, however, cannot be used to specify the true differences between students (Hays, 1988) because the distances between students on a continuum of L2 WTC cannot be assumed to be interval. In order to achieve interval level measurement, ordinal data must be first transformed into interval data using a statistical procedure such as a Rasch analysis (Wright & Stone, 1979).
The argument for establishing an interval measure of willingness to communicate before embarking upon other quantitative analyses, however, runs counter to the established practice of using factor analysis to identify clusters of items that form internally consistent sub-sections of the scale (e.g., J. D. Brown, 2001). In support for the use of the Rasch measurement model,
Wright (1996a) argues that factor analysis is ill advised because this statistical analysis utilizes data that is qualitative (i.e., ordinal data) and not quantitative in nature (i.e., interval scale).
Waugh and Chapman (2005) also argue that items that are correlated do not necessarily create a conceptual scale based upon item difficulty. In addition, Wright points out that true score theory has no objective means of dealing with missing data without introducing potential research bias
49 into statistical analyses such as factor analysis. The Rasch measure model, on the other hand, provides WTC researchers with not only a statistical procedure that transforms ordinal level data from questionnaire responses into an interval measure of WTC, but also a theory of measurement that has a number of expectations concerning what entails sound measurement; this theory of measurement can be used to evaluate the psychometric properties of questionnaire responses.
The Rasch Measurement Model
The Rasch measurement model is a family of probabilistic mathematical models that requires unidimensionality and additivity (E. Smith, Jr. & Dupeyrat, 2001). Unidimensionality means that the items on a questionnaire measure a single construct. Additivity involves the transformation of ordinal level data into an interval scale measured in logits. The logit as a unit of measurement has the distinct feature of maintaining the same size over the whole length of the scale. As a result, it is possible to determine the extent to which the 17 speaking and 17 writing situations/tasks on the L2 WTC Questionnaire define a line of increasing difficulty that meaningfully delineates the construct of willingness to communicate in English.
Treatment of the Participants’ Questionnaire Responses Using Rasch Measurement Model
The students’ responses to the L2 WTC Questionnaire were analyzed using the Rasch rating scale model (Andrich, 1978) implemented by Winsteps (Linacre, 2004b). Expressed as a formula, the Rasch rating scale model is:
(Bn – Di - Fk) (Bn – Di - Fk) Pnik = e / 1 + e
This formula states that the probability (Pnik) of any student choosing any category on any item on the L2 WTC Questionnaire is the function of the agreeability of a student (Bn) and the
50 endorsability of an item (Di) at a given threshold (Fk) (Wright & Masters, 1982). When this formula is implemented by Winsteps, student ability and item difficulty are determined through an iterative process. First, item difficulty is calculated with student ability constrained. The resulting item difficulty levels are then used to calculate student ability levels. From here, an iterative process commences in which item difficulty and student ability estimates are calculated and recalculated until the maximum difference between item and student ability levels during successive iterations meets a convergence value of 0.005 (Linacre, 2007). The end result of this iterative process is three separate parameter estimates along with standard error estimates that provide a more concise account of the students’ responses on the L2 WTC Questionnaire.
The first parameter estimate is person ability. In the context of this investigation, person ability is the students’ level of willingness to speak and write in English to different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom.
The second estimate is the item difficulty parameter. This estimation is the difficulty that the students had endorsing the different speaking and writing tasks/situations. If a particular speaking or writing task/situation is difficult to endorse, it requires a high level of willingness to communicate. Conversely if an item is easy to endorse, the task/situation does not require as much willingness to communicate.
The third estimate is the category thresholds common to the 17 speaking and 17 writing tasks/situations on the L2 WTC Questionnaire. A category threshold is the point where students have a 50% chance of moving from one category to the next. Thus, the L2 WTC Questionnaire’s
4-point scale contains three thresholds. The first threshold, for example, is the point between 1
(definitely not willing) and 2 (probably not willing). These thresholds are important for determining the intensity of students’ willingness to speak and write in English.
51
Dealing with Logit Measures
Because the logit is not a widely familiar unit of measurement, the logit measures for person ability, item difficulty, and category thresholds were transformed into a user-friendly scale measured in WITs. A WIT stands for Woodcock unit, which is a tribute to Richard
Woodcock, who was probably the first generally-recognized test developer to commit himself to
Rasch methodology (e.g., Woodcock, 1999). The WIT scale is calculated using the following formula (Wright & Stone, 1979):
B = α + γ (b – c)
where B is a student’s estimated level of L2 WTC or an item’s estimated difficulty expressed in WITs, α is the location factor of 500 so that the lowest L2 WTC score is greater than zero, γ is the spacing factor of 45.5 so that no useful information is lost from the logit scale when the WIT scores are rounded to the nearest integer, b is a student’s estimated level of L2
WTC or an item’s estimated difficulty measured in logits and c is a norm-referenced choice of 0 logits, which is the average item difficulty for the L2 WTC Questionnaire.
The WIT scale has a number of benefits. First, it eliminates the use of negatives and decimals that accompany logit scores with the midpoint of the scale being 500 WITs (E. Smith,
Jr., 2000). Second, the probabilities of a student being willing to do the different writing tasks are in easy-to-remember multiples of 50 (Wright & Stone, 1979). Table 3 displays the relationship between students’ level of willingness and the difficulty level of the different speaking and writing tasks/situations.
52 Table 3. The Relationship between Students’ Level of L2 WTC and the Level of L2 WTC Required by a Speaking or Writing Task/Situation Difference between a student’s level of L2 WTC Probability of a student using English in a and the level of L2 WTC required by a speaking speaking or writing task/situation or writing task/situation measured in WITs .10 -100 .25 -50 .50 0 .75 50 .90 100
According to Table 3, we can expect that the probability of students being willing to use
English in a speaking or writing situation/task is only 10% when the task/situation requires a level of L2 WTC exceeding their level of willingness by 100 WITs (resulting in a difference of
-100 WITs). With a difference of -50 WITs, the probability of students being willing to use
English becomes 25%. When there is no difference between the students’ level of L2 WTC and the level of willingness required by the speaking or writing task/situation, there is a 50% probability of the students being willing to use English. As students’ level of L2 WTC begins to exceed the level of L2 WTC required by a task/situation, the probability of students using
English also increases. A difference of 50 WITs results in a 75% probability; a 100 WIT difference raises the probability to 90%.
It must be remembered, however, that these percentages represent the probability of students using English in the different speaking and writing tasks/situations. Sometimes students who have a low level of L2 willingness to communicate might defy a predicted probability by responding that they are very willing to use English in a situation/task that greatly exceeds their overall level of L2 WTC. One possible explanation for this endorsement is that the item is a communicative situation that students have frequently encountered and thus feel more confident about their ability to use English.
53 The Pilot Study
A pilot study involving 500 Japanese university students (232 first-year students and 268 second-year students) from the target population was conducted to evaluate the performance of the L2 WTC Questionnaire (Weaver, 2005). Ten students were removed from the analysis of the
WTC questionnaire because their responses represented extreme scores. Six students responded that they were definitely willing to use English for all the items in the questionnaire; whereas, the four other students were at the opposite side of the spectrum responding that they were definitely not willing use English in any of the tasks/situations in the WTC questionnaire. Unfortunately, these extreme response patterns do not yield estimable person measures since the Rasch model requires at least one item to be beyond or below the respondents’ current level of ability
(Linacre, 2004a). The remaining 490 students’ responses were submitted to a Rasch analysis using WINSTEPS (Linacre, 2004b) to determine the extent to which the L2 WTC measure exhibited characteristics of sound measurement.
Unlike other types of statistical models, such as item response theory, which attempts to accurately model students’ responses, the Rasch model is based upon specific properties necessary for measurement. In short, the objective of a Rasch analysis is to seek data that fit the expectations of the Rasch model (Andrich, 1989). These expectations in turn provide a systematic means of evaluating different measurement properties of the L2 WTC Questionnaire.
Determining the Appropriate Rasch Model to Analyze the L2 WTC Questionnaire
The first issue addressed in the pilot study involved the analysis of the students’ responses to the L2 WTC Questionnaire with the Rasch rating scale model (Andrich, 1978) and the Rasch partial credit model. From a Rasch measurement perspective, a 4-point Likert scale
54 contains three category thresholds. These thresholds represent the 50% probability of students choosing one option over another. For example, the first threshold of the 4-point Likert scale is the point where students have a fifty-fifty chance of choosing option 2 (probably not willing) over option 1 (definitely not willing). Rating scale and partial credit models differ in the way that these thresholds are estimated. When using the rating scale model, the thresholds for all of the items in the WTC questionnaire are estimated at the same time. This estimation process thus produces a pattern of thresholds that is the same for all the items. In contrast, the partial credit model estimates each item’s thresholds separately without requiring the same pattern of thresholds for all of the items. As a result, it is possible to determine if the students consistently used the 4-point Likert scale in the same manner for all 17 speaking and 17 writing tasks/situations.
Figure 4 shows that the rating scale model and the partial credit model’s category threshold estimates for the 17 speaking and 17 writing tasks/situations are generally consistent.
The underlined numbers illustrate the points where the partial credit model estimated a category threshold differently from the rating scale model. The right side of Figure 4 also lists the rankings of the items’ difficulty according to the rating scale model (RSc) and the partial credit model (PCr). In the context of this study, the level of item difficulty indicates the amount of willingness to communicate that a speaking task/situation or a writing task requires from a student. Thus, students are very unwilling to do tasks/situations that have high difficulty estimates, such as item s7 (Translate a spoken utterance from Japanese into English). The cumulative effect of the different threshold estimates resulted in a slight reordering of four writing tasks (i.e., items w3 and w13 and items w15 and w11). The top right side of Figure 4 also
55 shows that the rating scale and partial credit models differed slightly in terms of which speaking and writing situations/tasks students were the most unwilling to do.
Yet taking into consideration the standard errors associated with the different threshold estimates, the standardized difference between the two models is quite small. Table 4 displays the standardized differences for all the items’ thresholds as well as the standardized match between the rating scale and the partial credit analyses. The largest difference between the rating scale and the partial credit estimates is for the first threshold for item s3 “Sing a song in
English.” The rating scale analysis estimates this threshold as 409.47 WITs; whereas the partial credit estimate was 448.01 WITs resulting in a difference of -38.54 WITs. The next step involves incorporating the estimation error so that the difference between the two estimates for the first threshold can be made in standardized units (Zi1). The difference thus becomes 38.54/6.23 =
-6.19 standardized units for the first threshold. The match T statistic is the difference between the rating scale and the partial credit analyses across all three thresholds. In terms of item s3, the difference is 6.25 standardized units. A mean difference of 0.53 WITs with a standard deviation of 1.2 for all the speaking and writing situations/tasks indicates that there are few distinctions worth noting between the use of the partial credit model and the rating scale model. In other words, the rating scale model is an appropriate model to use to estimate the students’ level of L2
WTC because the spacing between the thresholds for the different speaking and writing situations/tasks is largely consistent. Moreover, Kozaki (2004) notes that the use of the partial credit model can produce misleading results when respondents do not use all of the categories in a rating scale.
56
Figure 4. Differences in the rating scale and partial credit model estimates measured in WITs. Note. RSc = rating scale model; PCr = partial credit model; M = mean level of L2 WTC; S = one standard distribution above/below the mean; T = two standard distributions above/below the mean.
57 Table 4. The Match Between the Rating Scale and Partial Credit Category Threshold Estimates Standardized Differences Match
Item Zi1 Zi2 Zi3 T s1 -1.44 -0.24 1.00 0.32 s2 -2.83 -2.44 3.14 3.85 s3 -6.19 1.86 3.85 6.25 s4 -0.13 0.03 0.62 -1.48 s5 1.19 -0.07 -0.67 -0.25 s6 -0.33 -0.58 1.12 -0.35 s7 0.46 -1.07 1.60 0.61 s8 0.50 1.11 -1.60 0.65 s9 -0.07 2.13 -2.53 2.21 s10 -0.77 -1.16 3.05 2.26 s11 0.76 -0.18 -0.49 -0.98 s12 1.03 -1.27 0.90 0.45 s13 -0.05 -0.45 0.73 -1.07 s14 -1.33 0.64 0.17 -0.09 s15 -0.24 -0.49 0.82 -0.86 s16 -1.00 0.75 -0.03 -0.43 s17 -0.36 1.08 -0.70 -0.30 w1 -1.15 1.99 -1.03 1.29 w2 0.81 1.33 -1.73 1.05 w3 -0.11 -0.79 1.82 0.62 w4 -2.06 1.49 0.78 1.46 w5 1.34 0.48 -1.62 0.84 w6 1.78 -0.38 -0.90 0.68 w7 1.58 0.46 -1.50 0.92 w8 2.88 -1.57 -0.39 2.20 w9 -0.73 -0.03 1.20 -0.21 w10 0.40 -0.15 0.02 -1.92 w11 1.25 0.39 -1.49 0.61 w12 1.75 -1.29 0.38 0.90 w13 -2.06 2.02 -0.17 1.74 w14 2.10 -0.27 -1.32 1.27 w15 0.98 0.21 -0.93 -0.26 w16 1.60 0.60 -2.16 1.58 w17 0.64 0.85 -1.34 0.25 M -0.10 0.53 SD 1.40 1.20
58 Evaluating the Number of Points on the Rating Scale for the L2 WTC Questionnaire
After determining that the rating scale model was an appropriate model to analyze the L2
WTC Questionnaire data, the optimal number of points that the rating scale should have in order to detect differences between students was determined. McCroskey and Richmond’s (1987) original WTC scale asks respondents to indicate the percentage of time ranging from 0 (never) to
100 (always) that they would be willing to communicate in twelve different speaking situations.
The question, however, arises whether or not this 100-category scale can meaningfully represent differences in respondents’ WTC. One must question if it is possible for students to differentiate their willingness to use English into a hundred distinct units. MacIntyre, Baker, Clément and
Conrod (2001) collapsed the 100-category scale into a more manageable 5-point scale ranging from 1 (almost never willing) to 5 (almost always willing). Unfortunately, the researchers did not investigate whether or not their new scale defined a meaningful continuum of WTC.
The pilot study, in contrast, revealed that a 4-point rating scale (i.e., 1 = definitely not willing; 2 = probably not willing; 3 = probably willing; and 4 = definitely willing) met a number of interlocking expectations of a well-performing rating scale. Table 5 shows that the degree of fit between the expectations of the Rasch model and students’ use of the different categories in the rating scales fell below Linacre’s (1999) benchmark of an outfit mean square of 2.00. This level of agreement indicates that the different categories are contributing more information than random noise to the measurement process. The average measure, which is the average measure for all students who selected a particular point on the rating scale (Linacre, 2004b), also increased monotonically across the four categories in the rating scale.
59 Table 5. Category Frequencies, Average Measures, Thresholds, and Category Fit for L2 WTC Rating Scale Category Observed Average Outfit Mean Label count Measure Threshold Square Category Name 1 1929 -82 None 1.17 Definitely not willing 2 6094 -24 -100 0.91 Probably not willing 3 5590 32 8 0.87 Probably willing 4 2557 86 92 1.11 Definitely willing
Figure 5. The probability curves for the L2 WTC 4-point Likert rating scale.
Figure 5 shows that the thresholds for the four categories were also monotonically ordered. The distinct peaks for each rating category combined with monotonic ordering of the category thresholds indicates that students’ progression along the L2 WTC continuum is
60 mirrored by an increased possibility of them passing through the next category threshold on the rating scale. Figure 5 also illustrates that the spacing between category thresholds (indicated by the dashed lines) was large enough so that the different categories in the scale captured distinct steps along the L2 WTC continuum.
A 4-point rating scale also has the additional benefit of having no neutral category and thus students are forced to decide whether or not they are willing to use English in the different speaking and writing tasks/situations (J. D. Brown, 2001).
Evaluating the Number of Points on the Self-perceived L2 Ability Rating Scale
for the L2 WTC Questionnaire
In terms of detecting differences in students’ level of self-perceived L2 ability, the pilot study also found that a 4-point rating scale (i.e., 1 = definitely not able; 2 = probably not able;
3 = probably able; and 4 = definitely able) also met a number of interlocking expectations of a well-performing rating scale. Table 6 shows that the average measures increased monotonically across the four categories in the rating scale. The students’ use of the four categories and the expectations of the Rasch model also exhibited an acceptable amount of fit with the outfit mean square value for each category being below Linacre’s (1999) benchmark of 2.
Table 6. Category Frequencies, Average Measures, Thresholds, and Category Fit for Self- Perceived L2 Communicative Competence Rating Scale Category Observed Average Outfit Mean Label count Measure Threshold Square Category Name 1 1941 -56 None 1.13 Definitely not able 2 4813 -16 -76.42 1.01 Probably not able 3 6925 26 -11.37 .94 Probably able 4 3151 83 87.79 .99 Definitely able
61 Figure 6 shows the distinct peaks for each rating category that are monotonically ordered across the 4-point rating scale. The spacing between category thresholds (indicated by the dashed lines) was also large enough so that the four categories captured distinct steps along the self- perceived L2 communicative competence continuum.
Figure 6. The probability curves for the self-perceived L2 ability 4-point Likert rating scale.
Speaking Situations/Tasks Item Fit
The next issue concerned the extent to which the data collected with the L2 WTC
Questionnaire fit the expectations of the Rasch model. The outfit and infit statistics provide essential information for this inquiry. The outfit statistic is an outlier-fit statistic sensitive to
62 unexpected behavior far away from the person’s level of ability. In the context of this study, the outfit statistic helps detect if students are unexpectedly willing or unwilling to use English in a speaking or writing situation/task that requires a level of willingness that is significantly higher or lower than their level of L2 WTC. The infit statistic, on the other hand, is an information- weighed fit statistic sensitive to unexpected behavior close to the person’s level of ability
(Linacre, 2004b). In other words, the infit statistic helps detect if students are unexpectedly willing or unwilling to use English in a speaking or writing situation/task that requires a level of willingness that is close to their level of L2 WTC.
Among Rasch measurement theorists and practitioners, there is considerable debate considering the appropriate statistic to use when evaluating model fit (e.g., R. Smith, 2004).
Linacre (2003) suggests that it is important to distinguish between the standardized t fit statistic, which determines whether or not the data fit the Rasch model perfectly, and the mean-square statistics, which determine whether or not the data fit the Rasch model usefully. Linacre (2007) argues that the statistical power of the standardized t statistic increases with large sample sizes and thus can result in meaninglessly large standardized fit statistics. Considering the large N-size in this study, the mean square statistic was used to evaluate model fit. The frame of reference for the outfit and infit mean square statistics was determined with simulated data that fit the Rasch model. This simulated data were based on the distribution of item and person estimates from a calibration of the real data (Su, Sheu, & Wang, 2007). The standard deviation for the infit and outfit statistics was 0.7, which was then multiplied by two to provide a benchmark yielding an approximate Type I error rate of 5%. Thus, items with outfit and/or infit statistics exceeding 1.4 were considered to be contributing more off-variable noise than useful information. Items with a mean square value considerably less than 1 and overfit the Rasch model (i.e., there is much less
63 variation in the students’ responses than the Rasch model expects) are not of concern because they rarely distort measures enough to have a practical effect if they are few in number (Linacre,
2000).
Table 7. Rasch Fit Statistics for the Speaking Situations/Tasks on the L2 WTC Questionnaire Outfit Infit PB Item MSQ MSQ Corr s1 Greet someone in English. 1.23 1.21 .59 s2 Say thank you in English when someone lends you a pen. 1.50 1.58 .53 s3 Sing a song in English. 0.72 1.84 .53 s4 Give directions to your favorite restaurant in English. 0.93 0.91 .68 s5 Tell someone in English about the story of a TV show you 0.87 0.87 .68 saw. s6 Read out two-way dialogue in English from the textbook. 1.22 1.21 .60 s7 Translate a spoken utterance from Japanese into English. 0.99 0.96 .66 s8 Interview someone in English asking your own original 0.87 0.85 .68 questions. s9 Interview someone in English asking questions from the 0.79 0.78 .70 textbook. s10 Do a role-play in English at your desk (e.g., ordering food 0.90 0.87 .67 in a restaurant). s11 Do a role-play standing in front of the class in English 1.01 0.98 .67 (e.g., ordering food in a restaurant). s12 Give a short speech in English about your hometown with 0.87 0.86 .69 notes. s13 Give a short self-introduction without notes in English. 0.91 0.89 .69 s14 Ask someone in English to repeat what they just said in 1.07 1.07 .63 English because you didn't understand. s15 Ask the meaning of word you do not know in English. 1.00 0.98 .66 s16 Ask someone how to pronounce a word in English. 0.15 1.16 .62 s17 Ask someone in English how to say a phrase you know 1.00 1.02 .65 how to say in Japanese but not in English. Note. MSQ = mean square; PB Corr = point-biserial correlation.
Linacre (1995) also suggests that point-biserial correlations are another informative misfit indicator. Items with negative or very low point-biserial correlations indicate that students’
64 willingness to use English in the different speaking and writing situations/tasks are not associated with overall level of L2 WTC measured by the other items. Linacre, however, warns against scrutinizing the differences between positively correlated items since these correlations are largely dependent upon the students who completed the L2 WTC Questionnaire rather than the expectations of the Rasch model. The partial correlations of the different speaking situations/tasks and writing tasks composing the L2 WTC Questionnaire were all positive and ranged from .53 to .72.
In terms of the 17 speaking situations/tasks shown in Table 7, the infit and outfit measures for item s2 “say ‘thank you’ in English when someone lends you a pen” and item s3
“sing a song in English” exceeded the benchmark of 1.4. A closer inspection of the standardized residuals for these misfitting items (see Table 8) revealed that some students’ willingness to use
English in these two situations was inconsistent with their responses for the other situations/tasks. In the case of item s3, there are 35 negative residuals indicating that students’ willingness to sing in English was lower than expected. In addition, there are almost an equal number of positive residuals indicating that students’ willingness was higher than expected.
Taken together these unexpected responses account for 12% of the students who completed the
L2 WTC questionnaire. The poor fit of this item might arise from students’ previous experiences singing in English or a more general like/dislike of singing. Japanese university students might associate this activity with something done at a karaoke box rather than inside their language classroom. In contrast, the poor fit of item s2 is largely based upon 32 negative residuals originating from students who had high levels of WTC in the other situations/tasks, but were unwilling to say thank you in English.
65 Table 8. The Number of Students with Extreme Positive or Negative Standardized Residuals for Item s2 and s3 Standardized Residuals Item -4 -3 -2 2 3 4 s2 Say thank you in English when someone lends you a pen. 5 9 18 7 1 0 s3 Sing a song in English. 1 2 32 20 3 2
Self-perceived L2 Ability to Speak in English Item Fit
Similar to students’ willingness to speak in English, Table 9 shows that students’ self- perceived ability to use English for item sa2 “say ‘thank you’ in English when someone lends you a pen” and item sa3 “sing a song in English” exceeded the benchmark of 1.4.
A closer inspection of the standardized residuals for these misfitting items (Table 10) revealed that some students’ self-perceived ability to use English in these two speaking situations was inconsistent with their responses for the other situations/tasks. In the case of item sa2, there are 41 negative residuals indicating that students’ self-perceived ability to say “thank you” in
English was lower than expected. In addition, there are two positive residuals from students who reported a level of self-perceived L2 ability to use English in this situation that was higher than expected. Collectively these unexpected responses accounted for 9% of the students who completed the L2 WTC Questionnaire. The poor fit of item sa3 “sing a song in English” is also largely based upon negative residuals originating from 38 students who reported a lower than expected ability to sing in English and 17 students whose self-perceived ability to sing in English was higher than expected.
Considering that most of the misfit for items s2 and sa2 (i.e. “say ‘thank you’ in English when someone lends you a pen”) originated from a small group of students, these items were retained. In contrast, items s3 and sa3 “sing a song in English” were dropped because of the
66 Table 9. Rasch Fit Statistics for the Self-perceived Ability to Use English in the Speaking Situations/Tasks on the L2 WTC Questionnaire Outfit Infit PB Item MSQ MSQ Corr sa1 Greet someone in English. 1.36 1.30 .49 sa2 Say thank you in English when someone lends you a pen. 1.49 1.51 .44 sa3 Sing a song in English. 1.65 1.78 .44 sa4 Give directions to your favorite restaurant in English. 0.86 0.86 .62 sa5 Tell someone in English about the story of a TV show you 0.96 0.95 .58 saw. sa6 Read out two-way dialogue in English from the textbook. 1.30 1.26 .51 sa7 Translate a spoken utterance from Japanese into English. 1.03 1.08 .55 sa8 Interview someone in English asking your own original 0.86 0.87 .62 questions. sa9 Interview someone in English asking questions from the 0.92 0.93 .60 textbook. sa10 Do a role-play in English at your desk (e.g., ordering food 0.98 0.99 .60 in a restaurant). sa11 Do a role-play standing in front of the class in English 0.93 0.93 .62 (e.g., ordering food in a restaurant). sa12 Give a short speech in English about your hometown with 0.93 0.92 .62 notes. sa13 Give a short self-introduction without notes in English. 1.00 0.99 .60 sa14 Ask someone in English to repeat what they just said in 1.21 1.22 .53 English because you didn't understand. sa15 Ask the meaning of word you do not know in English. 1.16 1.14 .58 sa16 Ask someone how to pronounce a word in English. 1.28 1.28 .53 sa17 Ask someone in English how to say a phrase you know 1.05 1.08 .56 how to say in Japanese but not in English. Note. MSQ = mean square; PB Corr = point-biserial correlation.
greater number of students whose response to this speaking situation was inconsistent with their level of willingness to speak in English and their self-perceived ability level to speak in English, thus leaving 16 speaking situations/tasks for further analyses.
67 Table 10. The Number of Students with Extreme Positive or Negative Standardized Residuals for Item sa2 and sa3 Standardized Residuals Item -4 -3 -2 2 3 4 sa2 Say thank you in English when someone lends you a pen. 4 10 27 2 0 0 sa3 Sing a song in English. 3 6 29 17 0 0
Table 11. Rasch Fit Statistics for the Writing Tasks on the L2 WTC Questionnaire Outfit Infit PB Item MSQ MSQ Corr w1 Write a descriptive paragraph in English about a Japanese cultural event (i.e., summer festival or holidays like New 1.04 1.06 .64 Year's). w2 Write a short report describing your hometown in English. 0.84 0.83 .68 w3 Write an explanation in English about why you wanted to 1.40 1.03 .65 enter this university. w4 Write an account in English of your about future goals after 1.02 1.01 .67 graduating from the university. w5 Write instructions in English for how to make your favorite 0.98 0.97 .63 dish. w6 Write a diary about your daily life in English. 0.72 0.71 .72 w7 Write a self-introduction in English. 0.83 0.87 .68 w8 Write a one-page explanation about university life in Japan in 0.77 0.75 .70 English. w9 Write an essay trying to convince someone that they should buy your favorite singer's CD in English. 1.14 1.35 .62 w10 Write a postcard in English describing your last holiday. 0.94 0.92 .67 w11 Write an email in English describing your favorite website. 0.93 0.95 .65 W12 Write a comment in English about what you think about your 0.91 1.15 .66 English class. W13 Write a paragraph in English describing the cause and effect 1.09 1.06 .64 of something (i.e., how more cars cause global warming). W14 Write a short report in English about an article or book you 0.97 0.85 .67 read. W15 Write your opinion in English agreeing with a person's point 0.92 0.93 .66 of view. W16 Write your opinion in English disagreeing with a person's 0.79 0.79 .69 point of view. W17 Translate a sentence from Japanese to English. 1.05 1.09 .62 Note. MSQ = mean square; PB Corr = point-biserial correlation.
68 Table 12. Rasch Fit Statistics for the Self-perceived Ability to Use English in the Writing Tasks on the L2 WTC Questionnaire Outfit Infit PB Item MSQ MSQ Corr wa1 Write a descriptive paragraph in English about a Japanese cultural event (i.e., summer festival or 0.88 0.91 0.68 holidays like New Year's). wa2 Write a short report describing your hometown in 0.8 0.79 0.68 English. wa3 Write an explanation in English about why you wanted 0.94 0.92 0.67 to enter this university. wa4 Write an account in English of your about future goals 0.8 0.77 0.72 after graduating from the university. wa5 Write instructions in English for how to make your 1.02 1.11 0.62 favorite dish. wa6 Write a diary about your daily life in English. 0.64 0.65 0.73 wa7 Write a self-introduction in English. 0.93 0.95 0.63 wa8 Write a one-page explanation about university life in 0.76 0.74 0.72 Japan in English. wa9 Write an essay trying to convince someone that they 0.95 0.96 0.65 should buy your favorite singer's CD in English. wa10 Write a postcard in English describing your last 0.97 0.96 0.66 holiday. wa11 Write an email in English describing your favorite 1.03 1.06 0.64 website. wa12 Write a comment in English about what you think 0.74 0.73 0.70 about your English class. wa13 Write a paragraph in English describing the cause and effect of something (i.e., how more cars cause global 0.88 0.92 0.68 warming). wa14 Write a short report in English about an article or book 0.63 0.65 0.73 you read. wa15 Write your opinion in English agreeing with a person's 0.70 0.70 0.72 point of view. wa16 Write your opinion in English disagreeing with a 0.68 0.69 0.72 person's point of view. wa17 Translate a sentence from Japanese to English. 0.87 0.88 0.66
Note. MSQ = mean square; PB Corr = point-biserial correlation.
69 Writing Tasks Item Fit
In terms of the 17 writing tasks on the L2 WTC Questionnaire, Table 11 shows that there were no items with an outfit or infit statistic exceeding the benchmark of 1.4.
Self-perceived L2 Ability to Write in English Item Fit
Table 12 also shows that there were no items designed to assess students’ perceived L2 ability to write in English with an outfit or infit statistic exceeding the benchmark of 1.4.
Rasch Item Difficulty of the L2 WTC Questionnaire Items
Once the items were found to fit the Rasch model, the next issue involved examining how well the speaking situations/tasks and the writing tasks defined a continuum of L2 WTC inside of an EFL classroom. Ideally, the situations/tasks should cover a large range of item difficulty.
Rasch Item Difficulty of the Speaking Situations/Tasks
Table 13 shows that the level of item difficulty ranged from 413 WITs for the easiest to endorse speaking situation/task (item s2 “Say ‘thank you’ in English when someone lends you a pen”) to 532 WITs for the most difficult to endorse situation/task (item s7 “Translate a spoken utterance from Japanese into English.”)
70 Table 13. Rasch Item Difficulty Estimates for the Speaking Situations/Tasks on the L2 WTC Questionnaire Item Item Difficulty SE s1 Greet someone in English. 440 3 s2 Say ‘thank you’ in English when someone lends you a pen. 413 4 s4 Give directions to your favorite restaurant in English. 506 3 s5 Tell someone in English about the story of a TV show you 519 3 saw. s6 Read out two-way dialogue in English from the textbook. 471 3 s7 Translate a spoken utterance from Japanese into English. 532 3 s8 Interview someone in English asking your own original 484 3 questions. s9 Interview someone in English asking questions from the 490 3 textbook. s10 Do a role-play in English at your desk (e.g., ordering food in a 522 3 restaurant). s11 Do a role-play standing in front of the class in English (e.g., 528 3 ordering food in a restaurant). s12 Give a short speech in English about your hometown with 489 3 notes. s13 Give a short self-introduction without notes in English. 506 3 s14 Ask someone in English to repeat what they just said in 449 3 English because you didn't understand. s15 Ask the meaning of word you do not know in English. 467 3 s16 Ask someone how to pronounce a word in English. 492 3 s17 Ask someone in English how to say a phrase you know how to 501 3 say in Japanese but not in English.
A Wright map of the speaking subsection of the L2 WTC Questionnaire (see Figure 7) provides a comprehensive picture of the 490 students’ overall level of willingness to speak in
English and the level of willingness that each speaking situation/task required of the students. A
Wright map is two distribution curves turned vertically and integrated on the WIT scale. The left side of the Wright map is the distribution curve for person ability; it is the ranking of the 490
Japanese university students based upon their overall willingness to speak in English. Students
71
Figure 7. Wright map of the 16 speaking situations/tasks.
72 who are more willing to use English in the 16 speaking situations/tasks used in the final analysis have high person ability estimates and thus are located on the upper left side of the Wright map.
The students who are less willing to speak in English are located on the lower left side of the
Wright map. When interpreting the students’ locations on the Wright map, in the case of this analysis, each number sign (#) represents four students and a dot (.) represents less than four students. In addition, the “M” marker on the left side of the Wright map indicates the mean level of willingness to speak in English for the 490 students (i.e., 510 WITs). The “S” and the “T” are place markers for standard deviation. The “S” markers specify one standard deviation above and below the mean. The “T” markers are placed two standard deviations away from the mean.
The right side of the Wright map is the distribution curve for item difficulty. This side of the Wright map shows the level of difficulty students had endorsing the 16 speaking situations/tasks. If students felt a great degree of difficulty to use English in a particular speaking situation/task (i.e., item s7 “Translate a spoken utterance from Japanese into English”), the situation/task has a high item difficulty estimate and thus is located on the upper right side of the
Wright map. In contrast, when students felt little difficulty using English in a particular speaking situation/task (i.e., item s2 “Say ‘thank you’ in English when someone lends you a pen”), the situation/task has a low difficulty estimate and thus is located on the lower right side of the person-item map. The “M” marker on the right side of the Wright map indicates the mean level of willingness required of the 16 speaking situations/tasks (i.e., set at 500 WITs). Once again, the
“S” and the “T” are place markers for standard deviation. The “S” markers specify one standard deviation above and below the mean. The “T” markers are placed two standard deviations away from the mean.
73 The right side of the Wright map also reveals the degree of willingness students need to pass through the different thresholds for each speaking situation/task. The thresholds represent the point at which students have a 50% chance of endorsing the next level of willingness to do a particular speaking situation/task. For example, a student with a score of 310 WITs has a 50% chance of moving from “definitely not willing” to “probably not willing” to say “thank you” in
English when someone lends you a pen (item s2). The next threshold where students have a 50% chance of moving from “probably not willing” to “probably willing” to say “thank you” is located at 420 WITs. The final threshold of having a 50% chance of moving from “probably willing” to “definitely willing” to “say thank” you in English is located at 510 WITs.
The hierarchy of students’ level of willingness to use English in the 16 speaking situations/tasks is also stable across the different thresholds. For example, item s7 “Translate a spoken utterance from Japanese into English” fluctuates between the most and the second most difficult speaking task for students to endorse. This stability suggests that the 16 speaking situations/tasks create a unidimensional construct with students’ responses being linear across the different thresholds.
A Wright map also allows for the direct comparison between the 490 students’ overall level of willingness to speak in English and the amount of willingness required of the 16 speaking situations/tasks. On the left side of the Wright map, the “M” marker indicating the average level of the 490 students’ willingness to speak in English is located at 510 WITs. This location is 10 WITs higher than the “M” maker on the right side of the Wright map, which indicates the average level of willingness required of the 16 speaking situations/tasks. In other words, the average student has a slightly higher level of L2 willingness than the average amount required of the 16 speaking situations/tasks. More specifically, students located at 510 WITs
74 have a more than 50% chance of responding that they are “probably willing” to use English in 8 of the 16 speaking situations/tasks (i.e., items s16, s9, s12, s8, s6, s15, s1, and s14). These students also have a 50% chance of responding that they are “probably willing” to use English in three speaking situations/tasks (i.e., items s13, s17, and s4) and “definitely willing” to use
English for item s2 “Say ‘thank you’ in English when someone lends you a pen.” For the remaining four speaking situations/tasks (i.e. items s5, s10, s11, and s7), these students have a less than 50% chance of responding that they are “probably willing” to use English in these situations/tasks.
A Wright map also makes it possible to determine the amount of overlap between the 490 students’ overall level of willingness to speak in English and the amount of L2 willingness required to move through the three thresholds for the 16 speaking situations/tasks. This overlap is commonly referred to as targeting (Wright & Mok, 2000). The three thresholds for the 16 speaking situations/tasks tasks define a broad continuum of L2 willingness ranging from 310 to
630 WITs (indicated with the dashed box in Figure 6). This range of item difficulty targets 95% of the students who participated in the pilot study with the exception of 14 students who had more than a 50% chance of responding that they were “definitely willing” to use English in the
16 speaking situations/tasks and 11 students who had more than a 50% chance of responding that they were “definitely not willing” to use English in the 16 speaking situations/tasks.
Rasch Item Difficulty of the Self-perceived L2 Ability to Speak in English Situations/Tasks
Table 14 shows that the level of item difficulty ranged from 399 WITs for the easiest to endorse speaking situation/task (item sa2 “Say ‘thank-you’ in English when someone lends you a pen”) to 536 WITs (item sa5 “Tell someone in English about the story of a TV show you saw.”)
75 Table 14. Rasch Item Difficulty Estimates for the Self-perceived Ability to Speak in English Situations/Tasks Item Item Difficulty SE sa1 Greet someone in English. 441 3 sa2 Say ‘thank you’ in English when someone lends you a pen. 399 4 sa4 Give directions to your favorite restaurant in English. 511 3 sa5 Tell someone in English about the story of a TV show you 536 3 saw. sa6 Read out two-way dialogue in English from the textbook. 432 3 sa7 Translate a spoken utterance from Japanese into English. 542 3 sa8 Interview someone in English asking your own original 477 3 questions. sa9 Interview someone in English asking questions from the 491 3 textbook. sa10 Do a role-play in English at your desk (e.g., ordering food in a 534 3 restaurant). sa11 Do a role-play standing in front of the class in English (e.g., 529 3 ordering food in a restaurant). sa12 Give a short speech in English about your hometown with 473 3 notes. sa13 Give a short self-introduction without notes in English. 506 3 sa14 Ask someone in English to repeat what they just said in 435 3 English because you didn't understand. sa15 Ask the meaning of word you do not know in English. 463 3 sa16 Ask someone how to pronounce a word in English. 505 3 sa17 Ask someone in English how to say a phrase you know how to 521 3 say in Japanese but not in English.
76
Figure 8. Wright map of the self-perceived ability to speak in English situations/tasks.
77 Figure 8 shows that the three thresholds for the 16 speaking situations/tasks defines a broad continuum of self-perceived L2 speaking ability (indicated with the dashed box in Figure
8). This range of difficulty targets 97% of the students with the exception of 13 students who had more than a 50% chance of responding that they were “definitely able” to use English in the 16 speaking situations/tasks and four students who had less than a 50% chance of responding that they were “definitely not able” to use English in the 16 speaking situations/tasks. When interpreting the students’ locations on the left side of the Wright map, it should be remembered that each number sign (#) represents four students and a dot (.) represents less than four students.
Rasch Item Difficulty of the Writing Tasks
In terms of the 17 writing tasks on the L2 WTC Questionnaire, Table 15 shows that the level of item difficulty ranged from 484 WITs (i.e., item w7 “write a self-introduction in
English”) to 526 WITs (i.e., item w3 “write an explanation in English about why you wanted to enter this university”).
A Wright map of the writing section of the L2 WTC Questionnaire (see Figure 9) shows the students’ overall level of willingness to write in English and the amount of L2 willingness required of the 17 writing tasks. When interpreting the students’ locations on the left side of the
Wright map, it should be remembered that each number sign (#) represents four students and a dot (.) represents less than four students.
78 Table 15. Rasch Item Difficulty Estimates for the Writing Tasks on the L2 WTC Questionnaire Item Item Difficulty SE w1 Write a descriptive paragraph in English about a Japanese cultural 505 3 event (i.e., summer festival or holidays like New Year's). w2 Write a short report describing your hometown in English. 485 3 w3 Write an explanation in English about why you wanted to enter 526 3 this university. w4 Write an account in English of your about future goals after 528 3 graduating from the university. w5 Write instructions in English for how to make your favorite dish. 517 3 w6 Write a diary about your daily life in English. 497 3 w7 Write a self-introduction in English. 484 3 w8 Write a one-page explanation about university life in Japan in 513 3 English. w9 Write an essay trying to convince someone that they should buy 508 3 your favorite singer's CD in English. w10 Write a postcard in English describing your last holiday. 506 3 w11 Write an email in English describing your favorite website. 522 3 w12 Write a comment in English about what you think about your 511 3 English class. w13 Write a paragraph in English describing the cause and effect of 523 3 something (i.e., how more cars cause global warming). w14 Write a short report in English about an article or book you read. 513 3 w15 Write your opinion in English agreeing with a person's point of 522 3 view. w16 Write your opinion in English disagreeing with a person's point of 508 3 view. w17 Translate a sentence from Japanese to English. 516 3
The right side of the Wright map of the writing subsection of the L2 WTC Questionnaire shows that the range of item difficulty for the 17 writing tasks is relatively compact with the “S” and “T” markers being located fairly close to the “M” marker. The three thresholds for the 17 writing tasks, however, define a broad continuum of L2 willingness ranging from 380 to 630
WITs (indicated with the dashed box in Figure 9). This range of item difficulty targets 92% of the students who participated in the pilot study with the exception of 23 students who had more than a 50% chance of responding that they were “definitely willing” to use English in the 17
79 writing tasks and 22 students who had more than a 50% chance of responding that they were
“definitely not willing” to use English in the 17 writing tasks. The hierarchy of the students’ level of willingness to use English in the 17 writing tasks is also stable across the different thresholds. This stability thus suggests that the 17 writing tasks create a unidimensional construct with students’ responses being linear across the different thresholds.
The 490 students also had a slightly higher overall level of L2 willingness (510 WITs) compared to the level of L2 willingness required of the 17 writing tasks. Students located at 510
WITs have a more than 50% chance of responding that they are “probably willing” to use
English in 3 of the 17 writing tasks (i.e., items w6, w2, and w7). These students also have a 50% chance of responding that they are “probably willing” to use English in four writing tasks (i.e., items w1, w10, w16, and w9). For the remaining 10 writing tasks (i.e., items w12, w14, w17, w5, w8, w11, w13, w15, w3, and w4), these students have a less than 50% chance of responding that they are “probably willing” to use English in these tasks.
Rasch Item Difficulty of the Self-perceived L2 Ability to Write in English Tasks
In terms of students’ self-perceived L2 ability to write in English, Table 16 shows that the level of item difficulty ranged from 470 WITs for the easiest to endorse writing task (item wa7 “Write a self-introduction in English”) to 537 WITs (item wa13 “Write a paragraph in English describing the cause and effect of something. i.e., how more cars cause global warming.”)
Figure 10 shows that the three thresholds for the 17 writing tasks defines a broad continuum of self-perceived L2 writing ability (indicated with the dashed box in Figure 10). This range of difficulty targets 94% of the students with the exception of 19 students who had more than a
50% chance of responding that they were “definitely able” to use English in the 17 writing
80
Figure 9. Wright map of the 17 writing tasks on the L2 WTC Questionnaire.
81 Table 16. Rasch Item Difficulty Estimates for the Writing Tasks on the L2 WTC Questionnaire Item Item Difficulty SE wa1 Write a descriptive paragraph in English about a Japanese cultural 508 3 event (i.e., summer festival or holidays like New Year's). wa2 Write a short report describing your hometown in English. 481 3 wa3 Write an explanation in English about why you wanted to enter 527 3 this university. wa4 Write an account in English of your about future goals after 532 3 graduating from the university. wa5 Write instructions in English for how to make your favorite dish. 526 3 wa6 Write a diary about your daily life in English. 488 3 wa7 Write a self-introduction in English. 470 3 wa8 Write a one page explanation about university life in Japan in 518 3 English. wa9 Write an essay trying to convince someone that they should buy 515 3 your favorite singer's CD in English. wa10 Write a postcard in English describing your last holiday. 504 3 wa11 Write an email in English describing your favorite website. 522 3 wa12 Write a comment in English about what you think about your 512 3 English class. wa13 Write a paragraph in English describing the cause and effect of 537 3 something (i.e., how more cars cause global warming). w14 Write a short report in English about an article or book you read. 516 3 wa15 Write your opinion in English agreeing with a person's point of 524 3 view. wa16 Write your opinion in English disagreeing with a person's point of 516 3 view. wa17 Translate a sentence from Japanese to English. 510 3
tasks and 13 students who had less than a 50% chance of responding that they were “definitely not able” to use English in the 17 writing tasks. When interpreting the students’ locations on the left side of the Wright map, it should be remembered that each number sign (#) represents five students and a dot (.) represents less than five students.
82
Figure 10. Wright map of the self-perceived ability to write in English tasks.
83 Rasch Reliability and Sensitivity of the L2 WTC Questionnaire Items
The speaking and writing situations/tasks’ range of item difficulty in turn directly relates to how the Rasch model calculates the reliability of the L2 WTC Questionnaire. The Rasch model provides reliability measures not only for the students who completed the L2 WTC
Questionnaire, but also for the 16 speaking and 17 writing situations/tasks. The former is called person reliability while the latter is called item reliability. Person reliability is concerned with how well the 16 items in the speaking subsection and the 17 items in the writing subsection of the L2 WTC Questionnaire separated the students along a continuum of willingness to communicate in English; whereas item reliability focuses upon how well the students separated the 16 speaking and 17 writing situations/tasks according to the difficulty the students felt endorsing them.
Person and item reliability can be reported in two ways. First, there is the person/item reliability index which is the approximate test reliability based on the raw scores of the sample
(Linacre, 1997). Table 17 shows that the 16-item willingness to speak subsection of the L2 WTC
Questionnaire yielded a person reliability index of .91 and an item reliability index of .99. The
17-item willingness to write subsection of the L2 WTC Questionnaire yielded a person reliability index of .91 and an item reliability index of .93. In terms of students’ self-perceived L2 ability, the 16-item ability to speak in English items yielded a person reliability index of .89 and an item reliability index of .99, whereas the 17-item ability to write in English items yielded a person reliability index of .91 and an item reliability index of .97.
Smith (2001), however, notes that the person/item reliability index can have a ceiling effect because the uppermost limit of the scale is 1.00. The person/item separation index, in contrast, does not have this limitation because the logit scale extends to infinity on either side of
84 its point of origin (i.e., typically set at 500 on the WIT scale). Thus, the range to which students or items are spread along the logit scale can also theoretically stretch towards infinity, though in practice this index rarely exceeds 10 logits. The 16 item willingness to speak subsection of the
L2 WTC Questionnaire yielded a person separation index of 3.12 and an item separation index of
9.64, whereas the 17 item willingness to write subsection of the L2 WTC Questionnaire yielded a person separation index of 3.21 and an item separation index of 3.73. In terms of students’ self- perceived L2 ability, the 16-item ability to speak in English items yielded a person separation index of 2.77 and an item separation index of 12.86, whereas the 17-item ability to write in
English items yielded a person separation index of 3.11 and an item separation index of 5.65.
The values from the person/item separation indexes are also an important component of the statistic that determines how sensitive the L2 WTC Questionnaire is to differences in students’ level of L2 WTC. In terms of the students, the person strata indicate the number of statistically distinct levels that the items in the different subsections of the L2 WTC
Questionnaire can distinguish. The center of each strata is 3 calibrated errors apart (Wright &
Masters, 1982). Person strata can be calculated with the following formula:
Person strata = (4GP + 1) / 3
where GP is the person ability variance adjusted for error (i.e., person separation index).
Smith (2001) recommends that a measure aiming to detect significant differences between individuals must distinguish at least two levels of performance. The person strata for the willingness to speak subsection of the L2 WTC Questionnaire easily surpassed this benchmark with 4.49 levels of person strata and the willingness to write subsection of the L2 WTC
Questionnaire had 4.61 levels of person strata. The 16-item speaking subsection of the L2 WTC
85 Questionnaire also had 13.19 levels of item strata and the 17-item writing subsection of the L2
WTC Questionnaire had 5.31 levels of item strata.
Table 17. Reliability Estimates for the L2 WTC Questionnaire Subsections Person Item Measures Reliability Separation Strata Reliability Separation Strata 16-item L2 WTC speaking subsection .91 3.12 4.49 .99 9.64 13.19 17-item L2 WTC writing subsection .91 3.14 4.61 .93 3.73 5.31 16-item self-perceived L2 speaking ability subsection .89 2.77 4.01 .99 12.86 17.48 17 item self-perceived L2 Writing ability subsection .91 3.11 4.48 .97 5.65 7.75
In terms of students’ self-perceived L2 ability, the 16-item ability to speak in English items yielded 4.01 levels of person strata and 17.48 levels of item strata, whereas the 17-item ability to write in English items yielded 4.48 levels of person strata and 7.75 levels of item strata.
Exceeding four levels of personal strata is important considering that the self-perceived L2 ability items will be utilized in the main study to group students into four groups according to their self-perceived ability to speak and write in English.
Examining the Dimensionality of the L2 WTC Questionnaire
The fourth issue evaluated in the pilot study involved determining the extent to which the speaking and writing situations/tasks comprising the L2 WTC Questionnaire measured the same underlying construct: Japanese university students’ willingness to speak and write in English inside an EFL classroom. The pilot study revealed that the 16 speaking situations/tasks and 17 writing tasks formed two distinct components of students’ willingness to communicate (Table
18). Care should be taken not to interpret Table 18 as being the results of a factor analysis. The
86 Table 18. The Factor Loadings of the Standardized Residuals of the L2 WTC Situations/Tasks Factor Item Item Speaking Situation/Task Loading Difficulty s14 Ask someone in English to repeat what they just said in English .59 449 because you didn't understand. s1 Greet someone in English. .57 440 s2 Say thank you in English when someone lends you a pen. .52 413 s15 Ask the meaning of word you do not know in English. .47 467 s6 Read out two-way dialogue in English from the textbook. .44 471 s12 Give a short speech in English about your hometown with notes. .34 489 s8 Interview someone in English asking your own original .31 484 questions. s16 Ask someone how to pronounce a word in English. .29 492 s9 Interview someone in English asking questions from the .28 490 textbook. s4 Give directions to your favorite restaurant in English. .25 506 s13 Give a short self-introduction without notes in English. .25 506 s17 Ask someone in English how to say a phrase you know to how .15 501 say in Japanese but not in English. s5 Tell someone in English about the story of a TV show you saw. .12 519 s10 Do a role-play in English at your desk (e.g., ordering food in a .09 522 restaurant). s11 Do a role-play standing in front of the class in English (e.g., .06 528 ordering food in a restaurant). s7 Translate a spoken utterance from Japanese into English. .02 532 w2 Write a short report describing your hometown in English. -.08 485 w7 Write a self-introduction in English. -.09 484 w9 Write an essay trying to convince someone that they should buy -.10 508 your favorite singer's CD in English. w10 Write a postcard in English describing your last holiday. -.17 506 w12 Write a comment in English about what you think about your -.20 511 English class. w6 Write a diary about your daily life in English. -.20 497 w16 Write your opinion in English disagreeing with a person's point -.26 508 of view. w1 Write a descriptive paragraph in English about a Japanese -.30 505 cultural event (i.e., summer festival or holidays like New Year's). w17 Translate a sentence from Japanese to English. -.32 516 w3 Write an explanation in English about why you wanted to enter -.32 526 this university. w5 Write instructions in English for how to make your favorite dish. -.34 517 Table 18 continues
87 Table 18. (continued) w15 Write your opinion in English agreeing with a person's point of -.34 522 view. w11 Write an email in English describing your favorite website. -.38 522 w4 Write an account in English of your about future goals after -.41 528 graduating from the university. w8 Write a one page explanation about university life in Japan in -.43 513 English. w14 Write a short report in English about an article or book you read. -.43 513 w13 Write a paragraph in English describing the cause and effect of -.51 523 something (i.e., how more cars cause global warming).
Figure 11. Principal component analysis of the standardized residuals of the L2 WTC Questionnaire items.
88 positive and negative numbers indicate contrasts between opposing factors and not loadings on a single factor. Table 18 thus shows that the 16 speaking situations/tasks are grouped together in contrast to the 17 writing tasks. The standardized residuals of the 16 speaking situations/tasks and the 17 writing tasks produced a residual component with an eigenvalue of 3.6, representing
10.91% of the residual variance not explained by the Rasch measure of students’ willingness to speak and write in English. The Rasch measure, in contrast, had an eigenvalue of 32, representing 49.3% of the residual variance. Thus, it appears that contrast between the 16 speaking situations/tasks and the 17 writing tasks represents more than random variance; Smith and Miao (1994) argued that random variance usually does not exceed an eigenvalue of 1.4, while Raiche (2005) suggested that random noise can reach up to an eigenvalue of 1.98.
The contrast between the speaking and writing situations/tasks is also a relatively enduring factor for the first year and the second year students who completed the L2 WTC
Questionnaire. The pattern found in Figure 11 was independently replicated for the two groups of students. The residual component for first-year students had an eigenvalue of 3.4, representing
10.3% of the residual variance and the residual component for second-year students was slightly larger with an eigenvalue of 3.8, representing 11.51% of the residual variance.
To evaluate the impact of this dimensionality upon students’ overall level of L2 WTC, the shift constant was calculated for the 17 writing items. A shift constant is the difference between estimates based upon a subset of items and all items (Shumacker, 2004). In the case of the pilot study, the sum of the shift values was 188. When divided by the number of items (17), the shift constant was 11.06. This constant was then added to the person measures calibrated from the 17 writing items in order to bring them onto the same scale as the person measures calibrated from all 33 items. The correlation between these person measures was 0.95.
89 Considering that this correlation is not substantially lower than 1, the rank order of the students according to their level of L2 WTC did not change depending upon the items analyzed. The dimensionality found between the items focusing upon speaking and writing thus seems to be working together to define the latent variable of willingness to communicate in a second language.
To explore this issue further, estimates of students’ willingness to speak and write in
English were calibrated separately and then correlated. The resulting .88 Pearson correlation coefficient disattenuated of measurement error (Schumacker, 1996) reveals a largely linear relationship (shown in Figure 12). This strong relationship suggests that students’ willingness to speak and write in English could be treated as a single willingness to communicate construct.
However, such an approach would result in the loss of information about how students’ willingness to speak and write in English inside their EFL classroom varies. As such, the speaking and writing situations/tasks were treated as separate, but highly interrelated, measures of students’ willingness to use English inside an EFL classroom.
Examining the Dimensionality of the Speaking and the Writing Subsections
of the L2 WTC Questionnaire
The final issue evaluated in the pilot study involved examining the dimensionality of the speaking and writing subsections of the L2 WTC Questionnaire. The purpose of this examination was to determine if there were any other factors in addition to WTC that could account for the students’ responses to the two subsections of the L2 WTC Questionnaire. A principle components analysis of the standardized residuals of the 16 speaking situations/tasks produced a
90 residual component that had an eigenvalue of 2.4, representing 7.1% of the residual variance.
The willingness to speak in English Rasch measure, in contrast, had an eigenvalue of 18,
Figure 12. Scatterplot of the Pearson correlation between the separate calibrations of students’ willingness to speak and write in English.
representing 53% of the residual variance. Table 19 shows that the standardized residuals for the
16 speaking situations/tasks can be divided into two groupings that reflect the amount of speech required by the different speaking situations/tasks. At the top of Table 19, there is a grouping of four speaking situations/tasks that require students to use English for a relatively short period of time (i.e., items s2, s14, and s1) and/or in a controlled communicative situation where students are reading from the textbook (i.e., item s6). At the opposite end of the factor, there is a group of six items (i.e., items s13, s5, s4, s7, s11, and s10) that require students to speak in English for an extended period of time. Although this distinction might contribute information over and above a
91 single measure of willingness to speak in English, this contribution does not warrant dividing the
16 speaking situations/items into two subsections of items based upon the amount of English that the different speaking situations/items require of students. One source of empirical support for a single willingness to speak measure is that the two groupings of speaking situations/tasks largely conform to the amount of willingness they require. Table 19 shows that the four speaking
Table 19. The Factor Loadings of the Standardized Residuals for the Speaking Situations/Tasks on the L2 WTC Questionnaire Factor Item Item Speaking Situation/Task Loading Difficulty s2 Say thank you in English when someone lends you a pen. .62 413 s14 Ask someone in English to repeat what they just said in .59 449 English because you didn't understand. s6 Read out two-way dialogue in English from the textbook. .49 471 s1 Greet someone in English. .47 440 s15 Ask the meaning of word you do not know in English. .25 467 s8 Interview someone in English asking your own original .11 484 questions. s16 Ask someone how to pronounce a word in English. .06 492 s9 Interview someone in English asking questions from the .05 490 textbook. s12 Give a short speech in English about your hometown with -.05 489 notes. s17 Ask someone in English how to say a phrase you know to -.06 501 how say in Japanese but not in English. s13 Give a short self-introduction without notes in English. -.30 506 s5 Tell someone in English about the story of a TV show you -.40 519 saw. s4 Give directions to your favorite restaurant in English. -.42 506 s7 Translate a spoken utterance from Japanese into English. -.43 532 s11 Do a role-play standing in front of the class in English (e.g., -.49 528 ordering food in a restaurant). s10 Do a role-play in English at your desk (e.g., ordering food -.56 522 in a restaurant).
92 situations that require English use for short periods of time and/or in controlled situations (i.e., items s2, s14, s1, and s6) also require less willingness to communicate from the students ranging from 413 WITs to 471 WITs. On the other end of the continuum, the six speaking
Table 20. The Factor Loadings of the Standardized Residuals for the Writing Tasks on the L2 WTC Questionnaire Factor Item Item Writing Task Loading Difficulty w15 Write your opinion in English agreeing with a person's point of .64 522 view. w16 Write your opinion in English disagreeing with a person's point .61 508 of view. w13 Write a paragraph in English describing the cause and effect of .32 513 something (i.e., how more cars cause global warming). w14 Write a short report in English about an article or book you .31 523 read. w17 Translate a sentence from Japanese to English. .24 516 w5 Write instructions in English for how to make your favorite .10 517 dish. w12 Write a comment in English about what you think about your .09 511 English class. w8 Write a one-page explanation about university life in Japan in .03 513 English. w1 Write a descriptive paragraph in English about a Japanese .01 522 cultural event (i.e., summer festival or holidays like New Year's). w11 Write an email in English describing your favorite website. .01 505 w10 Write a postcard in English describing your last holiday. -.12 506 w6 Write a diary about your daily life in English. -.17 497 w4 Write an account in English of your about future goals after -.34 528 graduating from the university. w2 Write a short report describing your hometown in English. -.38 485 w3 Write an explanation in English about why you wanted to enter -.41 508 this university. w9 Write an essay trying to convince someone that they should -.41 526 buy your favorite singer's CD in English. w7 Write a self-introduction in English. -.45 484
93 situations/tasks that require more extended use of English (i.e., items s13, s5, s4, s7, s11, and s10) also required higher levels of L2 WTC from students ranging from 506 WITs to 532 WITs.
Moreover, the physical location of L2 use inside an EFL classroom (i.e., “in front of the class” item s11 or “at your desk” item s10) also seems to have an influence on students’ level of L2
WTC. In sum, these two groupings of speaking situations/tasks create a measure of L2 WTC that is able to distinguish different levels of willingness amongst Japanese university students.
A principle components analysis on the standardized residuals of the 17 writing tasks produced a residual component that had an eigenvalue of 1.9, representing 5.6% of the residual variance. The willingness to write in English Rasch measure, in contrast, had an eigenvalue of
17, representing 50.1% of the residual variance. Table 13 shows that the standardized residuals for the 17 writing tasks can be divided into two groupings that reflect the nature of the writing tasks. At the top of Table 13, there is a grouping of four academic writing tasks (i.e., items w15, w16, w13, and w14) that load separately from another grouping of five personal writing tasks
(i.e., items w4, w2, w3, w9, and w7) listed at the bottom of Table 20. In terms of the academic writing tasks, they generally require a higher level of willingness from students ranging from 508
WITs to 523 WITs. The grouping of personal writing tasks, on the other hand, is a mixture of writing tasks that require higher levels of L2 WTC (i.e., items w4, w3, and w9) ranging from 508
WITs to 528 WITs and lower levels of L2 WTC (i.e., items w2 and w7) ranging from 484 WITs to 485 WITs.
This continuum of willingness thus suggests that the personal writing tasks could be used to create a subsection of the L2 WTC Questionnaire. The academic writing tasks, however, could not create a subsection of items that would effectively distinguish various levels of L2 WTC amongst the Japanese university students. The dichotomy between academic and personal
94 Table 21. The Factor Loadings of the Standardized Residuals of the Self-perceived L2 Ability Situations/Tasks Factor Item Item Speaking Situation/Task Loading Difficulty sa6 Read out two-way dialogue in English from the textbook. .62 432 sa2 Say thank you in English when someone lends you a pen. .60 399 sa1 Greet someone in English. .56 441 sa14 Ask someone in English to repeat what they just said in English .54 435 because you didn't understand. sa15 Ask the meaning of word you do not know in English. .48 463 sa12 Give a short speech in English about your hometown with notes. .48 473 sa9 Interview someone in English asking questions from the .42 491 textbook. sa8 Interview someone in English asking your own original .42 477 questions. sa13 Give a short self-introduction without notes in English. .23 506 sa4 Give directions to your favorite restaurant in English. .22 511 sa16 Ask someone how to pronounce a word in English. .14 505 sa17 Ask someone in English how to say a phrase you know to how .08 521 say in Japanese but not in English. sa7 Translate a spoken utterance from Japanese into English. .04 542 sa10 Do a role-play in English at your desk (e.g., ordering food in a .02 534 restaurant). sa11 Do a role-play standing in front of the class in English (e.g., .02 529 ordering food in a restaurant). sa5 Tell someone in English about the story of a TV show you saw. .00 536 wa2 Write a short report describing your hometown in English. -.10 481 wa7 Write a self-introduction in English. -.12 470 wa10 Write a postcard in English describing your last holiday. -.17 481 wa17 Translate a sentence from Japanese to English. -.17 510 wa6 Write a diary about your daily life in English. -.18 488 wa12 Write a comment in English about what you think about your -.19 512 English class. wa5 Write instructions in English for how to make your favorite dish. -.22 526 wa11 Write an email in English describing your favorite website. -.29 522 wa16 Write your opinion in English disagreeing with a person's point -.32 516 of view. wa9 Write an essay trying to convince someone that they should buy -.34 515 your favorite singer's CD in English. wa15 Write your opinion in English agreeing with a person's point of -.35 524 view. Table 21 continues
95 Table 21. (continued) wa8 Write a one page explanation about university life in Japan in -.35 518 English. wa1 Write a descriptive paragraph in English about a Japanese -.36 508 cultural event (i.e., summer festival or holidays like New Year's). wa3 Write an explanation in English about why you wanted to enter -.37 527 this university. wa14 Write a short report in English about an article or book you read. -.39 516 wa4 Write an account in English of your about future goals after -.47 532 graduating from the university. wa13 Write a paragraph in English describing the cause and effect of -.49 537 something (i.e., how more cars cause global warming).
writing tasks is thus best considered as a potential factor that might mediate Japanese university students’ willingness to write in English, but does not require the creation of two separate subscales that measure students’ willingness to write in English inside an EFL classroom.
Examining the Dimensionality of the Self-perceived L2 Ability to Speak and Write
Situations/Tasks
The pilot study revealed that the 16 speaking situations/tasks and 17 writing tasks formed two distinct components of students’ self-perceived ability to speak and write in English (Table
21). A principle components analysis of the standardized residuals of the 16 speaking situations/tasks and the 17 writing tasks produced a residual component that had an eigenvalue of
4, representing 6.6% of the residual variance. The willingness to speak in English Rasch measure, in contrast, had an eigenvalue of 28.4, representing 46% of the residual variance.
The speaking versus writing dimensionality is also a relatively enduring factor for the first-year and the second-year students who completed the L2 WTC Questionnaire. The pattern found in Figure 13 was independently replicated for the two groups of students. The residual component for first year students had an eigenvalue of 4, representing 6.3% of the residual
96 variance and the residual component for second-year students was slightly larger with an eigenvalue of 4.2, representing 7% of the residual variance.
Figure 13. Principal component analysis of the standardized residuals of the L2 WTC Questionnaire items.
To explore this issue further, estimates of students’ self-perceived ability to speak and write in English were calibrated separately and then correlated. The resulting .88 Pearson correlation coefficient disattenuated of measurement error (Schumacker, 1996) reveals a largely linear relationship. Similar to the students’ level of L2 WTC, the strong relationship suggests that students’ self-perceived ability to speak and write in English could be treated as a single construct. However, such an approach would result in the loss of information about how
97 students’ self-perceived ability to speak and write in English inside an EFL classroom varies. As such, the speaking and writing situations/tasks were treated as separate, but highly interrelated, measures of students’ self-perceived L2 ability.
Conclusion
In this chapter I described the use of the Rasch measurement model to evaluate the psychometric properties of the L2 WTC Questionnaire. The methodology that was used to address this study’s research questions is described in detail in the next chapter.
98 CHAPTER 5
METHODOLOGY
A detailed description of the experiment carried out to answer the six research questions is provided in this chapter. First, the selection of research participants and the criteria for assigning groupings are explained. Next, the procedures of the study and how the data from the two questionnaires were analyzed are described. Finally, a summary of the chapter is given.
Participants
The participants for this study were 1,789 university students attending a national university in Tokyo, Japan. To gain admission into this university, the students’ level of English proficiency had to be sufficient to pass an entrance examination in which the English section poses a considerable challenge for most test-takers (Weaver & Sato, 2008). All of the students were non-English majors who were required to take at least six course credits in English to fulfill their foreign language requirement. Usually the students complete three to four English credits in their first year and finish the remaining courses in their second year of study. The university curriculum aims to develop students’ English speaking, writing, and reading abilities with two courses focusing on each skill area. Within these courses, there are opportunities for students to use a variety of English skills. For example, in reading classes, students give oral presentations/reviews and write summaries or critiques of materials that they have read. Students might also complete many steps of the writing process such as brain-storming and peer review in
English.
99 After collecting the L2 WTC questionnaires, 26 of them were discarded because those students failed to complete all of the items (i.e., some students did not realize that the questionnaire was double-sided and thus they indicated their willingness only to write or speak in
English). Another 50 international students’ responses were not included in the final data set because the target population for this study was Japanese university students. In the end, 1,713 students’ responses to the L2 WTC Questionnaire were subjected to data analysis. This sample included 617 females and 1,096 males and represented 45% of the undergraduate population.
At the time of the study, the university employed 11 part-time and eight full-time
Japanese teachers of English. The part-time Japanese teachers of English possessed a master’s degree in literature, while the full-time teachers held either master’s or doctor’s degrees in linguistics, applied linguistics, or English literature. The university also employed nine part-time and two contract full-time foreign teachers of English. The foreign teachers of English were from the United States (7), Canada (3), and England (1). Three of the part-time teachers possessed bachelor’s degrees in the social sciences, the other five part-time teachers had master’s degrees in the social sciences, and the two contract full-time teachers possessed a master’s degree in
TESOL. The university teaching experience of the Japanese teachers of English and the foreign teachers of English ranged from three years to over twenty years.
The Japanese teachers of English taught 60% (104 courses) of the English curriculum, whereas the foreign teachers of English taught 40% (68 courses). Typically, the courses taught by Japanese teachers of English were focused on developing reading skills while the foreign teachers of English taught more of the oral communication and oral presentation classes. Courses focusing on developing the students’ writing skills were evenly divided between the Japanese and foreign teachers of English. Institutional constraints unfortunately made it impossible to
100 observe the different teachers’ English classes. Determining the teachers’ level of preparedness as well as their level of English proficiency was also not possible. As such, the teachers’ nationality served as the label to differentiate two types of English teachers employed at the university.
In terms of international students, there were 165 undergraduate and 186 postgraduate students attending the university during the time of the study. These students composed about
4% of the undergraduate student population and 10% of the postgraduate population. The vast majority of the international students were from other Asian countries such as China, Vietnam, and Thailand.
Group Assignments
Two grouping variables were utilized in this study. The first grouping variable, which was based upon the 1,713 students’ self-perceived ability to speak in English, was composed of four levels: S1 I definitely cannot speak in English; S2 I probably cannot speak in English; S3 I can probably speak in English; and S4 I definitely can speak in English. The lowest speaking ability group (S1) was made up of 193 students. Their level of self-perceived ability to speak in
English was more than one standard distribution below the mean for the entire student population.
The next group (S2) was made up of 686 students. The range of their level of self-perceived ability to speak in English started at the mean and extended to one standard distribution below the mean for the entire student population. The third group (S3) was made up of 658 students.
Their range of self-perceived speaking competence started at the mean and extended to one standard deviation above the mean for the entire student population. The last group, the highest speaking ability group (S4), was made up of 176 students. Their self-perceived ability to speak in
101 English was more than one standard distribution above than the mean for the entire student population. Table 22 provides descriptive information about the academic year and gender of the students in each group based upon their self-perceived ability to speak in English.
Table 22. The Academic Year and Gender of the Participants in Each Self-perceived Ability to Speak in English Group Level of Self-perceived Ability to Speak in English S1 S2 S3 S4 Total Year 1 46 147 82 15 290 2 43 238 246 58 585 3 73 208 232 49 562 4 31 93 98 54 276 Total 193 686 658 176 1713 Gender Female 49 227 255 86 617 Male 144 459 403 90 1096 Total 193 686 658 176 1713 Note. S1 = the lowest self-perceived ability group to speak in English; S2 = the low self- perceived ability group to speak in English; S3 = the high self-perceived ability group to speak in English; and S4 = the highest self-perceived ability group to speak in English.
The second grouping was based on the 1,713 students’ self-perceived ability to write in
English. This grouping variable was also composed of four levels: W1 I definitely cannot write in English; W2 I probably cannot write in English; W3 I can probably write in English; and W4
I definitely can write in English. The lowest ability group (W1) was made up of 164 students.
Their level of self-perceived ability to write in English was more than one standard distribution below the mean for the entire student population. The next group (W2) was made up of 692 students. The range of their level of self-perceived ability to write in English started at the mean and extended to one standard distribution below the mean for the entire student population. The third group (W3) was made up of 698 students. Their range of self-perceived ability to write in
English started at the mean and extended to one standard deviation above the mean for the entire student population. The last group, the highest ability group (W4), was made up of 159 students.
102 Their self-perceived ability to write in English was more than one standard distribution above the mean for the entire student population. Table 23 provides descriptive information about the academic year and gender of the students in each group based upon their self-perceived ability to write in English.
Table 23. The Academic Year and Gender of the Participants in Each Self-perceived Ability to Write in English Group Level of Self-perceived Ability to Write in English W1 W2 W3 W4 Total Year 1 49 154 77 10 290 2 42 231 256 56 585 3 51 222 244 45 562 4 22 85 121 48 276 Total 164 692 698 159 1713 Gender Female 33 219 301 64 617 Male 131 473 397 95 1096 Total 164 692 698 159 1713 Note. W1 = the lowest self-perceived ability group to write in English; W2 = the low self- perceived ability group to write in English; W3 = the high self-perceived ability group to write in English; W4 = the highest self-perceived ability group to write in English.
In summary, the 1,713 students in this study were categorized according to their self- perceived ability to speak in English and their self-perceived ability to write in English.
Materials
The L2 WTC Questionnaire and Reliability Estimates
For Its Subsections
Based on the findings of the pilot study, the current study examining the Japanese university students’ willingness to use English with four types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom utilized a slightly shorter version of the L2 WTC Questionnaire with 16 speaking situations/tasks and 16 writing tasks. In terms of the speaking subsection of the L2 WTC
103 Questionnaire item, s3 “sing an English song” was not used because this item did not perform consistently with the other speaking situations/tasks. In the writing section of the L2 WTC
Questionnaire, item w12 “write a comment about your English class,” was not used because its intended audience is usually university administrators or a teacher and not another student in the class. Thus, this particular writing task was not consistent with the focus of the present investigation.
The remaining 16 speaking and 16 writing tasks/situations were used to measure the students’ self-perceived level of L2 competence and their level of L2 WTC. More specifically, the measures of interest were:
Self-perceived Speaking Competence. Students indicated their level of confidence of being able to successfully complete the different tasks by rating their ability on a 4-point Likert scale. The points of the scale were labeled: 1 = definitely not able; 2 = probably not able; 3 = probably able; and 4 = definitely able.
Willingness to Speak English with a Japanese Student. Students indicated their level of willingness to successfully complete the different tasks on a 4-point Likert scale. The points of the scale were labeled: 1 = definitely not willing; 2 = probably not willing; 3 = probably willing; and 4 = definitely willing.
Willingness to Speak English with an International Student. Students indicated their level of willingness to successfully complete the different tasks on a 4-point Likert scale. The points of the scale were labeled: 1 = definitely not willing; 2 = probably not willing; 3 = probably willing; and 4 = definitely willing.
Willingness to Speak English with a Japanese Teacher of English. Students indicated their level of willingness to successfully complete the different tasks on a 4-point Likert scale.
104 The points of the scale were labeled: 1 = definitely not willing; 2 = probably not willing; 3 = probably willing, and 4 = definitely willing.
Willingness to Speak English with a Foreign Teacher of English. Students indicated their level of willingness to successfully complete the different tasks on a 4-point Likert scale. The points of the scale were labeled: 1 = definitely not willing; 2 = probably not willing; 3 = probably willing; and 4 = definitely willing.
Self-perceived Writing Competence. Students indicated their level of confidence of being able to successfully complete the different tasks on a 4-point Likert scale. The points of the scale were labeled: 1 = definitely not able; 2 = probably not able; 3 = probably able; and 4 = definitely able.
Willingness to Write English to a Japanese Student. Students indicated their level of willingness to successfully complete the different tasks on a 4-point Likert scale. The points of the scale were labeled: 1 = definitely not willing; 2 = probably not willing; 3 = probably willing; and 4 = definitely willing.
Willingness to Write English to an International Student. Students indicated their level of willingness to successfully complete the different tasks on a 4-point Likert scale. The points of the scale were labeled: 1 = definitely not willing; 2 = probably not willing; 3 = probably willing; and 4 = definitely willing.
Willingness to Write English to a Japanese Teacher of English. Students indicated their level of willingness to successfully complete the different tasks on a 4-point Likert scale. The points of the scale were labeled: 1 = definitely not willing; 2 = probably not willing; 3 = probably willing; and 4 = definitely willing.
105 Willingness to Write English to a Foreign Teacher of English. Students indicated their level of willingness to successfully complete the different tasks on a 4-point Likert scale. The points of the scale were labeled: 1 = definitely not willing; 2 = probably not willing; 3 = probably willing; and 4 = definitely willing.
Before the data collection for the study commenced, the WTC L2 Questionnaire was administered to a group of 40 university students from the target population in order to check if the students understood how to complete the questionnaire (i.e., students understood that they had to report their level of self-perceived L2 ability and their level of willingness to use English with the four types of interlocutors for each of 16 speaking and writing situations/tasks). Their feedback resulted in a few changes in wording. The order of the items was also randomized and four Japanese versions of the questionnaire (see Appendix B) were produced to counterbalance any tiredness effect.
Various reliability statistics indicated that the different subsections of the L2 WTC
Questionnaire were highly reliable. Table 24 shows that Cronbach’s alpha (α) ranged from .90 to
.94 for the speaking subsections and from .93 to .95 for the writing subsections of the L2 WTC
Questionnaire. Similar to the Cronbach’s alpha values, the Rasch-based person ability reliability indexes for the different subsections were also relatively high, ranging from .88 to .91 for the speaking subsections and .90 to .91 for the writing subsections. In terms of sensitivity, the person strata for the different subsections of the L2 WTC easily surpassed the 2.0 benchmark as they ranged from 4.28 to 4.83; this indicated that the L2 WTC Questionnaire could divide the students into four statistically distinct groups.
106
Table 24. Reliability Estimates for the L2 WTC Questionnaire Subsections Person Item Measures α Reliability Separation Strata Reliability Separation Strata SABLE .90 .88 2.70 4.28 1.00 24.25 32.93 JSS .94 .91 3.12 4.83 .99 14.05 19.09 ISS .94 .90 3.08 4.78 1.00 27.14 20.70 JTS .94 .91 3.09 4.79 .99 13.97 19.07 FTS .94 .91 3.11 4.84 1.00 14.83 20.16 WABLE .93 .90 2.98 4.66 .99 11.20 15.31 JSW .94 .90 3.04 4.70 .97 5.94 8.39 ISW .95 .90 3.03 4.69 .98 7.53 10.45 JTW .95 .91 3.11 4.80 .97 5.90 8.33 FTW .95 .91 3.14 4.83 .98 7.13 9.91 Note. SABLE = Self-perceived Ability to Speak in English; JSS = Willingness to Speak in English to Japanese Students; ISS = Willingness to Speak in English to International Students; JTS = Willingness to Speak in English to Japanese Teachers of English; FTS = Willingness to Speak in English to Foreign Teachers of English; WABLE = Self-perceived Ability to Write in English; JSW = Willingness to Write in English to Japanese Students; ISW = Willingness to Write in English to International Students; JTW = Willingness to Write in English to Japanese Teachers of English; FTW = Willingness to Write in English to Foreign Teachers of English.
Procedure
Administration of the L2 WTC Questionnaire
In order to include the largest possible number of students in this study, the L2 WTC
Questionnaire was administered in two ways. The first way involved asking students (i.e., Year
2, 3, and 4 in Tables 15 and 16) to complete the questionnaire voluntarily in the last two weeks of their regular English classes in January 2003. There was also a second administration of the
L2 WTC Questionnaire to 290 first-year students (i.e., Year 1) during their first English class in
April 2003. The questionnaires were administered in 15 classes taught by foreign teachers of
English and 11 classes taught by Japanese teachers of English. This collection strategy resulted in 1,156 students’ responses (65% of the total sample of this study).
107 The remaining 633 students’ responses were collected by a group of research assistants, who canvassed undergraduate students around the university during the last two weeks of
January 2003. This collection strategy was especially effective because it broadened the scope of the study to include students who were either not taking an English class during the collection period or had already completed their required English credits, as is the case with many third- year and fourth-year Japanese university students.
The students were informed about the general purpose of the study both verbally and with a short written Japanese explanation on the L2 WTC Questionnaire. The students were told not to include their names on the questionnaire in order to facilitate more candid responses. The students were also asked not to complete the L2 WTC Questionnaire more than one time. This request was especially important considering the different strategies used to collect the students’ responses. Students who completed the questionnaire in their English class were also assured that the information collected would not be used towards their course grades. The questionnaire took approximately 10 to 15 minutes to complete.
Administration of the Open-ended L2 WTC Questionnaire
The Open-ended L2 WTC Questionnaire was given as the final writing assignment in two first-year writing courses in January 2003. A foreign teacher of English taught one course, while a Japanese teacher of English taught the other. A research assistant gave a general oral description of the study in Japanese and then distributed the L2 WTC Questionnaire written in
Japanese and the Open-ended L2 WTC Questionnaire written in English on the last day of the writing course. The students were given two weeks to complete the questionnaires and return them to a locked report box located in the university’s student affairs office. The students were
108 told that the research assistant would collect the questionnaires and then give their respective teachers a list of the students who had submitted the writing assignment. In other words, students received credit for the final writing assignment as part of their course grade solely on the basis of whether or not they submitted the L2 WTC Questionnaire along with the Open-ended L2 WTC
Questionnaire.
Before the students’ responses were analyzed, the research assistant removed the cover page of the writing assignments so that students’ L2 WTC Questionnaire and Open-ended L2
WTC Questionnaire became anonymous to the researcher. Students also had the opportunity on the cover page to indicate that they were not willing to have their responses used for research purposes. Three students chose this option and their writing assignments were immediately shredded by the research assistant. In the end, submissions from 29 students attending the writing class taught by the foreign teacher of English and 30 students attending the writing taught by the
Japanese teacher of English were used in this study.
Analyses
A combination of quantitative and qualitative techniques was employed to answer the study’s six research questions. The quantitative analyses were ordered sequentially with a Rasch analysis preceding two profile analyses of the students’ responses on the L2 WTC Questionnaire.
The Rasch analysis transformed the students’ responses from ordinal data into interval data measured in WITs. Then the profile analyses determined the extent to which students’ L2 WTC varied with different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom according to their self- perceived ability to speak and write in English. In order to provide a more complete account of other factors that might influence students’ level of willingness to communicate with different
109 types of interlocutors, the Open-ended L2 WTC Questionnaire responses were analyzed using a content analysis.
Together these three analyses help to define students’ L2 WTC from two perspectives.
The quantitative analyses of the L2 WTC Questionnaire responses provide an overall account of the interlocutor effect on students’ level of L2 WTC. The content analysis of the Open-ended L2
WTC Questionnaire responses, on the other hand, provides a more detailed account of specific factors mediating students’ L2 WTC. The following sections explain in detail how the different analyses were conducted.
Estimating Item Difficulty on the L2 WTC Questionnaire
Estimating the students’ level of L2 WTC is not a straightforward process. The Rasch model provides a number of ways in which student willingness can be estimated, and each of these estimates has its respective advantages and disadvantages. The first way is to simply estimate the students’ level of willingness based upon all their responses on the L2 WTC
Questionnaire. The drawback of this approach is that students’ would have only one overall estimate of WTC indicating their willingness to use English in all the speaking and writing tasks/situations with all the different types of interlocutors. As a result, this estimation method makes it impossible to determine the variability of students’ level of L2 WTC across the different language skills and interlocutors.
The second way involves separate estimations of students’ willingness to speak and write in English. This approach has two steps. First, students’ willingness to use English in the 16 speaking tasks/situations with the four types of interlocutors and their willingness to use English in the 16 writing tasks with the four types of interlocutors are estimated separately. The resulting
110 item difficulty estimates for the speaking and writing tasks/situations and the rating scale category threshold estimates are then used as anchor values to estimate the students’ willingness to speak and write in English to the different types of interlocutors (Wright, 1996b). This estimation approach has the advantage of producing separate WTC estimates for speaking and writing across the four types of interlocutors. The only drawback is that no direct comparisons between the students’ level of willingness to speak and write can be made because these values are estimated separately. In short, they do not share a common point of reference.
This study thus employed a slightly different two-step estimation approach. In the first step, the students’ responses to the L2 WTC Questionnaire were used to calculate item difficulty estimates for all the speaking and writing tasks/situations as well as the category thresholds for the 4-point rating scale. The resulting estimates were then used as anchor values for separate estimates of students’ willingness to speak and write in English to the four types of interlocutors.
This estimation approach thus transformed the students’ responses into logit scores that share a common scale for each modality (i.e., speaking and writing) and each type of interlocutor (i.e., a
Japanese student, an international student, a Japanese teacher of English, and a foreign teacher of
English). As a result, direct comparisons between students’ willingness to speak and write
English to the four types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom are possible.
The Use of Profile Analysis
After the Rasch analyses, the students’ responses to the L2 WTC Questionnaire were analyzed using two profile analyses. The first profile analysis addressed students’ willingness to speak English inside an EFL classroom with the four types of interlocutors. The second profile analysis examined students’ willingness to write English inside an EFL classroom with the four
111 types of interlocutors. For the sake of clarity, these two analyses are referred to as the willingness to speak profile analysis and the willingness to write profile analysis. Because this study involves two profile analyses, the p-value for each analysis was set at .025 to protect against committing a
Type I error (Petrinovich & Hardyck, 1972). In addition, partial eta-squared (η2) values were computed as effect size measures for all the analyses (Cohen, 1988).
A profile analysis answers three types of questions. The first question is the levels hypothesis. The concern here is whether or not one group of students based upon their level of self-perceived L2 communicative competence is more willing to speak and write in English to all of the different types of interlocutors than another group of students. For example, previous research (e.g., Yashima, 2002; Yashima et al., 2004) suggests that students who have higher levels of self-perceived L2 communicative competence are also more willing to communicate.
The levels hypothesis assesses if the same is true for this group of Japanese undergraduate university students. The second question posed by a profile analysis is the flatness hypothesis.
This inquiry examines if students’ level of L2 WTC is similar for all the speaking and writing tasks/situations and with all of the different interlocutors regardless of their level of self- perceived L2 communicative competence. The third question is the test of parallelism. This question asks whether or not students with different levels of self-perceived communicative competence have the same pattern of L2 WTC across the 16 speaking and 16 writing tasks/situations as well as with the four types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom.
The Use of Content Analysis on the Open-ended L2 WTC Questionnaire
A content analysis was used to analyze the students’ responses to the Open-ended L2
WTC Questionnaire. By definition, a content analysis is “any methodological measurement
112 applied to text (or other symbolic materials) for social science purposes” (Shapiro & Markoff,
1997). The analysis of texts allows researchers to gain access to people’s cognitive structures and attitudes (Weber, 1990). Typically in a content analysis, the frequency of words is treated as an indicator of underlying structure that is embedded within a text. Groups of words can also reveal underlying themes in addition to reflecting relationships between different themes (Krippendorff,
2004). The use of frequency has traditionally led to a summative account of a text where a text is divided into categories and then described using statistics. Yet, as in the case of this study, content analysis can also be used from a qualitative perspective to gain a deeper understanding of the content and the contextual meaning of a text through a process of systematically coding and identifying themes or patterns (Hsieh & Shannon, 2005).
Coding and Analyzing the Open-ended L2 WTC Questionnaire
The content analysis began with assigning the 59 respondents to the Open-ended L2
WTC Questionnaire with an identification tag indicating (a) their self-perceived level of competence to speak and write in English, (b) their level of willingness to speak and write in
English with the different interlocutors, (c) their sex, (d) whether they attended the foreign teacher or the Japanese teacher of English's writing class, and (e) which out of the 59 respondents the student was. Figure 14 is an example of a student identification tag.
Willingness Willingness Student to Speak to W rite Information S33434W22233MJ5
Figure 14. Example of a student identification tag for the Open-ended L2 WTC Questionnaire.
113 The meaning of the above identification tag is as follows. This student has a high level of self-perceived competence to speak (i.e., S3). The next four numbers are from the 4-point Likert scale indicating the student's level of willingness to speak English with the different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom. Thus, this student is willing to speak English with a
Japanese student (3), very willing to speak with a foreign student (4), willing to speak with a
Japanese teacher of English (3), and very willing to speak to a foreign teacher of English (4). In terms of writing in English, this student is not confident in his ability to write in English (i.e.,
W2). The next four numbers are from the 4-point Likert scale indicating the student's level of willingness to write English to the different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom. This student is thus unwilling to write English to a Japanese student and a foreign student (2), but is willing to write to a Japanese teacher of English and a foreign teacher of English (3). The next two letters in the identification tag indicate the student's gender and writing teacher. In this case, the student is a male (M) attending the writing class taught by the Japanese teacher of English
(J). The final number at the number is a unique number given to each student. In this case, the student is number five out of the 59 students who agreed to have their responses to the Open- ended L2 WTC Questionnaire used for research purposes.
The students’ responses to the L2 WTC Open-ended Questionnaire were then entered into a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet. For this study, the unit of analysis was the students’ written comments, which were coded individually (Neuendorf, 2002). The initial coding of the students’ responses was based upon the type of interlocutor they referred to in their responses. The result was a two by two matrix with each type of interlocutor occupying a quadrant of the matrix. The students’ responses were then coded according the whether they were specifically related to speaking in English, writing in English, or using English in general. Each quadrant was thus
114 divided into three sub-sections. At this point, a Japanese teacher of English, who worked at the university where the study was conducted, reviewed the classifications of the students’ responses into the matrix.
The next step involved creating categories from the students’ responses to the Open- ended L2 WTC Questionnaire. A content analysis was utilized to distinguish and organize the students’ responses into categories. The repetitive occurrence of keywords or phrases was the criterion used to define the categories. For example, keywords and phrases such as
“communicate with foreign people,” “know foreign view,” “I want foreign students to tell me their life,” and “I want to introduce Japanese custom to them” established the criteria for the category of “interest in communicating with people from overseas.”
The categorizing process first commenced with the students’ comments at the sectional level of the matrix. Then the categorization process moved to the quadrant level and finally to the entire matrix. The categorization process was iterative in nature. Categories formed in one section of a quadrant would inform the categorization of the other sections. Moreover, categories derived from the students’ responses at the quadrant level would sometimes lead to re- categorizations of students’ responses in the different sections. The same was true of categories arising from the matrix as a whole. They informed categories at quadrant and section level. In short, the categorization process was dynamic in that the different levels of the matrix (i.e., the sections, the quadrants, and the matrix) helped refine the categories that arose from the students’ responses to the Open-ended L2 WTC Questionnaire.
Considering the dynamic nature of the categorization process, two steps were taken to ensure the quality of the categorizations. First, the Japanese teacher of English from the university was asked to review the categorizations. This review resulted in a few changes where
115 students’ responses where moved from one category to another. The second step involved putting the categorizations away for a period of three months and then the research and the
Japanese English teacher reviewed the categories from a fresh perspective. This led to a further refinement of the categories.
The next step in the process involved identifying the main themes arising from the different categories. The intent was to determine what types of factors influence students’ willingness to use English with different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom. Once again this process was iterative in that the operational definitions of the main themes emerged from the different categories and the relationships existing between the different themes (Dey,
1993). For example, the categories of “interest in communicating with people from overseas,”
“interest in traveling or studying abroad,” and “interest in studying other foreign languages” was combined into the overarching theme of “international posture.” Afterwards, the Japanese teacher of English reviewed the main themes with the researcher. This review further refined the operational definitions of the main themes and resulted in some reclassifications of the students’ responses.
The final step of the analysis involved examining the students’ responses to the Open- ended L2 WTC Questionnaire organized under each theme. This examination involved (a) determining the type of interlocutor (i.e., a Japanese student, an international student, a Japanese teacher of English, or a foreign teacher of English) the students referred to and (b) whether or not the student felt an increase or a decrease in their level of willingness to use English with that particular type of interlocutor inside an EFL classroom. The interrater reliability between the researcher and the Japanese teacher of English was .91. In the case of disagreements, the
116 students’ responses were coded, for example, as decreasing and increasing students’ level of L2
WTC with a particular interlocutor.
In order to help define the main themes arising from the Open-ended L2 WTC
Questionnaire, excerpts of student responses were selected on the basis of providing the broadest range of student opinions. The students’ gender, their self-perceived ability to use English, and their level of L2 WTC were also taken into consideration to provide the most balanced account possible.
The study’s six research questions will be answered utilizing quantitative analyses of the students’ responses to the L2 WTC Questionnaire and a qualitative analysis of the students’ responses to the Open-ended L2 WTC Questionnaire. More specifically, the first research question asks “To what extent does Japanese university students’ level of willingness to speak in
English inside an EFL classroom vary according to their level of self-perceived L2 communicative competence?” This question will be answered with the levels hypothesis of the willingness to speak profile analysis and any required post hoc analyses to determine if any statistically significant differences exist between the self-perceived speaking ability groups.
The second research question asks, “To what extent does Japanese university students’ level of willingness to speak in English to different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom vary regardless of their level of self-perceived L2 communicative competence?” This question will be answered in two ways. First, the flatness hypothesis of the willingness to speak profile analysis will be utilized to determine if the students’ willingness to speak in English varies significantly. Second, the content analysis of the students’ responses to the Open-ended
117 L2 WTC Questionnaire will be used to identify factors that influence their willingness to speak in English to different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom.
The third research question asks, “To what extent does Japanese university students’ level of willingness to speak in English to different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom vary according to their level of self-perceived L2 communicative competence?” This question will be answered in two ways. First, the willingness to speak profile analysis’ test of parallelism and follow-up interaction-contrast analysis will be utilized to pinpoint where the significant differences exist amongst the different self-perceived speaking ability groups.
Second, a comparison of the level of L2 WTC required of the 16 speaking situations/tasks and the level of L2 WTC possessed by the average student in each self-perceived speaking ability group will be utilized to examine the probability of Japanese university students being willing to use English in the 16 speaking situations/tasks with the different types of interlocutors.
The fourth research question asks “To what extent does Japanese university students’ level of willingness to write in English inside an EFL classroom vary according to their level of self-perceived L2 communicative competence?” This question will be answered the levels hypothesis of the willingness to write profile analysis and any required post hoc analyses to determine if any statistically significant differences exist between the self-perceived writing ability groups.
The fifth research question asks, “To what extent does Japanese university students’ level of willingness to write in English to different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom vary regardless of their level of self-perceived L2 communicative competence?” This question will be answered in two ways. First, the flatness hypothesis of the willingness to write profile analysis will be utilized to determine if the students’ willingness to write in English varies significantly.
118 Second, the content analysis of the students’ responses to the Open-ended L2 WTC
Questionnaire will be used to identify factors that influence their willingness to write in English to different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom.
The sixth research question asks, “To what extent does Japanese university students’ level of willingness to write in English to different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom vary according to their level of self-perceived L2 communicative competence?” This question will be answered in two ways. First, the willingness to write profile analysis’ test of parallelism and follow-up interaction-contrast analysis will be utilized to pinpoint where the significant differences exist amongst the different self-perceived writing ability groups. Second, a comparison of the level of L2 WTC required of the 16 writing tasks and the level of L2 WTC possessed by the average student in each self-perceived writing ability group will be utilized to examine the probability of Japanese university students being willing to use English in the 16 writing tasks with the different types of interlocutors.
Conclusion
This chapter has provided an overview of the participants and groups, and the analytical approaches used in this study so that replication studies can be carried out. The Appendices also include copies of the L2 WTC Questionnaires. The results of the study are presented in the next chapter.
119 CHAPTER 6
RESULTS
The analyses of the data obtained in this study along with the results for the six research questions are presented in this chapter. It begins with an examination of the fit between the underlying assumptions of a profile analysis and the data collected with the L2 WTC
Questionnaire. Following this discussion, the results of the willingness to speak and the willingness to write profile analyses are presented. Interaction-contrast analyses are also presented in order to pinpoint the source of variability in students’ willingness to communicate with four types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom. To help with the interpretation of these results, the major themes arising from the students’ Open-ended L2 WTC Questionnaires are presented. These themes are first shown in a table that illustrates the relative frequency of the different themes and their relationship with different types of interlocutors. Then the different themes are explained by quoting excerpts from the students’ responses to the Open-ended L2
WTC Questionnaire. The chapter concludes with a table that displays an overview of the research questions and related findings.
Results of the L2 WTC Questionnaire
Checking the Profile Analysis Assumptions
Before proceeding with the two profile analyses, student responses to the L2 WTC
Questionnaire were examined to determine the extent to which they conformed to the underlying assumptions of a profile analysis (Tabachnick & Fidell, 2001). Because the present study
120 involves two profile analyses, the assumptions for each analysis were checked independently. A profile analysis entails the following five assumptions:
The same scaling technique is used for all the dependent variables. In this study, students indicated their level of willingness to speak and write in English to the four types of interlocutors on a 4-point Likert scale. These responses were in turn transformed into WIT measures using a series of Rasch analyses that produced estimates of willingness based upon the anchored item difficulty and rating structure estimates for all of the speaking and writing tasks/situations. As a result, all the students’ responses to the WTC questionnaire shared the same unit of measurement.
The number of students in the smallest group exceeds the number of dependent variables
(DVs) used in the respective profile analyses. This assumption was safely met because the profile analyses have four DVs (i.e., willingness to use English with a Japanese student, a foreign student, a Japanese teacher of English, and a foreign teacher of English). The smallest group for the willingness to speak profile analysis was the 176 students in the highest level of self- perceived speaking ability group (S4). The smallest group for the willingness to write profile analysis was the 159 students with the highest level of self-perceived competence. These numbers also assured that multivariate normality was not a problem. The unequal sample sizes are typically not a problem for profile analysis because each hypothesis is tested separately as if in a one-way design (Tabachnick & Fidell, 2001). Because there is only one between-subjects variable (i.e., self-perceived L2 communicative competence), there is no difficulty interpreting the results of the profile analyses.
There is an absence of multivariate and univariate outliers. The search for multivariate and univariate outliers involved identifying students who had Mahalanobis distance exceeding
121 18.46 within each self-perceived competency group. For the willingness to speak profile analysis, one student in the lowest self-perceived speaking ability group (S1), two students in the low self-perceived speaking ability group (S2), and two students in the high self-perceived speaking ability group (S3) were found to be multivariate outliers. An inspection of their level of willingness to speak to the four types of interlocutors revealed that these students were either very willing or very unwilling to communicate with a particular person in comparison to the other interlocutors. For example, the one student from the lowest self-perceived speaking ability group (S1) was very willing to speak in English to a Japanese teacher of English compared to the other interlocutors. From the low self-perceived speaking ability group (S2), one student was very willing to speak in English to a Japanese student and a foreign teacher of English; the other student was very unwilling to speak in English to a foreign English teacher. In the high self- perceived speaking ability group (S3), one student was very willing to speak in English to a
Japanese student and a foreign teacher of English, whereas the other student was very willing to speak in English to an international student and a foreign teacher of English.
For the willingness to write profile analysis, one student in the lowest self-perceived writing ability group (W1), three students in the low self-perceived writing ability group (W2), three students in the high self-perceived writing ability group (W3), and one student in the highest self-perceived writing ability group (W4) were multivariate outliers. The student in the lowest self-perceived writing ability group (W1) was very willing to write in English to a
Japanese teacher of Japanese. In the low self-perceived writing ability group (W2), one student was very unwilling to write in English to a Japanese teacher of English, the second student was very unwilling to write in English to a foreign teacher of English, while the third student was very willing to write in English to a Japanese teacher of English. In the high self-perceived
122 writing ability group (W3), one student was very unwilling to write in English to an international student, the second student was very unwilling to write in English to a Japanese student, while the third student was very willing to write in English to an international student and a foreign teacher of English. The student from the highest self-perceived writing ability group (W4) was very unwilling to write in English to a Japanese teacher of English.
Because one purpose of this study is to investigate the extent to which Japanese university students’ L2 WTC varies with four types of interlocutors, deleting the 13 students found to be multivariate outliers (i.e., these students’ level of L2 WTC dramatically varies with the four types of interlocutors) from the data set is counter to the spirit of the study. In order to lessen the impact of the outliers on the multivariate analyses, the students’ responses were adjusted either by increasing or decreasing the in WIT measures so that the standardized scores for their responses did not exceed 3.67 within their respective self-perceived competency groups
(Tabachnick & Fidell, 2001). After these adjustments, the data set was checked for univariate outliers. No cases were found in the self-perceived competency groups for the willingness to speak and the willingness to write profile analyses.
The variance-covariance matrices within each cell of the design are sampled from the same population variance-covariance, which allows for a single error estimate. This assumption is generally upheld with equal sample sizes. However, the notable discrepancies in the number of students in the self-perceived competence groups posed a potential threat to this assumption.
Box’s test, available through SPSS MANOVA, was highly significant at p < .001. As a result, robustness to violations to the assumption of homogeneity of variance is not guaranteed. One means of addressing this potential threat is to equalize the samples sizes of the self-perceived competence groups used in the profile analysis. This procedure would, however, result in the
123 elimination of 1,009 students from the willingness to speak profile analysis and 1,077 students from the willingness to write profile analysis.
Considering the substantial effort required to collect responses from the 1,713 students, a statistical approach was taken to address this issue. An inspection of the relationship between sample sizes and the sizes of the variances and covariances revealed that cells with smaller sample sizes produced larger variances and covariances. This situation causes the significance test to be too liberal. In other words, the null hypotheses can be retained with confidence, but indications of a mean difference are suspect (Tabachnick & Fidell, 2001, p. 330). To deal with the potentially distorted alpha levels, Pillia’s criterion was used to the judge multivariate significance.
All of the dependent variables have a linear relationship. An inspection of the scatterplots through SPSS PLOT revealed fairly linear relationships between students’ willingness to speak and write in English to the four types of interlocutors.
There is an absence of multicollinearity and singularity. Although the bivariate correlations between the dependent variables were moderately high, they did not exceed the .90 criterion suggested by Tabachnick and Fidell (2001).
In summary, after adjusting the 13 multivariate outliers’ responses to the L2 WTC
Questionnaire, the assumptions underlying profile analysis were largely met. Table 25 presents a summary of the descriptive statistics for the four self-perceived ability groups’ willingness to speak in English to the four types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom.
The mean (M) indicates the average level of willingness each group of students has to speak in English to the four types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom. Because these levels of willingness are reported as WIT scores, it is possible to determine the probability of students
124 being willing to engage in the different speaking/writing tasks. As a reminder, a score of 500
WITs indicates that students are willing to use English in about half of the speaking and writing
tasks/situations featured in the L2 WTC Questionnaire. Thus, students in the lowest self-
perceived competence group (S1) with a mean score of 447.28 for Japanese students suggests
that an average student in this group is probably willing to use English in less than half of the
speaking and writing situations/tasks. The opposite is true of students in the highest self-
perceived ability group (S4) (M = 571.48).
Table 25. Descriptive Statistics for Students’ Willingness to Speak in English to Four Types of Interlocutors Inside an EFL Classroom Self- 95% perceived CI 95% CI Inter Ability Lower Upper locator Group M SE Bound Bound SD Skew SES Kurtosis SEK JS S1 447.28 6.07 435.30 459.26 84.38 -0.82 0.17 3.35 0.35 S2 498.06 2.34 493.45 502.66 61.38 -2.04 0.09 8.65 0.19 S3 535.32 2.51 530.39 540.25 64.39 -0.38 0.10 5.09 0.19 S4 571.48 8.01 555.67 587.29 106.28 -0.06 0.18 1.02 0.36 IS S1 435.64 6.91 422.02 449.27 95.97 -0.72 0.17 2.08 0.35 S2 496.15 2.18 491.88 500.42 56.97 -0.83 0.09 8.90 0.19 S3 536.62 2.29 532.13 541.10 58.63 -0.45 0.10 9.06 0.19 S4 600.82 7.04 586.92 614.73 93.45 0.17 0.18 1.71 0.36 JT S1 447.63 6.69 434.42 460.42 92.99 -0.66 0.17 2.12 0.35 S2 499.00 2.31 494.47 503.52 60.37 -0.98 0.09 9.02 0.19 S3 533.98 2.63 528.81 539.14 67.48 -0.98 0.10 8.35 0.19 S4 573.52 8.46 556.82 590.23 112.31 -0.50 0.18 1.78 0.36 FT S1 445.49 8.08 429.55 461.42 112.24 0.33 0.17 2.68 0.35 S2 496.28 2.29 491.77 500.79 60.23 0.44 0.09 8.54 0.19 S3 540.27 2.77 534.84 545.71 70.99 0.74 0.10 5.21 0.19 S4 609.93 6.93 596.26 623.61 91.92 0.47 0.18 -0.29 0.36 Note. JS = Japanese Student; IS = International Student; JT = Japanese Teacher of English; and FT = Foreign Teacher of English.
The standard deviation values indicate the dispersion of students’ level of willingness
around the mean. Generally, the range of students’ willingness to speak to different types of
125 interlocutors is quite similar across different self-perceived ability groups. However, the students in the low self-perceived ability group (S2) consistently have a more compact range of willingness to speak in English to the four types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom.
Skewness indicates the degree of asymmetry of a distribution around its mean. If the skewness statistic (Skew) is more than two times larger than the standard error of skewness
(SES), then the data might be unacceptably skewed (Tabachnick & Fidell, 2001). According to
Table 25, there are a number of instances where students’ level of willingness to speak with a particular interlocutor is either positively or negatively skewed. One reason for the numerous instances of skewness is the N-size, which reduces the standard error of skewness.
Closely related to the skewed distributions are the significant levels of kurtosis in the distributions of the low (S2) and the high (S3) self-perceived ability groups’ willingness to speak in English to the different types of interlocutors. In all cases, the significant levels of positive kurtosis indicate a relative peakedness in distribution curves. If the kurtosis statistic is more than two times larger than the standard error of kurtosis (SEK), then the data might be unacceptably skewed (Tabachnick & Fidell, 2001). Figure 15 shows that the distribution for the low self- perceived ability group’s (S2) willingness to speak in English to a Japanese student has a high peak located around 500 WITs. This peak indicates that there are a large number of students in this self-perceived ability group who have a 50% probability of speaking in English to a
Japanese student inside of an EFL classroom. This peak in students’ willingness to speak in
English to Japanese students also contributes to the significant negative skew in which the left tail of the distribution is longer because of a small group of students located at 200 WITs.
The high number of instances of kurtosis is not surprising because the different self- perceived ability groups displayed a limited amount of variance in their willingness to speak in
126 English to the four types of interlocutors; this was especially true for students in the low (S2) and the high (S3) self-perceived ability groups. Moreover similar to the detection of skewness, the multiple occurrences of kurtosis can also be due to the large N-size, which reduces the standard error values used to determine the significance level of kurtosis.
Figure 15. Histogram for the low self-perceived ability students’ willingness to speak in English to Japanese students.
Table 26 presents a summary of the descriptive statistics for the four groups of students’ willingness to write in English to the four types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom. Similar to the students’ willingness to speak, the average level of willingness to write English to different interlocutors varied amongst the different self-perceived ability groups. Because the students’ level of L2 WTC are based on the joint-estimation of all the speaking and writing tasks, it is also
127 possible to directly compare students’ level of willingness to speak and write in English to the
four types of interlocutors. For example, the students in the lowest self-perceived ability groups
(i.e., S1 and W1) are more willing to speak in English with a Japanese student (447.28 WITs)
compared to their willingness to write in English to a Japanese student (397.47 WITs).
Table 26. Descriptive Statistics for Students’ Willingness to Write English to the Four Types of Interlocutors Inside an EFL Classroom Self- 95% 95% perceived CI CI Inter Ability Lower Upper locator Group M SE Bound Bound SD Skew SES Kurtosis SEK JS W1 397.47 8.03 381.62 413.32 102.78 -0.73 0.19 -0.17 0.38 W2 476.53 2.41 471.80 481.26 63.42 -0.88 0.09 7.31 0.19 W3 515.81 2.78 510.35 521.27 73.49 -0.86 0.09 6.25 0.18 W4 570.87 8.05 554.98 586.77 101.48 0.25 0.19 1.31 0.38 IS W1 401.43 8.42 384.80 418.05 107.82 -0.69 0.19 -0.08 0.38 W2 473.25 2.31 468.71 477.79 60.82 -0.50 0.09 8.12 0.19 W3 519.49 2.72 514.15 524.84 71.91 0.09 0.09 6.24 0.18 W4 583.08 8.48 566.33 599.82 106.89 -0.01 0.19 1.80 0.38 JT W1 398.79 9.04 380.94 416.64 115.77 -0.39 0.19 -0.39 0.38 W2 475.01 2.65 469.81 480.20 69.61 -0.27 0.09 6.22 0.19 W3 517.00 2.81 511.49 522.52 74.20 -0.28 0.09 6.35 0.18 W4 570.50 9.60 551.53 589.53 121.06 -0.39 0.19 1.86 0.38 FT W1 416.60 10.21 396.45 436.75 130.69 0.40 0.19 1.29 0.38 W2 473.52 2.75 468.11 478.92 72.40 0.91 0.09 6.77 0.19 W3 521.67 2.93 515.92 527.42 77.39 0.76 0.09 5.08 0.18 W4 586.19 7.97 570.46 601.93 100.47 0.63 0.19 0.23 0.38 Note. JS = Japanese Student; IS = International Student; JT = Japanese Teacher of English; and FT = Foreign Teacher of English.
In terms of the standard deviation, the students in the low (W2) and the high (W3) self-
perceived ability groups’ willingness to write in English to the four types of interlocutors inside
an EFL classroom consistently displayed less variance. In addition, there are significant levels of
skewness in the different self-perceived ability groups’ willingness to write in English to a
Japanese student, an international student, and a foreign teacher of English. Similar to the
128 willingness to speak in English, a number of the distribution curves for the low (W2) and high
(W3) self-perceived ability group have significant peaks. Likewise, the significant levels of skewness and kurtosis might in some cases reflect the relationship between the large N-size and the error statistics used to calculate significance.
The Willingness to Speak Profile Analysis
Table 27 shows that all three contrasts in the profile analysis were significant. The first effect shown in the Table 9 is the interlocutor effect (flatness), which indicates that students’ willingness to speak English to the four types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom varied significantly regardless of their level of self-perceived communicative competence, F = 11.58, p
< .001, partial η2 = .007, power = 1.00.
Table 27. Profile Analysis for Students’ Willingness to Speak in English to Different types of Interlocutors by Self-perceived Ability Group Source of Variance SS df MS F p η2 Power Within Group Interlocutor (flatness) 73339.04 3 24446.35 11.59 .00 .007 1.00 Interlocutor*Group 207527.64 9 23058.63 10.93 .00 .019 1.00 (parallelism) Error 10816575.05 5127 2109.73 Between Group Group (level) 9809518.28 3 3269839.43 226.62 .00 .285 1.00 Error 24659029.08 1709 14428.92
The second effect is the interaction effect (parallelism), which indicates that students’ willingness to speak in English to the four types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom varied significantly according to their level of self-perceived communicative competence, F = 10.93, p
< .001, partial η2 = .019, power = 1.00. Figure 16 shows the profiles of the students’ level of willingness to speak in English to the four types of interlocutors according to their self-perceived
129 level of communicative competence. The most notable differences are the profiles of the students in the highest and lowest self-perceived proficiency groups. A follow-up interaction-contrast analysis, which used a Scheffé adjustment to control the rate of familywise error (Tabachnick &
Fidell, 2001, p. 421), indicated that students with the highest levels of self-perceived communicative competence (S4) had a significantly distinct pattern of willingness compared to the other groups, F = 6.82, p < .001, partial η2 = .004, power = .74. They were significantly more willing to speak English to international students and foreign teachers of English and less willing to speak to Japanese students and Japanese teachers of English. Students who had the lowest levels of self-perceived communicative competency (S1) also had significantly distinct pattern of willingness compared to the other groups, F = 55.71, p < .001, partial η2 = .032, power = 1.00.
However, their pattern of L2 WTC was the opposite of students in the S4 group; the lowest self- perceived communicative competence students (S1) were significantly more willing to speak
English to Japanese students and Japanese teachers of English and less willing to speak English to international students and foreign teachers of English.
The third effect, shown in Table 28, is the group effect (level), which indicates that the students’ willingness to speak in English inside an EFL classroom varied significantly according to their level of self-perceived communicative competence, F = 226.62, p < .001, partial η2 =
.285, power = 1.00. Using the Sidak adjustment to control the rate of familywise error, post hoc comparisons of the four groups of students’ overall level of willingness to speak in English revealed that each self-perceived ability group varied significantly from the others. Table 20 shows that students’ willingness to speak in English inside their EFL classroom uniformly increased across the different self-perceived ability groups.
130
Figure 16. Profiles for willingness to speak in English to different types of interlocutors by self- perceived speaking ability group. Note. JS = Japanese Student; IS = International Student; JT = Japanese Teacher of English; FT = Foreign Teacher of English; S1 = the lowest self-perceived ability group to speak in English; S2 = the low self-perceived ability group to speak in English; S3 = the high self-perceived ability group to speak in English; S4 = the highest self-perceived ability group to speak in English.
Table 28. Students’ Willingness to Speak in English by Self-perceived Ability Group 95% CI 95% CI Ability Lower Upper Group M SE Bound Bound SD S1 444.01 6.14 431.91 456.12 85.26 S2 497.37 1.89 493.67 501.07 49.41 S3 536.55 2.06 532.50 540.59 52.89 S4 588.94 6.39 576.32 601.56 84.82 Note. S1 = the lowest self-perceived ability group to speak in English; S2 = the low self- perceived ability group to speak in English; S3 = the high self-perceived ability group to speak in English; S4 = the highest self-perceived ability group to speak in English. All possible contrasts between the different self-perceived ability groups’ level of willingness to speak in English inside their ESL classroom were significant.
To further investigate the differences between the self-perceived ability groups, the mean level of willingness to speak in English for each self-perceived ability group was compared to
131 the level of willingness required to use English in the 16 speaking tasks/situations with the four types of interlocutors (Table 29). This comparison reveals that the average student from the low self-perceived ability group (S2), the high self-perceived ability group (S3), and the highest self- perceived ability group (S4) would probably be willing to greet the four types of interlocutors in
English. The average student from the lowest self-perceived ability group (S1), in contrast, would probably not be willing to greet the different types of interlocutors in English because his or her level of willingness to speak in English (444.01 WITs) is below the level of L2 WTC required of this speaking situation.
Table 29. Level of L2 Willingness Required of the Speak English in 16 Situations/Tasks to the Four Types of Interlocutors Self-perceived Ability Group Willingness to Speak with the Four Type of Interlocutor Types of Interlocutors
Item Speaking Task or Situation JS IS JT FT JS IS JT FT s1 Greet someone in English. 467 460 479 452 S2, S3, S2, S3, S2, S3, S2, S3, S4 S4 S4 S4 s2 Say thank you in English when 447 432 450 426 S2, S3, S2, S3, S2, S3, S1, S2, someone lends you a pen. S4 S4 S4 S3, S4 s4 Give directions to your favorite 521 511 522 505 S3, S4 S3, S4 S3, S4 S3, S4 restaurant in English. s5 Tell someone in English about the 527 523 536 519 S3, S4 S3, S4 S3, S4 S3, S4 story of a TV show you saw. s6 Read out a two-way dialogue in 481 479 482 471 S2, S3, S2, S3, S2, S3, S2, S3, English from the textbook. S4 S4 S4 S4 s7 Translate a spoken utterance from 541 537 539 528 S4 S4 S4 S3, S4 Japanese into English. s8 Interview someone in English asking 504 495 505 485 S3, S4 S2, S3, S3, S4 S2, S3, your own original questions. S4 S4 s9 Interview someone in English asking 510 503 508 492 S3, S4 S3, S4 S3, S4 S2, S3, questions from the textbook. S4 s10 Do a role-play in English at your 527 521 533 512 S3, S4 S3, S4 S3, S4 S3, S4 desk (e.g., ordering food in a restaurant). s11 Do a role-play standing in front of 538 532 540 524 S4 S3, S4 S4 S3, S4 the class in English (e.g., ordering food in a restaurant). Table 29 continues
132 Table 29. (continued) s12 Give a short speech in English about 503 495 506 488 S3, S4 S2, S3, S3, S4 S2, S3, your hometown with notes. S4 S4 s13 Give a short self-introduction without 518 506 520 501 S3, S4 S3, S4 S3, S4 S3, S4 notes in English. s14 Ask someone in English to repeat 472 464 476 456 S2, S3, S2, S3, S2, S3, S2, S3, what they have just said in English S4 S4 S4 S4 because you didn't understand. s15 Ask the meaning of word you do not 495 483 489 471 S2, S3, S2, S3, S2, S3, S2, S3, know in English. S4 S4 S4 S4 s16 Ask someone how to pronounce a 521 505 517 494 S3, S4 S3, S4 S3, S4 S2, S3, word in English. S4 s17 Ask someone in English how to say a 521 510 514 501 S3, S4 S3, S4 S3, S4 S3, S4 phrase you know how to say in Japanese but not in English. Note. JS = Japanese Student; IS = International Student; JT = Japanese Teacher of English; FT = Foreign Teacher of English; S1 = the lowest self-perceived ability group to speak in English; S2 = the low self-perceived ability group to speak in English; S3 = the high self-perceived ability group to speak in English; S4 = the highest self-perceived ability group to speak in English.
This type of comparative analysis can thus help researchers interpret students’ level of L2
WTC in terms of the probability of them using English in the 16 speaking tasks/situations with the four types of interlocutors. The average student from the highest self-perceived ability group
(S4) with a L2 WTC speaking score of 588.94 WITs is probably willing to speak in English in all of the 64 possible communication situations (i.e., 16 different speaking tasks/situations with the four types of interlocutors) featured on the L2 WTC Questionnaire. The average student in the high self-perceived ability group (S3) with a level of willingness of 536.55 WITs, on the other hand, is probably willing to speak in English in 59 out of the 64 communicative situations.
This student is probably willing to “translate a spoken utterance from Japanese to English” (item s7) only with a foreign teacher of English and “do a role-play standing in front of the class in
English” (item s11) only with an international student or a foreign teacher of English. The average student in the low self-perceived ability group (S2) with a level of willingness of 497.37
WITs is probably willing to speak in English in 26 out of the 64 communicative situations. This
133 student is probably willing to speak in English with the four types of interlocutors in five speaking tasks/situations: “greet someone in English (item s1); “say ‘thank you’ in English when someone lends you a pen” (item s2); “read out two-way dialogue in English from the textbook”
(item s6); “ask someone in English to repeat what they just said in English because you didn't understand” (item s14), and “ask the meaning of word you do not know in English” (item s15).
This student is also probably willing to speak in English to an international student or a foreign teacher of English in order to “interview someone in English asking your own original questions” (item s8) and “give a short speech in English about your hometown with notes” (s12).
In addition, this student is probably willing to speak in English to a foreign teacher of English to
“interview someone in English asking questions from the textbook” (item s9) and “ask someone how to pronounce a word in English” (item s16). Finally, the average student in the lowest self- perceived ability group (S1) with a level of willingness of 536.55 WITs is probably willing to speak in English only to a foreign teacher of English to “say ‘thank you’ in English when someone lends you a pen” (item s2).
Willingness to Write in English Profile Analysis
Table 30 shows that all three contrasts in the profile analysis were significant. The first effect shown in Table 21 is the interlocutor effect (flatness), which indicates that students’ willingness to write in English to the four different interlocutors inside an EFL classroom varied significantly regardless of their level of self-perceived communicative competence, F = 8.53, p <
.001, partial η2 = .005, power = .99.
134 Table 30. Profile Analysis for Students’ Willingness to Write in English to Different Types of Interlocutors by Self-perceived Ability Group Source of Variance SS df MS F p η2 Power Within Group Interlocutor (flatness) 60559.21 3 20186.40 8.53 0.00 0.005 0.98 Interlocutor*Group 66641.13 9 7404.57 3.13 0.00 0.005 0.98 (parallelism) Error 12128650.38 5127 2365.64 Between Group Group (level) 12524653.55 3 4174884.52 226.60 0.00 0.285 1.00 Error 31486565.26 1709 18423.97
The second effect is the interaction effect (parallelism), which indicates that students’ willingness to write in English to the four types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom varied significantly according to their level of self-perceived communicative competence, F = 3.13, p <
.001, partial η2 = .005, power = .98. Figure 17 shows the profiles of students’ level of willingness to write in English to the four types of interlocutors according to their self-perceived level of communicative competence. Similar to the students’ willingness to speak, the most notable differences are the profiles of the students in the highest (W4) and the lowest (W1) self- perceived proficiency groups. Follow-up interaction-contrast analyses, however, found that these two groups did not have a significantly distinct pattern of willingness in comparison to the other groups of students.
The third effect shown in Table 22 is the group effect (level), which indicates that the students’ willingness to write in English inside an EFL classroom varied significantly according to their level of self-perceived communicative competence, F = 226.60, p < .001, partial η2 =
.285, power = 1.00. Using the Sidak adjustment to control the rate of familywise error, post hoc comparisons of the four groups of students’ overall level of willingness to write in English revealed that each self-perceived ability group varied significantly from the others. Table 31
135
Figure 17. Profiles for willingness to write English to different types of interlocutors by self- perceived ability group. Note. JS = Japanese student; IS = international student; JT = Japanese teacher of English; FT = foreign teacher of English; W1 = the lowest self-perceived ability group to write in English; W2 = the low self-perceived ability group to write in English; W3 = the high self-perceived ability group to write in English; W4 = the highest self-perceived ability group to write in English.
Table 31. Students’ Willingness to Write in English by Self-perceived Ability Group 95% CI 95% CI Ability Lower Upper Group M SE Bound Bound SD W1 403.57 7.56 388.64 418.50 96.84 W2 474.57 2.16 470.33 478.82 56.87 W3 518.49 2.39 513.79 523.19 63.25 W4 577.66 7.25 563.35 591.97 91.37 Note. W1 = the lowest self-perceived ability group to write in English; W2 = the low self- perceived ability group to write in English; W3 = the high self-perceived ability group to write in English; W4 = the highest self-perceived ability group to write in English. All possible contrasts between the different self-perceived ability groups’ level of willingness to write in English inside their ESL classroom were significant.
136 shows that students’ willingness to write in English inside their EFL classroom increased uniformly across the different self-perceived ability groups.
To further investigate the differences between the self-perceived ability groups, the mean level of willingness to write in English for each self-perceived ability group was compared to the level of willingness required to write the 16 tasks in English to the four types of interlocutors
(Table 32). The average student from the highest self-perceived ability group (W4) has a level of willingness of 577.66 WITs which means that he or she is probably willing to write all 16 tasks in English to the four types of interlocutors inside an EFL class (i.e., all 64 possible writing situations). With a level of willingness of 518.49 WITs, the average student in the high self- perceived ability group (W3) is probably willing to write in English in 61 out of the 64 writing situations. The three exceptions involved this student probably not being willing to write in
English to a Japanese student in the following tasks: “write an explanation in English about why you wanted to enter this university” (item w3); “write an account in English of your about future goals after graduating from the university” (item w4), and “write a paragraph in English describing the cause and effect of something” (item w12). The average student in the low self- perceived ability group (W2) with a level of willingness to write of 474.57 WITs is probably willing to write in English in only one writing task “write a self-introduction in English” (item w7) to an international student or a foreign teacher of English. Finally, the average student in the lowest self-perceived ability group (W1) is probably not willing to write in English in any of the
16 writing tasks to any of the four types of interlocutors because his or her level of willingness to write is only 403.57 WITs.
137 Table 32. Level of L2 Willingness Required to Write the 16 Tasks in English to the Four Types of Interlocutors Self-perceived Ability Group Willingness to Write with the Four Type of Interlocutor Types of Interlocutors Item Writing Task JS IS JT FT JS IS JT FT w1 Write a descriptive paragraph in 505 491 501 483 W3, W3, W3, W3, English about a Japanese cultural W4 W4 W4 W4 event (i.e., summer festival or holidays like New Year's). w2 Write a short report describing 487 475 482 467 W3, W3, W3, W3, your hometown in English. W4 W4 W4 W4 w3 Write an explanation in English 522 516 518 508 W4 W3, W3, W3, about why you wanted to enter W4 W4 W4 this university. w4 Write an account in English of 519 513 516 503 W4 W3, W3, W3, your about future goals after W4 W4 W4 graduating from the university. w5 Write instructions in English for 507 500 507 492 W3, W3, W3, W3, how to make your favorite dish. W4 W4 W4 W4 w6 Write a diary about your daily life 493 486 494 475 W3, W3, W3, W3, in English. W4 W4 W4 W4 w7 Write a self-introduction in 484 469 481 462 W3, W2, W3, W2, English. W4 W3, W4 W3, W4 W4 w8 Write a one-page explanation 514 505 510 496 W3, W3, W3, W3, about university life in Japan in W4 W4 W4 W4 English. w9 Write an essay in English trying to 503 489 494 475 W3, W3, W3, W3, convince someone that they W4 W4 W4 W4 should buy your favorite singer's CD. w10 Write a postcard in English 503 489 504 482 W3, W3, W3, W3, describing your last holiday. W4 W4 W4 W4 w11 Write an email in English 512 504 513 500 W3, W3, W3, W3, describing your favorite website. W4 W4 W4 W4 w13 Write a paragraph in English 519 516 515 504 W4 W3, W3, W3, describing the cause and effect of W4 W4 W4 something (i.e., how more cars cause global warming). w14 Write a short report in English 510 503 508 492 W3, W3, W3, W3, about an article or book you read. W4 W4 W4 W4 w15 Write your opinion in English 514 510 512 500 W3, W3, W3, W3, agreeing with a person's point of W4 W4 W4 W4 view. w16 Write your opinion in English 505 499 502 489 W3, W3, W3, W3, disagreeing with a person's point W4 W4 W4 W4 of view. w17 Translate a sentence from 507 507 506 495 W3, W3, W3, W3, Japanese to English. W4 W4 W4 W4 Note. JS = Japanese student; IS = international student; JT = Japanese teacher of English; FT = foreign teacher of English; W1 = the lowest self-perceived ability group to write in English; W2 = the low self-perceived ability group to write in English; W3 = the high self-perceived ability group to write in English; W4 = the highest self-perceived ability group to write in English.
138 Results of the Open-ended L2 WTC Questionnaire
Table 33 shows the six factors arose from the students’ written comments on the Open- ended WTC L2 Questionnaire. Within each factor, the students’ comments were coded as either increasing or decreasing their level of willingness to use English with the different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom and then summed into subtotals. According to the total number of times that the students mentioned the different factors, perceived L2 competence (109 times) and social distance (93 times) were the most frequently cited factors influencing their level of L2 WTC. With the exception of the classroom environment, the students reported that the other five factors increased their level of L2 WTC. The most frequently cited interlocutors that influenced students’ willingness to use English inside an EFL class were the Japanese teacher of English (126 times) and the foreign teacher of English (124 times). While students reported that foreign teachers of English typically increased their level of L2 WTC (97 times
Table 33. The Main Factors Influencing Students’ L2 WTC with the Four Types of Interlocutors Influence on Main Factors L2 WTC JS IS JT FT Subtotal Total Perceived L2 Increase 0 14 14 38 66 109 Competence Decrease 9 5 27 2 43 Classroom Increase 0 1 5 11 17 36 Environment Decrease 1 0 13 5 19 Social Increase 17 12 18 6 53 93 Distance Decrease 11 10 7 12 40 International Increase 1 15 1 9 26 31 Posture Decrease 1 2 1 1 5 Mode of Increase 2 1 13 18 34 55 Communication Decrease 3 4 7 7 21 Focus of the Increase 0 0 3 15 18 35 Teacher Decrease 0 0 17 0 17 Increase 20 43 54 97 Decrease 25 21 72 12 45 64 126 124 359 359 Note. JS = Japanese student; IS = international student; JT = Japanese teacher of English; and FT = foreign teacher of English.
139 noting an increase in L2 WTC compared to 12 times noting a decrease in L2 WTC), Japanese teachers of English had a mixed influence on students’ level of willingness to use English (54 times noting an increase in L2 WTC and 72 times noting a decrease in L2 WTC). The following sections provide a more complete account of each theme along with excerpts of students’ responses to the Open-ended L2 WTC Questionnaire.
Perceived Level of L2 Competence
Students' perceptions of their interlocutors' level of English competence was an important factor influencing their level of L2 WTC inside an EFL classroom. The main determinant of
English competence for many students was whether or not the interlocutor's first language was
English. Living for an extended period time in an English speaking country and/or actively using
English as a primary means of communication were other standards that students also mentioned.
English competence was a defining feature of students' willingness to use English with their teacher. In many students’ minds, a foreign teacher of English was synonymous with a native speaker of English. This label of native speaker led many students to believe that foreign teachers could teach them what many students referred to as “natural English.” In the case of spoken English, students frequently noted that foreign teachers could pronounce words naturally and precisely. In terms of writing, foreign teachers understood the organization of written texts and could explain how different words convey different meanings in English.
The idea of a native speaker in turn created a dichotomy in which students expressed a level of doubt concerning their Japanese teachers’ knowledge of current English. Students often characterized Japanese teachers’ use of English as being outdated, rigid, and bookish. “Japanese teacher is slightly unreliable,” one male student (S2) wrote. “For example, pronunciation may
140 not be correct or the way of speaking in English is old {fashioned}.” Another student (S4) commented that “I don't know whether the Japanese teacher was confident of the pronunciation, but he always used the tape which a foreigner recorded. And his lesson was fitting a pattern.”
These types of comments suggest that students are not only learning from their teachers, but are also evaluating their teachers’ level of competence in English.
Students’ evaluations of their teachers’ level of English competence also influenced a number of student beliefs concerning the potential for language learning inside an EFL classroom. Many students thought that foreign teachers were more able to detect subtle errors in students’ writing and they could explain how closely related words differed in meaning and use.
Japanese teachers, on the other hand, could help students overcome difficulties in English by providing them with assistance in Japanese. These beliefs also influenced students’ willingness to use English with their teachers. “Students want to speak with foreign teacher and not Japanese teachers,” wrote one female student (S4), “I think it is because they want to learn correct pronunciation {and} phrases in English.” However, one male student (S4) felt, “Japanese teachers speak slowly and clearly, but foreign teachers speak speedy and not clear. So, I think
Japanese students may be difficult to understand.” These statements not only reflect the wide range of preferences existing amongst Japanese university students, but more importantly they reveal in which types of learning situations students believe foreign and Japanese teachers of
English can be of assistance.
In the end, the difference between foreign teachers and Japanese teachers of English is a matter of degree as illustrated in this student's (S4) comment, “Though I don't say that I don't believe Japanese teacher {of English}, I believe a teacher from America more.” Underlying this statement is the importance of competence. “I thought no matter who teaches us,” wrote a female
141 student (S3), “the most important thing is how he or she makes us understand English.”
Students’ evaluations of their teachers’ level of English competence thus not only influences students’ level of willingness to use English with their teachers, but it also shapes their expectations about what teachers can do to help them develop their current level of English competence.
The Classroom Environment
Another point closely related to students’ perceptions of their teachers’ English competence is how teachers conduct their English lessons. Many students commented that foreign teachers were cheerful and their classes were seasoned with humor. "So I feel like joking too," wrote a male student (S3). Humor can, however, have a potentially negative influence on students’ WTC. One female noted (S4), “foreign teachers tend to make a fool of our mistakes.
We Japanese especially hate to humiliate ourselves.” Thus, the use of humor in an attempt to reduce students’ fear of making errors might in fact enhance some students’ level of communication anxiety and thus reduce their willingness to use English with foreign teachers.
Yet, many students also noted that communicating with a foreign teacher was the best way to receive feedback on their current level of English competence.
A number of students wrote that Japanese teachers of English are in a better position to appreciate the challenges that students face learning English as a foreign language. The use of
English and/or Japanese as the language of instruction was an example that students consistently cited to illustrate this point. In the case of foreign teachers, the predominant or the exclusive use of English sometimes left students with the feeling that they did not understand what was going on in class, which resulted in heightened feelings of communication anxiety. In this situation,
142 some students felt that a Japanese teacher would be more helpful because they could simply resolve any communication difficulties by speaking Japanese. Switching to a shared language thus provided some students with a convenient means of ensuring a comfortable classroom environment. “When I speak to a Japanese teacher, they teach my mistakes in Japanese,” wrote a female student (S4), “then I can understand it certainly.” Another student (S4) recounted his decision not to enter a commercial English conversation school because “when I have thing that I want the teachers to teach me, I cannot tell the teachers who cannot speak Japanese what I wanted.”
Japanese teachers can also provide students with immediate situation specific feedback to help advance the students’ current level of English. “If we don't know a word that we want to say, we can ask in Japanese,” mentioned one female student (S3), “we can {thus} compensate for our lack of vocabulary.” The overuse of Japanese inside an EFL classroom can, however, be problematic. One male student (S3) commented that a previous English course taught entirely in
Japanese was “understandable, but it was unsatisfactory.” In contrast, the experience of attending a course conducted in English by a foreign teacher led one female student to write, “It was difficult for me to understand what he said. However, I think that {my} English capacity has improved.” The challenge of a communication situation that is beyond a students’ current level of English competence might thus initially undermine students' level of L2 WTC, but it might also help to improve their willingness to communicate in the long run.
Instructional materials and pedagogical practices that teachers utilize in their English class also had a substantial influence upon students’ level of L2 WTC. One female student (W2) wrote, “the textbook I used when I was in junior high school was full of boring sentences. {For example}, This is a pen. I like apples very much. I thought will I really use such sentences?”
143 This disconnect between students’ self-perceived needs and course materials thus reduced some students’ willingness to use English. Moreover, this type of instructional material solidified the idea that English is a subject to be studied rather than a means of communication. English instruction that provided limited participation opportunities or drill-like practice also reduced students’ willingness to engage in the class activities. For example, one female student (W3) wrote, “I look back to Japanese teacher’s writing class then I was bored because teacher asks students to only read a sentence and answer a question.” From the perspective of many students, classes taught by foreign teachers provided them with different ways to participate. “Through a variety of games and assignments,” wrote a male student (S2), “we can think about English hard or enjoy it.” In sum, students’ beliefs about the potential for language development mediate the relationship between opportunities for L2 use inside a language classroom and students’ willingness to use English in these opportunities.
Social Distance
From the students’ perspective, the relative social distance between themselves and their interlocutor often influenced their relationship with that person. Many students defined social distance very broadly to include a number of factors such as age, ethnicity, and relative social position. The combination of these factors in turn influenced not only how the students perceived their interlocutors inside an EFL classroom, but also their willingness to use English with them.
The students generally felt that the greatest degree of social distance was between themselves and their teachers. “Their age and my parents’ age is about the same,” wrote a male student (S2),
“so I think they can’t understand what I have interested in.” Communication with the teacher also involves a certain level of formality and respect, which sometimes reduced students’
144 willingness to use English. “Really, teachers are hard to deal with for me,” a female student (S4) wrote, “For example, I could not write to them honestly and could not speak small talk to teachers in junior high school.” Interactions with foreign teachers of English were also problematic for some students because they had the impression that teacher-student interactions are a form of evaluation. In other words, a communication situation that is best avoided.
There is, however, an interesting contrast between students’ responses to the Open-ended
L2 WTC Questionnaire and the L2 WTC Questionnaire. Although a number of students identified that social distance reduced their willingness to use English with teachers, students in highest self-perceived speaking ability group (S4) and the high self-perceived speaking ability group (S3) reported that they would be more willing to speak in English to a foreign teacher of
English. Students in the lowest self-perceived speaking group (S1) also reported a higher level of willingness to speak English to a Japanese teacher of English. The highest self-perceived writing ability group (W4), the low self-perceived writing ability group (W2), and the lowest self- perceived writing ability group (W1) also reported a higher level of willingness to write in
English to teachers. One possible explanation for these contrasting findings might be that inside an EFL classroom there is an expectation that students would use English with their teachers.
Thus, expected roles of students and teachers inside of a language classroom might counteract the influence that social distance has upon students’ level of willingness to use English with teachers. Yet, it is also interesting to note that there are a number of other self-perceived ability groups that were not as willing to speak or write in English to their teachers inside of an EFL classroom. This variability thus highlights the difficulty of identify particular features within a communicative context that uniformly influence students’ level of willingness.
145 In terms of social distance, students felt closest to other Japanese students. Their shared cultural and educational backgrounds put many students at ease, especially when it came to L2 use. A majority of the students thought that Japanese students had roughly the same L2 proficiency level and thus they were not worried to make mistakes because errors in L2 use are to be expected. A shared L1 also enhanced some students’ sense of security when speaking and writing to other Japanese students. One female student (S3) noted, "if I don't know what he or she said, I can ask in Japanese." However, many students also thought communicating in English with other Japanese students does not help advance their level of English competency. “When we try new thing, we ask an upper advice, {we} don't ask a person at the same level” wrote one female student (S2), “that is because we know the answer of upper person is superior to same level or lower level.” In contrast, some students saw some value in communicating with their
Japanese peers because it provided them with an opportunity to practice what they already knew.
“We practice speaking with friends,” wrote a female (S4) student, “but we learn things from the teacher.”
Another reason often cited for a lack of willingness to use English with other Japanese students was that it seemed unnatural. “There is not necessity to talk {in English} with
Japanese,” wrote one female student (S3), “For example, people who ask me for directions are not Japanese. So I should be able to talk to a foreigner.” Stated more strongly, a male student
(S2) wrote, “here is Japan so we have only to talk in Japanese. Talking in Japanese is more convenient for us to communicate.” The convenience of speaking Japanese also reinforces many students’ belief that English is a very restrictive means of communication. “I don't speak English very well,” commented one male student (S2), “I am ashamed to speak English when I talk to friends. I want to speak {about} my favorite soccer player, I can appeal more detail in Japanese
146 than in English.” The disparity between what this student wanted to tell his peers and his lack of ability to do so in English creates a communication situation that is not only frustrating, but also lowers students’ willingness to use English with their peers.
In the case of international students, many Japanese students wrote that they were more willing to use English to bridge gaps in understanding because they did not share a common L1.
International students also represented an opportunity for Japanese students to learn from a more proficient user of English. “When I talk to a foreign student and if I am not able to express my thinking well,” wrote a male student (S3) “he or she gives me more advice than Japanese students.” Yet, communicating in English to an international student seemed insurmountable for some students like this male student (S3) who thought, "it is hard for me to make gestures. I am ashamed to make gesture to foreign student” and this female student (S3) who commented, “I care about whether I can speak well to the person whose mother tongue is not Japanese. I am afraid that I won't be able to make the person understand my poor English.” Thus, international students represent an interesting mix of opportunity and challenge. The lack of a common L1 created a communicative situation in the EFL classroom that many Japanese students thought was authentic and natural and that could help them advance their level of English competence.
However, some students' fears about their ability to successfully communicate with international students in English undermined their willingness to do so.
International Posture
The nationality of one's interlocutor was another factor that Japanese students identified as influencing their level of willingness to use English. Many Japanese students felt that classes taught by a teacher and/or attended by students from overseas created an opportunity to use
147 English for cultural exchange. One male student wrote, “speaking and writing in English with
Japanese {people} is not very interesting because Japanese people have the same view. I want to listen to foreign students {talk about} their country food and their special experience and I want to know how they think about Japan.” The potential for cultural exchange inside an EFL classroom also provided Japanese university students with an opportunity to talk about Japan and its customs. However, some students commented that it is extremely challenging to explain certain facets of Japanese culture such as the summer festival season if their international interlocutor had never experienced one of these cultural events.
The presence of non-Japanese in the language classroom also provided some students with a tangible reason to study English. As one female student (S3) wrote, “we have few opportunities to use English except for English lessons. So when we meet foreigners, we hit the idea that we must use English somehow.” International students and foreign teachers of English thus personify the abstract idea of Japan becoming a member of a global community that uses
English. Positive experiences using English in a foreign country also contributed to higher levels of willingness amongst Japanese students. "When my friend and I went to England in summer vacation, we tried speaking English and somebody understood what we would like to tell," a female student recounted, "then we were glad and decided to speak more next time." An interest in people from other countries and the possibility of cultural exchange thus not only increased
Japanese students’ willingness to use English, but also represented a shift in students’ purpose for using English inside an EFL classroom. English was no longer a foreign language to be studied, but rather it provided a medium that allows for cultural exchange.
148 Mode of Communication
Students’ willingness to use English with different types of interlocutors also varied considerably according to the mode of communication. A majority of students were more willing to speak English because they believed that successful oral interactions did not require a high level of English competence compared to written English. If they encountered difficulty in a spoken interaction, students could use gestures or rely upon their interlocutor's L2 competence to communicate more effectively. The temporal and dynamic nature of spoken interactions also reduced many students' concern for grammatical accuracy, which in turn led to higher levels of willingness to speak English with foreign and Japanese teachers of English. The tempo of oral interactions was, however, problematic for some students with one male student (S3) mentioning his great difficulty with “machine gun speaking by foreign teachers.” Although some students preferred to speak to Japanese teachers of English because they speak English slowly and clearly, many other students commented that Japanese teachers’ pronunciation of English was a significant issue. One student (S2) wrote about her junior high school teacher who consistently spoke katakana English, a spoken form of English that which heavily relies upon the Japanese phonological system. Some students also commented that foreign accents were sometimes very difficult to understand and thus influenced their willingness to speak with international students.
Japanese university students’ level of willingness to speak English thus involves a number of performance-based factors that include not only their own ability to speak but also their ability to understand their interlocutor in a real-time interaction.
Writing in English, in contrast, liberated some Japanese students from the performance pressures of spoken interactions. “Writing is faceless,” one female student (W3) wrote, “what is in front of me is paper, so I can write freely.” Writing also affords time for students to think
149 about what they want to write and review what they have written before presenting it to their intended audience. The permanence of writing does, however, increase some students’ level of communication anxiety. One female student (W3) wrote, “I would rather write to a Japanese teacher of English or Japanese student than an international student or foreign teacher because written English remains on paper, so if I write mistake English, reader will find it and read there again and again. I don't like it.”
The Focus of Teachers’ Feedback
Once the act of communication commenced, many students were very sensitive to the type of feedback that they received from their teachers about their L2 use. When it came to receiving feedback on their writing, many students thought that there was a substantial difference between Japanese and foreign teachers of English. Japanese teachers’ comments tended to be seen as more critical and negative, whereas foreign teachers’ comments were thought to be more encouraging. For example, a male student (W4) commented that a Japanese teacher might write,
“This sentence is too short” compared to a foreign teacher assessment of "Wow, nice sentence, but you should write more details that will be better.”
Many students also commented that Japanese teachers are preoccupied with grammatical accuracy. One male student (W3) wrote that his teachers “check only grammar and they don't check what I wanted to tell them.” The perceived search for grammatical errors caused many students to be more cautious about what they wrote in order to avoid the situation as one student
(W1) described, “when I mistake grammar of English, I make Japanese teacher angry.” Many students reflected upon their English studies in junior and senior high school as being the time when Japanese teachers were the most severe about grammatical accuracy. The intense focus on
150 grammatical accuracy also shaped the students’ perceptions about their English proficiency. One female student (W3) commented that, “Maybe we haven’t done writing in English. What we learned before was grammar, memorizing, idioms and reading. They are the things that Japanese teachers taught us.” Stressing the importance of grammatical accuracy also led some students to feel that their Japanese teachers of English were too rigid. An illustrative example is a female student's (W3) account of how homework requiring students to translate sentences from Japanese into English was corrected in class, “though we answered in our {own} way, the teacher showed one answer and the question was dropped.” This approach left the impression that there is only one acceptable way to write in English and/or the teacher did not have the competence to illustrate the possibility of alternative answers.
Students’ impressions of feedback from foreign teachers of English were considerably different. Many students characterized foreign teachers' feedback as being more comprehensive because they considered the content, the length, and the overall quality of the composition in addition to grammatical accuracy. The use of various criteria led a male student (W3) to comment that, “even if there is no mistake, we expect that a more exact expression or description will be taught.” Thus, the goal of accuracy remains important for students, but it is redefined as a concern for target-like use. This shift in perspective also had a positive influence on students’ level of willingness to write in English. As one male student (W3) wrote, “I can frame my expression, this is interesting for me. So I want to communicate with them positively. ”
Summary of the Results
Table 34 lists this study’s six research questions, the analyses used to answer each research question, and the results of the study.
151 Table 34. Summary of the Results Research Questions Analysis Results 1. To what extent does Japanese Profile Analysis: A significant and meaningful difference F(3,1709) = university students’ level of Levels Hypothesis 226.62, p < .001, partial η2 = .285, power = 1.00. willingness to speak in English inside an EFL classroom vary Post Hoc Analysis Significant differences found between each self- according to their level of self- and an Inspection perceived group’s willingness to speak in English: S1 perceived L2 communicative of Willingness (M = 444.01), S2 (M = 497.37), S3 (M = 536.55), and competence? Probabilities S4 (M = 588.94).
The average S1 student is probably willing to speak in one out of the 64 communication situations on the L2 WTC Questionnaire; the average S2 student is probably willing in 26 out of the 64 communication situations; the average S3 student is probably willing to speak in 59 out of the 64 communication situations, and the average S4 student is probably willing to speak in all of the 64 communication situations.
2. To what extent does Japanese Profile Analysis: A significant difference, but the effect size is minimal university students’ level of Flatness F(3,5127) = 11.58, p < .001, partial η2 = .007, power willingness to speak in English to Hypothesis = 1.00. different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom vary Content Analysis Importance of perceived L2 communicative regardless of their level of self- competence of a potential interlocutor, classroom perceived L2 communicative environment, social distance, international posture, and competence? mode of communication.
3. To what extent does Japanese Profile Analysis: A significant difference, but the effect size is minimal university students’ level of Test of F(9,5127) = 10.93, p < .001, partial η2 = .019, power willingness to speak in English to Parallelism = 1.00. different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom vary Follow-up The highest self-perceived ability group was more according to their level of self- Interaction- willing to speak to foreign students and teachers of perceived L2 communicative Contrast Analysis English (S4) F(1,1711) = 6.82, p < .001, partial η2 competence? = .004, power = .74. The lowest self-perceived ability group was more willing to speak with Japanese students and Japanese teachers of English F(1,1711) = 55.71, p < .001, partial η2 = .032, power = 1.00. Table 34 continues
152 Table 34. (continued) 4. To what extent does Japanese Profile Analysis: A significant and meaningful difference F(3,1709) = university students’ level of Levels Hypothesis 226.60, p < .001, partial η2 = 0.285, power = 1.00. willingness to write in English inside an EFL classroom vary Post Hoc Analysis Significant differences found between each self- according to their level of self- and an Inspection perceived group’s willingness to write in English: perceived L2 communicative of Willingness W1 (M = 403.57), W2 (M = 474.57), W3 (M = competence? Probabilities 518.49), and W4 (M = 577.66).
The average W1 student is probably not willing to write in English in any of the communication situations on the L2 WTC Questionnaire; the average W2 student is probably willing to write in one communication situation; the average W3 student is probably willing to write in 61 out of the 64 communication situations, and the average W4 student is probably willing to write in all of the 64 communication situations. 5. To what extent does Japanese Profile Analysis: A significant difference, but the effect size is minimal university students’ level of Flatness F(3,5127) = 8.53, p < .001, partial η2 = .005, power willingness to write in English to Hypothesis = 0.99. different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom vary regardless of their level of self- Content Analysis Importance of perceived L2 communicative perceived L2 communicative competence of a potential interlocutor, classroom competence? environment, mode of communication, and focus of teacher feedback.
6. To what extent does Japanese Profile Analysis: A significant difference, but the effect size is minimal university students’ level of Test of F(9,5127) = 3.13, p < .001, partial η2 = .005, power willingness to write in English to Parallelism = 0.98. different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom vary according to their level of self- perceived L2 communicative competence?
Conclusion
In this chapter, the analyses used to answer the research questions posed in this study have been presented. A summary of the research questions and the related results was presented in Table 34. A discussion of these results and their implications for L2 WTC research and L2 pedagogy is presented in the next chapter.
153 CHAPTER 7
DISCUSSION
A discussion of the findings reported in Chapter 6 is presented in this chapter. The discussion is focused on the research questions posed in this study from the perspective of the two measures used to determine students’ willingness to use English with different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom. An interpersonal account of L2 willingness to communicate is then introduced and explained drawing upon this study’s findings. Next, the pedagogical implications of the study are discussed and some suggestions for teachers who are interested in increasing their students’ L2 WTC are provided. The chapter closes with a summary of the main points of this discussion.
Key Points Arising from the L2 WTC Questionnaire
The statistical analyses of the students’ responses to the L2 WTC Questionnaire provide a number of insights into how Japanese university students’ self-perceived level of L2 communicative competence interacts with their level of willingness to speak and write in English to different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom. These insights are best addressed by first examining the well-investigated interaction between L2 WTC and self-perceived L2 ability followed by the more involved interaction of L2 WTC, self-perceived L2 ability, and the interlocutor effect.
154 The Interaction Between Self-perceived L2 Communicative Competence and L2 WTC
Previous L2 WTC research has used correlation analysis (e.g., Baker & MacIntyre, 2000), structure equation modeling (e.g., Yashima, 2002; Yashima et al., 2004), and regression analyses
(e.g., MacIntyre et al., 2003; MacIntyre & Charos, 1996) to find a largely positive relationship existing between self-perceived L2 ability and L2 WTC. The present study takes a slightly different approach in order to determine the extent to which L2 WTC varies amongst learners who perceive themselves as having different levels of L2 communicative competence. This line of research is similar to the investigation carried out by MacIntyre, Baker, Clément, and
Donovan (2002). However, the present study utilizes a direct measure of self-perceived L2 communicative competence as opposed to the inferential measure used by MacIntyre and colleagues that equated hypothesized increases in L2 ability to the grade level of 268 Canadian
French immersion students. Although the researchers found a statistically significant increase in
L2 self-perceived competence between students in grades 7 and 8 as well as students in grades 7 and 9, there was no significant difference between students in grades 8 and 9. These findings thus suggest that self-perceived L2 communicative competence does not necessarily increase as students progress in their language studies. As such, the present study’s use of a direct measure of self-perceived L2 communicative competence helps clarify that for Japanese university students there is a significant and meaningful difference in students’ level of L2 WTC according to their level of self-perceived L2 communicative competence. The established positive relationship between self-perceived L2 communicative competence and L2 WTC, however, ensures a statistically significant result with the test of parallelism because the grouping variable
(i.e., self-perceived L2 communicative competence) is an artifact of the dependant variable (i.e.,
155 L2 WTC). As a result, the significant and meaningful differences found between the different self-perceived ability groups should not be surprising.
This study also makes an important contribution in that self-perceived L2 communicative competence was found to be a significant factor not only for spoken interactions, which L2 WTC research has predominately addressed, but also for written communication. This finding thus helps broaden the scope of the L2 WTC model beyond speaking to other language skills. The use of the Rasch measurement model in this study also allows for the direct comparison between
Japanese university students’ willingness to speak and write in English. The results indicated that these students’ overall willingness to speak in English was slightly higher than their willingness to write in English. One possible explanation for this difference is that writing is a more permanent artifact of students’ L2 language competence. As such, the thought that a written error in English can be read and re-read might dramatically reduce students’ willingness to write.
Speaking in English, on the other hand, is potentially more fluid in nature. As a result, a spoken error might go unnoticed in the flow of conversation. The act of writing can also be a daunting task that draws upon multiple language competencies (e.g., Hirose & Sasaki, 1994). For example in writing, students need to provide the context of their message. They cannot rely upon strategies that are available in spoken interactions such as situational cues or gestures to help them bridge gaps in their current level of L2 competence. As a result, Japanese university students, who are in the process of learning English as a foreign language, might be more willing to speak in English simply because they might perceive it as being an easier means of communication to successfully convey their ideas to another person compared to writing in
English.
156 The Interlocutor Effect on Students’ Willingness to Use English
The statistical analyses of the students’ responses to the L2 WTC Questionnaire revealed that different types of interlocutors influenced Japanese students’ level of willingness to speak and write in English. The interlocutor effect is persuasive in that students’ level of L2 WTC with different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom varied significantly for the entire student population (i.e., the flatness hypothesis) as well as for the different sub-groups of students based upon their self-perceived level of L2 communicative competence (i.e., the levels hypothesis). In general, Japanese university students’ reported that they were more willing to speak and write in
English to a foreign teacher of English, followed by an international student, followed by a
Japanese teacher of English, and finally to another Japanese student. The examination of the interaction between students’ level of self-perceived L2 communicative competence and their level of L2 WTC with the four types of interlocutors, however, provides a more refined account of the interlocutor effect.
The Interlocutor Effect on Students’ Willingness to Speak in English
In terms of students’ willingness to speak in English to the four types of interlocutors, two distinctive patterns of willingness were found for students who had the lowest and the highest levels of self-perceived L2 communicative competence. The least confident students (S1) were more willing to speak in English to other Japanese students and Japanese teachers of
English than to international students and foreign teachers of English. This preference might ultimately reflect a perceived need to be able to communicate in a shared L1 in order to resolve misunderstandings and/or ask questions about English. Previous researchers investigating the language related episodes have found that L1 use can effectively help students to attend and
157 bridge gaps in their developing L2 communicative competence (Swain & Lapkin, 2000) without requiring students to negotiate meaning in their L2 over a series of conversation turns in an interaction (e.g., Mackey, Gass, & McDonough, 2000), which also can be potentially frustrating for students.
The least confident group of students’ higher level of willingness to speak in English to interlocutors who share the same L1 also provides some empirical support of Medgyes’ (1992) argument that language teachers with an in-depth knowledge of the students’ L1 can be an empathetic and valuable source of information for students. In practical terms, Japanese teachers of English can enhance their students’ L2 learning situation and their willingness to use their L2 by using the shared L1 to teach grammar and abstract vocabulary, establish teacher-student rapport, and explain task procedures or background information (e.g., Árva & Medgyes, 2000;
Cook, 2001; Liu, Ahn, Baek, & Han, 2004).
At the opposite end of the self-perceived L2 communicative competence spectrum, students with very high levels of confidence (S4) were found to be more willing to speak in
English to an international student and a foreign teacher of English. These very confident students might feel that they have acquired a relatively high level of L2 communicative competence, which allows them to successfully use English without having to rely upon a common L1. The social context of the present investigation might also be another influential factor. It is possible that the highest self-perceived students believe that international students and foreign teachers of English might provide them with rare opportunities to interact with a proficient user of English inside an EFL classroom and thus an opportunity to further their current level of English competence and/or cultural knowledge.
158 The Interlocutor Effect on Students’ Willingness to Write in English
Interestingly, these two patterns of willingness to communicate are not apparent in the students’ willingness to write in English to different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom. Although a statistically significant interaction was found between students’ willingness to write in English to different types of interlocutors and their level of self-perceived
L2 communicative competence, follow-up interaction-contrast analyses were unable to pinpoint distinctive patterns of willingness among the different student groups. One possible explanation is that the act of writing in English is challenging for all students regardless of their level of self- perceived L2 communicative competence. As such, their level of willingness to write in English to different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom does not exhibit the distinct patterns of willingness found with students’ willingness to speak. In short, the level of L2 competence and effort required to write in English might mediate the influence of an interlocutor effect upon students’ willingness to write in English.
The Interlocutor Effect on the Average Students’ L2 WTC
An examination of the level of willingness required by the 16 speaking situations/tasks and 16 writing tasks on the L2 WTC Questionnaire compared to the average student’s level of
L2 WTC from each of the self-perceived ability groups revealed a slightly different account of how different types of interlocutors might influence students’ level of willingness to use English.
Unlike the other statistical analyses used in this study, which used overall measures of students’ willingness to speak and write in English, this examination focuses upon specific speaking situations/tasks and writing tasks inside of an EFL classroom. Consequently, the results from this macro perspective are slightly at odds with the findings of the other statistical analyses.
159
The Interlocutor Effect on the Average Students’ Willingness to Speak in English
In terms of students’ willingness to speak in English to the four types of interlocutors, the study’s main statistical analyses (i.e., the test of parallelism and the follow-up interaction- contrast analysis) indicated that students in the highest (S4) and the lowest (S1) self-perceived ability groups had significantly higher levels of willingness to speak in English to certain types of interlocutors. This pattern of willingness, however, was not as evident when the average student from each of these self-perceived ability groups was examined. For example, the average student from the highest self-perceived ability group (S4) has a level L2 WTC (588.94 WITs) that surpasses the level of L2 willingness to communicate required of all 16 speaking situations/tasks with all four types of interlocutors. However, at the group level, students from the highest self-perceived ability group (S4) reported higher levels of willingness to speak with international students and foreign teachers of English than with Japanese students and Japanese teachers of English.
The incongruence between these two findings is a poignant reminder of how individual differences such as the willingness to communicate construct can be characterized from different points of views. Examining willingness to communicate from an individual’s perspective reveals how the interlocutor effect varies across different speaking situations/tasks especially for the average student in the low (S2) and the high (S3) self-perceived L2 ability groups. The average student in the high self-perceived L2 ability group (S3) has a level of L2 WTC that surpasses the level of L2 willingness to communicate required of the majority of speaking situations/tasks with the four types of interlocutors. However, two transactional speaking tasks provide some interesting exceptions. For example, the average student in the high self-perceived L2 ability
160 group (S3) is probably willing to “translate a spoken utterance from Japanese to English” (item s7) only with a foreign teacher of English. This preference is notable considering that translation is a common teaching technique used by Japanese teachers of English in junior high school, senior high school, and university English education (e.g., Gorsuch, 1998), which suggests that previous experience in a particular communicative situation/task does not necessarily lead to higher levels of L2 willingness. This selective willingness also suggests that the communicative purpose of translating a spoken utterance from Japanese into English might influence students’ level of L2 WTC. If the act of translation is perceived as a method of instruction, students’ might be less willing than when they perceive that their interlocutor does not know what something means in Japanese and thus requires a translation into English.
Another example of selective L2 willingness is that the average student from the high self-perceived ability group (S3) is also probably willing to “do a role-play standing in front of the class in English” (item s11) only with an international student or a foreign teacher of English.
This preference suggests that students might be mindful of their interlocutor’s level of L2 communicative competence as a potential resource to help them successfully participate in a particular communicative situation/task.
In terms of the low self-perceived ability group (S2), the average student is willing to speak in English to the four types of interlocutors in five out of the 16 speaking tasks/situations.
Four of these speaking tasks/situations typically do not require students to use English for an extended period of time in interactional speech situations such as greeting someone (item s1) and saying thank-you (item s2) and classroom English situations such as asking for repetition (item s14), or asking the meaning of a word (item s15). The interlocutor effect also did not influence the average student’s level of L2 WTC in transactional speech situation where the use of English
161 is fairly controlled as in the case of “read out a two-way dialogue in English from the textbook”
(item s6).
The average student in the low self-perceived ability group (S2), however, was selective in their level of willingness to speak in English to particular interlocutors in five communicative situations featuring transactional speech. When students had to “interview someone asking questions from the textbook (item s9), a foreign teacher of English was the preferred interlocutor.
An international student or a foreign teacher of English was the preferred interlocutors when students had to “interview someone in English asking your own original questions” (item s8) and
“give a short speech in English about your hometown with notes” (item s12). These preferences provide empirical support to McCroskey and Richmond’s (1990) argument that WTC might become more relevant when people encounter communicative situations that are unfamiliar or deviate from their habitual actions. Within an EFL classroom, an unfamiliar communicative situation can manifest itself as an opportunity for international exchange with an interlocutor from another country.
For the average student in the lowest self-perceived group (S1), the interlocutor effect had a clear impact in that this student is probably willing to speak only to a foreign teacher of
English to “say thank you in English when someone lends you a pen” (item s2). Willingness in this particular interactional speech situation might reveal the conditions in which a student with very low self-perceived L2 ability might feel the desire or need to use English inside an EFL classroom. In the case of lending a pen, this communicative situation unfolds as an adjacency pair sequence in which the first turn of the interaction (i.e., offering the pen) requires a second turn from the recipient (i.e., either accepting or declining the offer). The requirement to respond to an offer might at first seem to violate the volitional condition that underlies the willingness to
162 communicate construct. Clément, Baker, and MacIntyre (2003), for example, have noted that L2
WTC might not influence people’s L2 behavior in communicative situations when there is an expectation to use one particular language over another. In the case of accepting the offer of someone lending a pen, however, a student can choose from a number of relevant responses ranging from use of body language (i.e., nodding) to saying thank you in either Japanese or
English. The probable willingness of the average student from the lowest self-perceived ability group (S1) to use English when accepting an offer of a pen from a foreign teacher of English, however, reveals that within this particular communicative situation the student not only actively chooses how to respond to the offer, but also that choice involves some reflection concerning what type of response would be most appropriate considering one’s interlocutor. In the case of a foreign teacher of English as the interlocutor, there is a relative power difference between the student and the teacher that might encourage the student towards a verbal response to an offer made by the teacher. Moreover, the student might also think that a foreign teacher of English might not understand an acceptance spoken in Japanese and thus saying thank you in English, which in itself requires the student only to hold the conversation floor momentarily, might underlie the probable willingness of the average student from the lowest self-perceived ability group (S1) to speak in English to a foreign teacher of English.
In summary, the probable willingness of the average students from the different self- perceived L2 ability groups to speak in English to the four types of interlocutors reveals how specific conditions within the 16 different speaking tasks/situations that might heighten a student’s awareness of their interlocutor. In some communicative situations when there is a gap in L2 linguistic or cultural knowledge, the average student from the low (S2) and the high self-
163 perceived ability groups (S3), for example, are probably more willing to speak in English to an international student or a foreign teacher of English.
The Interlocutor Effect on the Average Students’ Willingness to Write in English
Similar to willingness to speak in English, the average student in the highest self- perceived ability group (W4) is probably willing to write 16 tasks in English to the four different interlocutors. In contrast, there was no combination of writing task and interlocutor where the average student in the lowest self-perceived ability group (W1) is willing to write in English.
This unwillingness might reflect a larger threshold of L2 communicative competence required for written communication. This higher threshold might also be an underlying factor leading to the average student from the low perceived ability group (W2) being probably willing to write only one out of the 16 possible tasks. The average student is also selective in that he or she is probably willing to “write a self-introduction in English” (item W7) to an international student or a foreign teacher of English. This preference suggests that the task of introducing oneself to an interlocutor who shares a common L1 undermines the need to use English.
The interlocutor effect upon students’ willingness to write in English is also apparent in the reluctance of the average student from the high self-perceived ability group (W3) to write to a Japanese student in three writing tasks. Two of these tasks were required students to divulge personal information about why they selected the university and what their future plans are after graduation. Within the Japanese educational context where students typically write entrance examinations at multiple universities hoping to gain acceptance to their first choice, it is possible that a student wanted to attend another university but could not pass the entrance examination; thus, their final selection was not a matter of choice. Students might therefore not be willing to
164 share this information with other students. In addition, an increasingly difficult job market in
Japan that awaits students once they graduate university can also reduce their willingness to share future plans with other Japanese students.
The average student from the high self-perceived ability group (W3) is also probably not willing to write a paragraph in English describing the cause and effect of something to a
Japanese student. This unwillingness to write in English to a Japanese student might reflect students’ belief that other Japanese students have relatively the same level of L2 competence and thus might not have the rhetorical knowledge required of this academic-orientated writing task or the ability to provide feedback on their L2 writing.
The Effect Size of the Interlocutor Effect on Students’ L2 WTC
Despite the various findings arising from the quantitative analyses of the students’ responses to the L2 WTC Questionnaire suggesting that different types of interlocutors influence students’ level of willingness to speak and write in English, it is important to interpret these findings cautiously because of the small effect sizes that accompany the significant interactions between students’ self-perceived level of L2 ability and their willingness to speak and write in
English to four types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom. Thus it could be argued that while a statistically significant result was found in the Japanese university students’ level of willingness to use English with the four types of interlocutors, this finding might not be practically very significant compared to other factors such as task type, which produced a wide range of willingness levels amongst the students.
The interlocutor effect seems to be more salient for certain types of students. Revisiting
Figures 12 and 13 reveals that the interlocutor effect is most apparent with students who
165 compose in the highest and the lowest self-perceived ability groups, which represent 33% of the respondents in this study. It is thus possible that a quantitatively unimpressive effect size might have some practical implications (Rosenthal, Rosnow, & Rubin, 2000). One means of determining the practical importance of an effect size is to survey other L2 WTC studies.
Unfortunately, there are few studies that report effect sizes despite recent calls to researchers on necessity of doing so (Norris & Ortega, 2001). Two L2 WTC studies that report the effect sizes associated with willingness to communicate are small according to Cohen’s (1988) standard (i.e., less than 0.1). Baker and MacIntyre (2000), for example, found that the effect size for the effect of immersion and nonimmersion language instruction on L2 WTC to be 0.04. MacIntyre and colleagues (2002) found that the effect size for the effect of grade level on L2 WTC to be 0.05 and the effect size for the effect of the interaction of grade level and sex on L2 WTC to be 0.03.
These small effect sizes along with the ones found in this study suggest on the surface that L2
WTC might have little practical importance for language learners. Future L2 WTC studies must thus employ a research design that incorporates students’ actual use of their L2 in order to reveal the practical importance of L2 WTC.
In the context of this study, relying solely upon the quantitative analyses of the students’ responses to the L2 WTC Questionnaire, the interlocutor effect might appear to be an afterthought compared to students’ level of self-perceived communicative competence. As one student noted, “It doesn’t matter who it is. I can’t speak English.” Students’ responses to the open-ended questionnaire, however, provide a more comprehensive account of the variety of different factors that influence their willingness to use English with different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom.
166 Key Points Arising from the Open-ended L2 WTC Questionnaire
Unlike the L2 WTC Questionnaire, the open-ended questionnaire provided students with an opportunity to reflect not only upon their willingness to engage in various speaking and writing tasks/situations, but also to consider how different types of interlocutors affect the manner in which these tasks/situations unfold inside an EFL classroom. The questionnaire was also useful in identifying the types of expectations and opportunities for language use and language learning that arose from these tasks/situations. These different factors can be organized into three interlocking spheres that influence students’ willingness to use English with another person inside an EFL classroom. Figure 18 shows these three spheres of influence and how they relate to each other.
Figure 18. Three realms of influence mediating students’ WTC with different interlocutors inside an EFL classroom.
The first sphere of influence represents the factors internal to students that influence their level of willingness. Self-perceived communicative competence and communicative anxiety, for example, have been found to consistently influence L2 WTC. The second sphere is the factors that students observe in their potential interlocutor(s), which in turn influences their level of willingness to use English. These factors include, but are not limited to the interlocutor’s level
167 L2 competence, nationality, and relative social status within the classroom. The third sphere of influence involves the students’ expectation(s) of what might arise from an interaction with a particular interlocutor. Expectations might include, but once again are not limited to, the chance for cultural exchange or the opportunity to develop one’s current level of L2 communicative competence.
These spheres of influence do not necessarily have the same importance. Certain spheres are more salient for some students compared to others. The importance of these spheres might also vary across different communicative situations, interlocutors, and over time. However, these different spheres of influence when considered together comprise an interpersonal conception of the willingness to communicate model.
Conception of Oneself as an L2 User
Similar to previous L2 WTC research involving Japanese students (e.g., Yashima, 2002;
Yashima et al., 2004), student responses to the Open-ended L2 WTC Questionnaire highlighted the importance of self-perceived L2 communicative competence. However, the relative importance of L2 competence in many cases was mediated by the demands of the communicative task or situation. For example, some students noted that they were less willing to speak in English because of the speed of spoken interactions. Writing, on the other hand, afforded these students more time to compose what they wanted to write and thus they were more willing to write in English. Yet, there was another group of students with exactly the opposite opinion. They were more willing to speak in English because if they made a mistake, it might go unnoticed; whereas a written mistake seemed to them to be a permanent record of their
168 lack of L2 competence. Self-perceived communicative competence thus has two important aspects.
The first aspect concerns students’ self-perceived ability to successfully complete a given communicative task/situation in their L2. The second involves students’ willingness to reveal their current level of L2 competence to potential interlocutors. Kang (2005) also found a similar sentiment in her study of four Korean students studying English in America. One student mentioned that he was least willing to speak in English in front of other Korean students because he was ashamed of his English ability. Together these findings suggest a need for a more comprehensive account of self-perceived L2 communicative competence that not only articulates the relationship between communicative competence and communicative anxiety, but also incorporates an interactive component concerning students’ willingness to reveal their current level of L2 competence to others.
Conception of One’s Interlocutor as an L2 User
One of the most interesting findings arising from this study is the degree to which students’ evaluated their potential interlocutors. The students’ responses to the Open-ended L2
WTC Questionnaire revealed that they were primarily concerned with their interlocutor’s level of
English competence. This evaluation, in turn, influenced their willingness to speak and write in
English to different types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom. Considering that these
Japanese students were in the process of developing their current level of English communicative competence, many of them expressed higher levels of willingness to use English with interlocutors who they perceived as having a high level of L2 competence. This expectation was also the source of friction between Japanese students and Japanese teachers of English. A
169 number of students criticized their teachers’ level of English competence, especially those who taught English at junior and senior high school. The perceived lack of L2 competence not only reduced many students’ willingness to use English with their Japanese teacher of English, but also undermined their confidence in their teachers and what they studied in English class.
Student perceptions about their teachers’ level of L2 competence naturally leads to the widespread debate concerning the difference between nonnative and native speakers of English
(e.g., Milambiling, 2000). This study provides two points of consideration that are relevant to language instruction inside an EFL context. First, L2 competence does not simply define a teacher’s knowledge or the ability to use an L2. It also includes the ability to convey this knowledge in an understandable and engaging way to students. This latter component of L2 competence is an essential feature in Bailey’s (2002) conceptualization of needed skill areas for nonnative language teachers (shown in Figure 19).
Figure 19. Continua of target language proficiency and professional preparation. From “Declarative knowledge, procedural knowledge, and the varieties of English we teach” by K. Bailey, 2002, NNEST Newsletter, 4(2), p. 3.
For Japanese teachers of English, their ability to use the students’ L1 in times of need might be a language competency that can enhance opportunities for L2 learning. In this study,
170 the possibility of student and teacher switching into a shared L1 was the basis of some students’ belief that Japanese teachers of English were in a more advantageous position to help them than foreign teachers of English. The possibility of being able to switch to a shared L1 is also a likely factor that explains why students who have low levels of L2 communicative competence were found to be more willing to speak in English with Japanese English teachers.
The second point arising from this research is the danger of overgeneralizing perceptions of a particular individual to a larger group of individuals. Labels such as native and non-native speaker, which is characteristic of the previous research examining EFL/ESL teachers, overly simplify the complex range of issues that mediate interactions between teachers and their students. Students in this study reported that there was a range of factors that influenced their willingness to use English with their teachers. In some cases, students felt that there was a difference between Japanese teachers of English and foreign teachers of English. One example is the difference in the type of feedback students received on their writing from Japanese teachers of English and foreign teachers of English. In other cases, students reported that a degree of social distance reduced their willingness to use English with both Japanese teachers of English and foreign teachers of English.
Students’ previous experiences using English with different types of interlocutors, however, inform their perceptions of potential interlocutors. For example, many students in this study reflected on their junior and senior high school English classes when they identified different factors influencing their willingness to speak and write English in their university EFL classrooms. These experiences not only shaped their perceptions of Japanese teachers of English, but they also served as a foundation for their beliefs concerning English language instruction. It is important to recognize that these perceptions can be dynamic as future communication
171 encounters can sustain, challenge, or change student beliefs about different types of interlocutors.
In other words, students’ perceptions of their interlocutors are grounded in past experiences, but are open to change.
Conception of the L2 Interaction
Along with evaluating their L2 competence as well as their interlocutor’s, students also evaluate the purpose of an L2 interaction and what it might entail. This evaluation process might include expectations concerning the roles and responsibilities of people in the interaction as well as the potential benefit of entering into an L2 interaction. Students’ responses to the Open-ended
L2 WTC Questionnaire repeatedly noted three underlying purposes for using English inside their
EFL classroom. The first is to practice their current level of English competence. This conceptualization of an L2 interaction led some students to be willing to use English with other
Japanese student because they were not worried about making mistakes in front of an interlocutor who has roughly the same level of L2 competence.
The second conceptualization is to advance their current level of English competence. In this type of L2 interaction, many Japanese students are more willing to use English with interlocutors that they perceived as having a higher level of communicative competence, which typically meant a preference to use English with an international student, a Japanese teacher of
English, or a foreign teacher of English. One consequence of this interlocutor-driven willingness is that the number of interlocutors who meet this expectation is relatively small within an EFL classroom. Typically a class will have only one Japanese teacher of English or foreign teacher of
English. Although the number of international students studying in Japan is increasing, they still compose a very small percentage of overall student population. In short, EFL classes in Japan are
172 composed largely of Japanese students who are doubtful that they can improve their current level of L2 competence by interacting in English with other Japanese students.
The third conceptualization is to participate in an interaction where students are exchanging ideas and experiences about differing personal and cultural backgrounds. This type of L2 interaction led many Japanese students to be more willing to use English with an international student or a foreign teacher of English. As previously mentioned, EFL classrooms in Japan are largely composed of Japanese students who have similar personal backgrounds, which reduces the perceived need to use English for the purposes of cultural exchange.
A lack of willingness to enter into L2 interactions with other Japanese students is a serious concern for any theoretical and pedagogical approach that relies upon interaction to help advance L2 development. Previous research examining the role of peers in L2 learning has indicated that they can be a source of support or distraction for students. For example, Ushioda
(2003) found that students generally thought of their peers as providing them with a low anxiety interactional space to practice what they already knew in English. However, in the minds of many students, the potential for further L2 development only arose from interactions with interlocutors who were clearly more proficient users of English. This kind of belief not only influences students’ level of L2 willingness, but also has the potential to influence their actual L2 use inside an EFL classroom. One example of the disparity of L2 use in student-student and teacher-student interactions is Levine’s (2003) Internet-based survey in which 600 students reported more target language use with their teachers compared to when they communicated with other students in a foreign language classroom.
Students’ conceptualizations of L2 interactions, however, can be very dynamic in nature.
Once students have entered into an interaction, their expectations might be confirmed or not,
173 which in turn influences not only their current willingness to continue using their L2 in the interaction, but also their willingness to use English in future interactions with different types of interlocutors. For example, many Japanese students in this study perceived international students as having a superior level of English, which created an opportunity for L2 development. In some cases, this expectation was upheld and enriched with the intercultural exchange. In other cases, factors such as foreign accents lowered Japanese students’ level of L2 WTC. International students’ level of Japanese proficiency is also another important factor. Often it is case that international students’ level of Japanese exceeds the level of English abilities of Japanese students. As a result, interactions that begin in English can quickly turn into exchanges conducted in Japanese to resolve problems of miscommunication or to expedite the communication process (Weaver, 2002, November).
In the case of writing in English, there can be a combination of immediate and delayed factors that influence students’ conceptualizations of a particular L2 interaction. Some Japanese students in this study commented that writing tasks perceived as being an exercise to assess their current level of grammatical competence reduced their willingness to write to Japanese teachers of English. In contrast, receiving what students perceived as comprehensive feedback on their writing increased their level of L2 WTC to attempt other writing tasks.
In sum, L2 WTC not only influences learners’ willingness to enter into L2 communicative situations, but it can also influence their continued willingness to use their L2 as the interaction unfolds. Once the interaction is complete, a successful conversation might lead to improved perceptions of L2 competence and lower levels of L2 communication anxiety. In addition, a successful interaction might also increase learners’ willingness to communicate with a particular interlocutor or a group of interlocutors in the future.
174
Implications for Language Instruction
If WTC is to be an important goal of a second language instruction as proposed by
MacIntyre et al. (1998), L2 WTC theory and research needs to provide teachers with practical techniques that will help increase students’ willingness to use their L2. The results of this study confirm the importance of self-perceived communicative competence and communication anxiety as factors that mediate students’ L2 WTC. In addition, this study reveals that the duration of the L2 use required of a speaking or writing task/situation, the amount of textual support available to students, and the physical location in which students must use English inside an EFL classroom influences their level of L2 WTC. The main focus of this study, however, examined how different types of interlocutors within an EFL classroom can influence students’ level of willingness. The interlocutor effect has a number of pedagogical implications. Some of these implications are specific to particular language skills. Others are more general in nature.
The Interlocutor Effect on Students’ Willingness to Speak
Pedagogical suggestions arising from previous L2 WTC research have primarily focused on increasing students’ self-perceived level of L2 communicative competence while lowering their level of anxiety. For example, techniques such as providing students with planning time and allowing them to have access to written notes have been found to increase students’ willingness to speak English in certain types of tasks (Weaver, 2007). Kang (2005) has also suggested that selecting conversation topics in which students have a considerable amount of background knowledge or they find interesting might result in increased levels of willingness. The participation structure of classroom interactions is another important consideration. Cao and
175 Philp (2006) found that the number of interlocutors in a group either contributed to or reduced students’ L2 willingness inside an ESL classroom. In their study, students were more willing to use English in smaller groups with interlocutors who actively participated in the interaction. This finding highlights not only the importance of interlocutor, but also how students perceive their interlocutor within the interaction.
Students in this study reported a higher level of willingness to speak in English inside an
EFL classroom with more competent L2 interlocutors in order to advance their level of English competency. As a result, many students felt that their Japanese peers provided them with an opportunity to practice, but not advance their level of L2 competence. This belief can seriously undermine the effective application of communicative-based language methodologies inside an
EFL context. The challenge thus becomes designing and implementing speaking tasks that maximize opportunities in which students perceive some sort of advancement arising from their use of the L2 with their interlocutor(s). This advancement, for example, can take the form of increased levels of motivation to use the L2 prompted by interacting with interlocutors with a higher level of task motivation (Dörnyei, 2002); or by advancing students’ level of L2 competence with the use of tasks that give rise to language-related episodes in which students collectively examine and share their explicit L2 knowledge (Swain & Lapkin, 2001). Students can also be explicitly instructed on the manner in which they should complete a task in an attempt to promote negotiations of form between students (Swain, Brooks, & Tocalli-Beller,
2002). These techniques thus try to highlight the individual differences that exist amongst students in order to create a communicative interaction in which students can learn from each other. Teachers can also support these types of interactions by giving feedback and assistance to students in a manner that only temporarily interrupts interactions between students (Ohta, 2001).
176 It is important, however, to remember that teachers should provide feedback in a manner that enhances students’ willingness to communicate. The use of humor, for example, to make light of a performance error might inadvertently increase students’ level of communicative anxiety and thus reduce their willingness to take chances in future L2 interactions. In addition, it is important not to create the impression that the teacher is the sole source of L2 knowledge in the classroom.
Teachers can help students provide feedback to each other through the use of structured tasks that focus on particular aspects of oral communication (e.g., J. Lee & McChesney, 2000;
Weaver, 2009, August). However, equally important is the teacher’s public acknowledgement of how students can cooperatively and collectively develop their level of L2 communicative competence. This acknowledgement is essential so that students do not consider the teacher as the only legitimate interlocutor within the EFL classroom.
The common theme underlying of all these pedagogical suggestions is the importance of placing students into communicative situations where they not only practice their pre-existing level of L2 competence, but they also have the opportunity to advance their level of L2 competence by participating in well designed speaking tasks that help students explore each other’s strengths and improve upon their weaknesses. Moreover, the opportunity for cultural exchange can also be an effective means of the increasing students’ willingness to speak to different types of interlocutors.
The other pedagogical consideration highlighted in the results of this study is the developmental nature of L2 WTC. The average student from the different self-perceived ability groups varied considerably in terms of their willingness to use English in the different speaking tasks/situations with the different types of interlocutors. Teachers should be mindful of these differences and try to design and implement speaking tasks that promote students’ level of L2
177 WTC. Pertinent task features arising from the students’ responses to the L2 WTC Questionnaire include the amount of L2 use required of students, the physical location within the classroom where the students will undertake the task, and the amount of support or constraint that task materials impose on students.
The Interlocutor Effect on Students’ Willingness to Write
The interlocutor effect potentially influences three interrelated aspects of the L2 writing process. The first two aspects involve the act of writing in English. The third aspect is the feedback that students receive on their L2 writing. The first aspect of the writing process when the interlocutor effect becomes salient occurs when students consider to whom are they writing.
L1 and L2 writing research (e.g., Johns, 1990) has stressed the importance of identifying one’s audience and understanding the relationship between the writer and the audience. In the case of
EFL writers, the audience can have a disproportionate amount of influence over the writing process. Some students in this study, for example, reported being preoccupied with writing an error-free composition in fear of exposing their current level of L2 competence to a foreign teacher of English. This heightened sense of communicative anxiety not only lowers students’ willingness to write in English, but also has the potential of making students more conservative when they write and less likely to experiment with the L2 or take risks, which are thought to be important mechanisms for interlanguage development (H. D. Brown, 2000). Moreover, writing tasks requiring the discourse of personal information might reduce some students’ level of willingness to write to particular interlocutors.
The second aspect involves the implicit or explicit purpose of L2 writing inside an EFL classroom. For many students the purpose of writing English was to improve their current level
178 of L2 competence. This purpose, in some cases, was made more salient by the practices of senior high school English teachers, who tried to help students prepare for university entrance examinations. Using the act of writing to promote L2 development also has the effect of creating the belief in students that people with higher levels of L2 competence are valuable mentors in the writing process. As a result, the Japanese university students in this study reported having lower levels of willingness to write in situations where they perceived other people involved in the writing process as having relatively the same amount of L2 competence or a level of L2 competence that seemed questionable. The perceived need for competent interlocutors in the writing process has some clear implications for practices such as peer review sessions, in which students are asked to provide comments and feedback on their peers’ writing. Previous researchers investigating the effectiveness of peer review groups in L2 writing classes have found that the quality of student interactions vary considerably (e.g., Lockhart & Ng, 1995). As a result, students sometimes have mixed or negative feelings about the value of peer reviews (e.g.,
Jacobs, 1987; Mangelsdorf, 1992; Nelson & Murphy, 1992) and tend to prefer the teacher’s comments over those of other students (I. Lee, 2008; Nelson & Carson, 1998). Teachers can address potential shortcomings of peer review session by providing students with structured tasks and/or train them on how to be more effective peer evaluators (e.g., Stanley, 1992). These pedagogical approaches can thus help raise students’ metalinguistic knowledge of English, which might also increase students’ willingness to work with their peers at different stages of the writing process because their peers now have some analytical skills that can lead to improved L2 writing.
The third aspect of the writing process involves the type of feedback students receive on their writing. Teacher feedback on students’ L2 writing has generated a substantial amount of
179 research and commentary (e.g., Bitchener, 2008; Ferris, 1999, 2003; Lundstrom & Baker, 2009;
Truscott, 1999; Truscott & Hsu, 2008). This study’s contribution to the ongoing debate demonstrates the importance of providing students with feedback that not only addresses the structural properties of the students’ writing, but also the content. Students in this study consistently commented that one-dimensional feedback scrutinizing their grammatical competency not only reduced their willingness to write in English, but it also influenced how they perceived and valued Japanese teachers of English as a potential audience that could help them improve their L2 competence.
Pedagogical Choices Within an EFL Context
Studying English in an EFL context also creates some unique pedagogical challenges for language teachers. For example in this study, numerous students reported a higher level of willingness to speak with foreign teachers of English because they thought that these teachers served as a model of L2 pronunciation. This belief might arise from the relatively infrequent contact that Japanese students have with proficient users of English. Initiatives to place assistant language teachers from English-speaking countries into junior and senior high school English classes have unfortunately encountered a number of challenges in Japan (e.g., Gorsuch, 2002).
More recently, advancements in teaching materials and supporting resources such as computer assisted language learning (e.g., Robin, 2007) have made it possible for EFL students to hear and interact with proficient users of English from all over the world. Teachers, however, must be careful that students understand the value of using these resources in their language studies. In some cases, students might interpret the use of these resources as a sign that the teacher lacks L2 competency. It is thus important to remember that students are active participants within the
180 classroom, who are both learning from the teacher and evaluating what the teacher does in the classroom. This evaluation in turn informs students’ beliefs about the potential for language learning and their willingness to use English inside an EFL classroom.
Conclusion
The aim of this chapter was to explain how the results of this study relate to the current theoretical and empirical L2 research. This discussion also gave rise to an interpersonal account of L2 willingness and a number of pedagogical implications for teachers interested in enhancing their students’ level of L2 WTC. The limitations of this study, areas for future L2 WTC research, and a summary of the main contributions of this study to L2 WTC theory and research are presented in the next chapter.
181 CHAPTER 8
CONCLUSION
This chapter reviews the main contributions that this study offers to L2 WTC theory and research methodology. The chapter then outlines the limitations of this study and provides some suggestions for future research.
Summary of the Findings
This study makes a number of contributions to L2 WTC theory and related research methodology. The main contributions include:
• Developing a L2 WTC Questionnaire to capture students’ willingness to use English
inside their classroom. Considering that language classrooms are often the primary
opportunity for EFL students to use and learn English, it is important to identify factors
that mediate students’ L2 willingness in order to maximize the potential for language
learning.
• Broadening the scope of L2 WTC research beyond spoken interactions to include writing
tasks. This broader focus provides a more comprehensive account of Japanese university
students’ willingness to productively use English.
• Using Rasch measurement model in order to establish a common scale between students’
willingness to speak and write English with different types of interlocutors inside an EFL
classroom. Without a common scale reference, attempts to make direct comparisons
between different types of interlocutors can potentially be confounded.
182 • Confirming that self-perceived communicative competence is an important factor that
influences Japanese university students’ willingness to speak and write in English. A
statistically significant and a meaningful difference in the students’ level of L2
willingness according to their self-perceived ability to speak and write in English was
identified in this study.
• Detecting an interlocutor effect that mediated Japanese university students’ willingness to
use English inside an EFL classroom. This mediating factor was evident at the group
level for students who were very confident (S4) or not very confident (S1) in their
speaking ability and at the individual level where the average student from the different
self-perceived ability groups had varying degrees of willingness to use English in
different speaking and writing situations/tasks with different types of interlocutors.
• Identifying a number of immediate and historical factors influencing Japanese university
students’ willingness to use English with four types of interlocutors inside an EFL class.
Many of these factors also revealed students’ underlying beliefs about learning English as
a foreign language in an instructed language learning setting.
• Conceptualizing the interlocutor effect as the interaction between students’ conception of
themselves as L2 users, their interlocutors as L2 users, and the purpose of the L2
interaction within a specific communicative context. The relative importance of these
different conceptions and the interaction between them can be quite dynamic. As a result,
students’ level of L2 WTC can vary among different people in different communicative
situations over time.
183 Limitations
Although this study provides some interesting insights into how different types of interlocutors can influence Japanese university students’ willingness to use English inside an
EFL classroom, there are some limitations that should be kept in mind when interpreting the results of this study and/or when planning a future study. The limitations are largely methodological issues that reflect conscious decisions of the researcher as well as some of the institutional constraints in which this study was carried out. The main limitations of this study and areas for future research are listed below:
Use of the Questionnaires
Similar to the vast majority of L1 and L2 WTC research, one of the most significant limitations of this study is its reliance upon self-reports with the L2 WTC Questionnaire and the
Open-ended L2 WTC Questionnaire. The retrospective nature of self-report data opens up the possibility of inaccuracies caused by students over-reporting or under-reporting their behavior
(Schunk & Meece, 1992). It is also possible that students have given answers that they think are expected by the researcher, which in the case of this study is a foreign teacher of English, or provide a socially desirable response (i.e., students are equally willing to use English with any type of interlocutor). The layout of the L2 WTC Questionnaire which required to the students to first report their level of self-perceived L2 ability before reporting their level of L2 WTC with the four types of interlocutors might also have influenced students’ responses by making the relationship between self-perceived L2 ability and L2 WTC more salient for students. In addition, the pedagogical requirement of having students respond to the Open-ended L2 WTC
184 Questionnaire in English might have prevented some students from fully articulating how different factors influence their willingness to use English inside an EFL classroom.
In terms of L2 WTC research, the relationship between students’ reported level of L2
WTC and actual L2 use has been examined in only two studies. Dörnyei and Kormos (2000) found a positive relationship between the number of turns students took in a discussion task and their level of L2 WTC, whereas Cao and Philp (2006) found no significant relationship between students’ actions within an ESL classroom and their reported level of L2 WTC. These contradictory findings might reflect the different approaches used to quantify students’ communicative behavior in their respective language classrooms. Examining the relationship between L2 WTC and actual L2 use, however, now becomes an indispensable feature for future of L2 WTC studies. Weaver (forthcoming), for example, tracked the communicative behavior of
10 Japanese university students in a semester long oral communication course using video and audio recordings to order to examine not only the relationship between students’ level of L2
WTC and their actual L2 use inside an EFL classroom, but also to determine how students’ level of L2 WTC and their use of English varies over time. Without audio and video accounts of students’ communicative behavior (e.g., Kang, 2005), L2 WTC construct cannot be rigorously evaluated which in turn might reduce the relative importance of this construct in L2 research and theory.
Another potential shortcoming is that the speaking and writing tasks/situations featured on the L2 WTC Questionnaire measure students’ level of willingness to practice using English inside an EFL classroom rather than their willingness to use English for communicative purposes.
The distinction between practice and communicative use is an important difference that reflects divergent approaches to curriculum and syllabus design (e.g., Robinson, 1998). In the context of
185 this investigation, the L2 WTC Questionnaire reflects the types of communicative situations students encounter in their EFL classrooms in a particular curriculum designed for science students at a particular university in Tokyo, Japan. Many of the writing and speaking tasks/situations place a high priority on providing students with an opportunity to use English.
The opportunity in many cases is for the purpose of practicing English in order to prepare students use English outside of the language classroom.
The Language Classroom as the Communicative Context for a L2 WTC Study
A number of previous L2 WTC theorists and researchers have come to realize the importance of volition as an underlying pre-condition for willingness to communicate (e.g.,
MacIntyre, 1994). The reliability and validity of L2 WTC research conducted within language classrooms (e.g., Cao & Philp, 2006) or interested in students’ level of L2 WTC inside an EFL classroom might be questioned on the grounds that participants might feel obliged to use their L2 in this social context regardless of level of L2 WTC. As such, L2 WTC research might be best conducted in communicative situations where participants have a real choice whether or not they will use their L2, for example, in a volunteer conversation-partner program (e.g., Kang, 2005).
The importance of volition thus posses a significant challenge for researchers and teachers interested in advancing MacIntyre and colleagues’ suggestion that WTC should be a prominent goal for language instruction (MacIntyre et al., 1998). Future L2 WTC researchers interested in a language classroom might want to consider Van Lier’s (2000, 2004) work on affordances as a possible alternative to a volition-based WTC construct (e.g., MacIntyre, 2007).
The concept of affordances entails the extent to which learners take advantage of the opportunities given to them in a particular communicative context. In other words, the
186 communicative context is a potential source of learning, but it is the learner’s actions that determine learning. Affordances that are acted upon also promote learners to more action and higher levels of interaction in the L2. In sum, the concept of affordances might help researchers provide a more refined account of the relationship between learners’ level of L2 WTC and their actual use of their L2 in communicative contexts such as an EFL classroom.
Refining the Notion of Interlocutor
Although statistically significant quantitative differences were found in the students’ responses to the four types of interlocutors inside an EFL classroom, the students’ responses on the Open-ended L2 WTC Questionnaire suggested the need for a more refined account of one’s interlocutor. In this study, interlocutors were defined in terms of four broad categories: Japanese student, international student, Japanese teacher of English, and foreign teacher of English.
Within each of these categories, there are a number of other social factors such as age and gender that could potentially influence students’ level of L2 WTC.
Students in this study, for example, noted that friendship with their interlocutor(s) helped create a communicative context in which they experienced lower levels of anxiety. Yet, other students reported that they felt frustrated with their inability to effectively use English with their friends, which in turn led them to believe that their shared L1 was a more effective means of communication. Familiarity with one’s interlocutors thus has the potential to enhance students’ willingness to use their L2 (e.g., Cao & Philp, 2006) or do just the opposite (e.g., Kang, 2005). In addition, the interlocutor effect might also be mediated by the level of support that peers provide students to use their L2 (e.g., MacIntyre et al., 2001; Ushioda, 2003).
187 In the case of the Japanese and foreign teachers of English, students’ comments on the
Open-ended L2 WTC Questionnaire suggest that the English curriculum in Japanese junior high schools, senior high schools, and universities influences their perceptions of their teachers as well as their willingness to use English. As a result, a more refined characterization of language teachers might help clarify the extent to which students’ willingness to use English varies with their teachers as they progress through different levels of English education.
Selection of the Student Participants
It must be remembered that the results of this study are grounded in a particular EFL context. For example, the speaking and writing situations/tasks featured in the L2 WTC
Questionnaire also reflect the types of communicative situations and tasks that students would most likely encounter in a specific EFL curriculum offered at a national university in Tokyo,
Japan. As a result, the speaking and writing tasks/situations might not be representative of other
EFL or ESL contexts. Fortunately, there is a Rasch-based technique called item linking that allows researchers to compare different tasks/situations and educational contexts on the same scale of reference (see Wright & Stone, 1979, Chapter 5 for a detailed account of item linking).
Item linking thus creates the opportunity for concise cross-cultural examinations of learners’ willingness to use English in different types of tasks (e.g., Weaver & Yunzhang, 2008), which would be a welcomed development in L2 WTC research considering that the majority of studies conducted so far involve learners in Canada and Japan.
Another important consideration is that the students in this study are all non-English majors pursuing undergraduate degrees in different fields of science. Thus, it would be interesting to see if the interlocutor effect also mediates L2 WTC of students studying English or
188 another academic field. In the field of science, the number of male students generally exceeds the number of females, which is the case in this study. The role of gender is thus another mediating factor that requires further investigation. For example, Weaver and Veenstra (2008) found that
Japanese university female science students reported significantly higher levels of communicative anxiety compared to their male counterparts. This difference might in turn influence their willingness to use English inside an EFL classroom.
Student Participant Groups
Unlike previous L2 WTC research (e.g., MacIntyre et al., 2002) that has used grade level as the criterion for dividing students into different groups to investigate the role of communicative competence, this study relies upon students’ self-perceived level of ability to speak and write in English. Yet it might be the case that some students might have over- or under-estimated their level of L2 communicative competence (MacIntyre et al., 1997). As a result, the composition of the self-perceived ability groups used in this study might not reflect students’ actual level of L2 competence. WTC theorists might argue that the potential difference between self-perceived and actual L2 ability is not problematic because willingness is primarily informed by individuals’ perceptions of themselves within a communicative situation.
Nevertheless, it would be prudent to incorporate an objective measure of L2 communicative competence in a future study in order to examine the relationship between self-perceived and objective L2 ability and how they interact with students’ willingness to use English. The grouping variable of self-perceived L2 communicative competence and objectively defined L2 communicative competence is also conceptually problematic in that it is difficult to clearly differentiate self-perceived L2 communicative competence from L2 WTC. As a result, its use as
189 the grouping variable creates a serious artifact in the study’s design and thus should be considered carefully when interpreting the results of this study.
L2 Willingness to Communicate from Other Perspectives
This study’s focus on Japanese university students’ level of L2 WTC unfortunately does not incorporate the perspectives of other interlocutors inside of an EFL classroom. In other words, Japanese EFL learners are not the only L2 users of interest. International students’ willingness to use English as a second or even a third language (L3) inside an EFL classroom is another area of research that needs further investigation. Some international students, for example, have the communicative competence to use either English or Japanese when they interact with Japanese students. It would thus be interesting to determine the type of factors that influence which language is used in interactions involving international and Japanese students.
Another important interlocutor within a language classroom is the teacher. Future WTC research might investigate teachers’ level of willingness and their actual use of the target language in their classes. Previous research (e.g., Liu et al., 2004) suggests that teacher beliefs about their students’ L2 proficiency and the difficulty of classroom tasks mediate the extent to which teachers use the target language. However, it would be also be valuable to examine the extent to which nonnative language teachers’ willingness to use the target language is mediated by their personal histories as an L2 learner, an L2 user, and an L2 teacher (e.g., Armour, 2004).
Incorporating the perspectives of the different interlocutors inside an EFL classroom into future WTC research thus holds the potential to reveal how dynamic individuals’ level of willingness to communicate can be. Undoubtedly, this line of research would not only provide a more comprehensive account of the WTC construct, but it might also lead to pedagogical
190 techniques that can increase students’ level of L2 WTC and opportunities for further L2 development.
Variability of L2 Willingness to Communicate over Time
This study employs a cross-sectional design that required the Japanese university students to report their self-perceived level of L2 competence and their level of willingness to speak and write in English to four types of interlocutors inside of an EFL classroom on a single occasion.
This approach to data collection, however, is not sensitive to different types of temporal factors that might have influenced the students’ responses, such as the time of day in which the students completed the L2 WTC Questionnaire and/or the Open-ended L2 WTC Questionnaire. In addition, the results of this study cannot directly address the issue of how students’ willingness to speak and write in English to different types of interlocutors varies over time. This issue would be a natural extension of the present study and would require a longitudinal approach to data collection (e.g., Weaver, 2007).
Articulating the Interlocutor Effect in the L2 WTC Model
Following from the results of this study, researchers interested in developing a more situational-based account of the L2 WTC model should take into account how learners interact with different interlocutors (e.g., Cao & Philp, 2006; Kang, 2005). The interlocutor effect proposed in this study is composed of three spheres of influence: conception of oneself as an L2 user, conception of one’s interlocutor as an L2 user, and conception of the L2 interaction (see
Figure 14). The relative importance of these spheres, however, needs to be investigated further.
In addition, other factors such as affiliation might need to be included to provide a more
191 comprehensive account of how the interlocutor effect potentially influences students’ level of L2 willingness. It is also important to remember that the interlocutor effect can interact with a number of other situational-based factors such as task difficulty (e.g., Liu et al., 2004; Weaver,
2007) as well as other factors arising from previous L2 encounters. Thus, the interlocutor effect represents an interesting factor in the L2 WTC model where dynamic situational factors and more stable trait-like tendencies interact to influence students’ level of willingness to use their
L2.
Final Conclusions
Collectively, the findings of this study suggest that different interlocutors within an EFL classroom present Japanese university students with various challenges and opportunities that not only influence their level of L2 WTC, but also potentially influence opportunities for L2 development. Future L2 WTC researchers, however, need to examine the relationship between students’ level of L2 willingness, their actual L2 use, and L2 learning. In order to gain a deeper understanding of this relationship, mediating factors such as the interlocutor effect warrant further empirical investigation. This type of research hopefully provides additional insights on how to help students become more willing L2 users in different communicative contexts and with a greater variety of interlocutors.
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APPENDICES
207 APPENDIX A
L2 WTC QUESTIONNAIRE
208
209 210 211
APPENDIX B
OPEN-ENDED L2 WTC QUESTIONNAIRE
Final Assignment for English Writing One
Submitted by
(your name in English)
(your student number)
I do not want my assignment used for research purposes.
212 Assignment Paper
For your final assignment you need to answer the following questions. Your answers should be typed, double-spaced. Plus, the answers for each question should not be shorter than 100 words. The deadline is Friday, February 13th 5pm. Your assignment needs to include:
The cover sheet with your name written in English and your student number The L2 WTC Questionnaire you did in class Your answers to Questions 1 to 4.
Question 1: Do you prefer to speak or write in English? When and where do you usually use English? Is there any difference in your level of willingness to speak and write in English inside your English classes? What is the relationship between your English ability and your willingness to use English inside your English classes? Please include some examples to support your answer.
Question 2: Is there someone special that you want to use English with in your English classes? Is there someone you do not like using English with in your English classes? Does it matter to you who you are talking to or writing to in English? If so, please explain what factors influence your willingness to speak and write in English with different types of people in your English classes (for example, Japanese student, international student, Japanese teacher of English and foreign teacher of English). Give examples to support your answer.
Question 3: What factors influence your ability to learn English inside of your English classes? Who do you talk to if you have a question about English? Why do you want to talk to that person? Give examples to support your answer.
Question 4: How do other students influence your willingness to use English inside your English classes? Do you have opportunities to speak in English with international students study at the university? What motivates you to speak English with different people inside your English classes? Give examples to support your answer.
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