The relationship among foreign language speaking anxiety, English-speaking skills self-efficacy beliefs, and English-speaking performance of Turkish ELT students

Abstract

In today’s world, foreign language speaking skills hold a significant place in every aspect of life including foreign language education. Speaking skills are closely related to affective and cognitive factors in foreign language learning. In this respect, this current study investigated the relationship between foreign language speaking anxiety, speaking self-efficacy beliefs, and English-speaking performance of Turkish ELT students. The study was conducted with 71 first-year Turkish ELT students at a public university. For this mixed-methods research study, a questionnaire was given to all participants, and a semi-structured interview was held with seven voluntary participants to gain deeper insights into how anxiety and self-efficacy impact English-speaking performance. Correlational analyses were employed for survey data, and the results found significant relationships among foreign language speaking anxiety, speaking self-efficacy beliefs, and English-speaking performance. For the qualitative aspect, a thematic analysis was implemented for the interviews to examine the perspective of the students in more detail. The first-year ELT students reported that foreign language anxiety had an adverse effect on their Englishspeaking performance while high self-efficacy beliefs had a facilitative impact on performance. Based on the findings of the present study, implications for practice were drawn, and suggestions for further research were highlighted.