Anxiety in English Oral Presentations of Thai EFL Engineering Students

Abstract

Anxiety in the language classroom affects EFL students, particularly Thai learners. Students become nervous with high tension when performing oral presentations in front of the classroom. Throughout presentations, a significant number of students also worry about the performance evaluation. This study aimed to investigate the overall anxiety level in English oral presentations and anxious situations in two stages: pre-presentation and while-presentation of 72 Thai EFL Engineering Students. The data were collected by the use of two research instruments: a questionnaire adapted from the Personal Report on Public Speaking Anxiety (PRPSA-34) by McCroskey (1970) and a semi-structured interview about feelings towards before, while, and after the oral presentation, other experienced anxious situations and anxiety coping strategies. The findings revealed that the overall anxiety level of participants was at a moderate level (55.55%). Participants perceived higher anxiety levels while doing the presentation than preparing for the presentation. From the interview, both high and low anxious groups suffered identical problems in a lack of English vocabulary and grammar, including local accents and pronunciations at the preparation stage. During performing, making eye contact with live audiences was the most significant anxiety contributor among high anxiety participants. While low anxiety participants felt uncomfortable answering any unassociated questions from audiences. Only the high anxious group encountered anxiety after delivering the presentation regarding a negative evaluation. Live audiences’ reaction was another experienced anxiety mentioned by the high anxious learner. Furthermore, both groups reduced their oral presentation anxiety through various strategies.