An Investigation of the Relationship between Foreign Language Examination Success and Willingness to Communicate Levels of Exam Takers


Thesis Type: Postgraduate

Institution Of The Thesis: Gazi University, Eğitim Bilimleri Enstitüsü, YABANCI DİLLER EĞİTİMİ, Turkey

Approval Date: 2019

Thesis Language: English

Student: GAMZE BARLAS

Supervisor: Semra Saraçoğlu

Abstract:

The main aim of this quantitative study is to examine the relationship between Foreign

Language Examination (FLE) success and Willingness to Communicate levels of examtakers

in Turkish EFL context. The present study tries to shed light on the efficiency of a

foreign language examination in assessing an exam taker’s proficiency in the English

language. Besides, it aims to find out whether the exam-takers with high scores have a

tendency and willingness to communicate in the same language as they have already

studied some fundamental points in it. Purposive (criterion-based) sampling technique was

used in this research. The participants were selected among exam-takers whose FLE scores

were 70 and over mainly in order to investigate whether there is a linear correlation

between their levels of language (indicated as the scores A, B, C) and that of Willingness

to Communicate. A questionnaire created via Google Forms were conducted to 97 female

and 69 male participants. In the first section, 10 demographic and occupational questions

including the FLE scores of participants were asked in order to determine the factors which

may affect respondents’ answers, interests and opinions. The second section followed with

12 questions of James McCroskey’s Willingness to Communicate Questionnaire to

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measure the motivation levels of the participants to speak in English. With the employment

of the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) Software Program the findings were

demonstrated through tables and figures. The results of this search showed that the

participants with scores above 70 had the willingness to communicate in English at the rate

of 88,2 out of 120 which is the maximum value for WTC and can be evaluated in the

category of High WTC level (80-120). However, the analysis of the questionnaires of the

exam-takers who got 100 scores on FLE brought about a quite different interpretation. The

WTC rate of 84,57 out of 120 for these three participants signified that their

overachievement in FLE had quite a little influence on their willingness to communicate

which meant their inefficiency in the English language. WTC levels increased at a certain

rate in line with the increase of FLE scores; nevertheless this could not go beyond the

medium level limit meaningfully. The majority of the participants reflected their

unwillingness to present a talk in English to a large group of strangers in their responses

while they reported that they felt much more comfortable when speaking English with a

friend personally. All these results were examined thoroughly in the conclusion chapter

and some implications and suggestions were made for future research.

Key Words : Willingness to communicate, FLE scores, communication