The Correlation between Speaking Anxiety, Self-Confidence, and Speaking Achievement of Undergraduate EFL Students of Private University in Palembang

TLDR: In this article, the authors used correlation design to find out whether there was a significant correlation between students' speaking anxiety, self-confidence, and their speaking achievement in foreign language classes.

Abstract: Speaking in a foreign language can be influenced by such psychological aspects as anxiety and self-confidence. The students who have high level of anxiety, worry, fear and low level of self-confidence in foreign language classes may have difficulties in developing their speaking ability. The objective of this research was to find out whether there was a significant correlation between students’ speaking anxiety, self-confidence, and their speaking achievement. The research used correlation design. The data were collected through interviews that were scored by two raters and two questionnaires that were administered to fifth semester students (n = 28) from a Teacher and Training Faculty in Indonesia. The data were analyzed using descriptive and correlational analysis. The results indicated that speaking anxiety has no significant correlation with speaking achievement. Self-confidence has a significant correlation with speech achievement (p = .01). That is, students with self-confidence have higher achievement. So, it is important for teachers and lecturers to encourage students and practice speaking English in front of class, especially to improve the self-confidence when the students are communicating in English.