Investigating the Barriers to Oracy Proficiency Among Thai EFL Learners Through an Exploratory Factor Analysis
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17507/tpls.1604.12Keywords:
oracy skills, barriers, exploratory factor analysis, EFL learnersAbstract
Oracy proficiency is important for EFL learners, but this skill poses great problems for Thai students. To fill this gap, the purpose of this study is to examine the barriers to oracy skills among Thai EFL learners. The sample consisted of 661 Thai EFL students who filled out a 32-item questionnaire intended to identify barriers to oracy skills. The data were analyzed through exploratory factor analysis (EFA), and the Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin (KMO) measure of sampling adequacy was 0.912, and Bartlett’s test of sphericity was significant at 2345.423 (p < 0.05), indicating the appropriateness of factor analysis. Five main barriers to oracy skills were identified, which were listening processing challenges (LPC), accent and speech clarity (ASC), speaking anxiety barriers (SAB), speaking fluency difficulties (SFD), and grammar and comprehension gaps (GCG), with eigenvalues between 1.066 and 12.990 explaining 60.305% of the variance of the 32 variables. These findings illustrate the challenges faced by Thai EFL learners and highlight the need for them to have extensive exposure to authentic and level-appropriate listening and speaking materials, as well as the importance of an encouraging classroom atmosphere.
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