"Willingness to communicate" among Hong Kong students

Barry ASKER

Research output: Book Chapters | Papers in Conference ProceedingsConference paper (refereed)Researchpeer-review

Abstract

Over years there has been much anecdotal evidence suggesting that Hong Kong students are orally weaker than their peers in other Asian countries and that students evince considerable unwillingness to communicate in English in academic contexts. Industry leaders continue to make similar complaints, arguing that the resulting poor quality of English speech has a negative effect on Hong Kong's ability to perform in the international commercial arena. 
Such evidence has played its part in the establishment of an oral component in the Use of English examination. The hope is that by putting oral performance on the test agenda, more time and effort will be put into oral competence. However, there is as yet little hard objective evidence to suggest that in fact Hong Kong Students are excessively reticent and even less to show that such lack of willingness to speak up in English implies an equal inability to do so.
This present paper, then, seeks to measure willingness to communicate among Hong Kong students and to establish whether the "Willingness to Communicate" instrument (McCroskey, J.C., & Richmond, V.P., 1987) is a reliable and efficient way to identify orally reticent students (in great numbers) and so create opportunities for extra training or more directed class groupings.
Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationBringing about change in language education : Proceedings of the International Language in Education Conference 1994
EditorsDavid NUNAN, Roger BERRY, Vivien BERRY
Place of PublicationHong Kong
PublisherDept. of Curriculum Studies, University of Hong Kong
Chapter9
Pages149-159
Number of pages11
ISBN (Print)9789628109012, 9628109014
Publication statusPublished - 1995

Bibliographical note

Conference: 2nd International Language in Education Conference, 14-16 December 1994, University of Hong Kong.

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