The role of mindfulness in reducing English language anxiety among Thai college students

Abstract

ABSTRACTThis study was designed to investigate whether the degree of mindfulness exhibited by a sample of Thai students had an effect on the level of anxiety they experienced in English as a second language (ESL) public speaking classes, and whether such an effect was related to the students’ level of performance in communicating in English during classroom presentations. The student sample (N = 333) was selected from four marketing major courses in a leading private international university in Thailand, all of which were taught by foreign instructors. Data were collected at different times and from multiple sources in order to lower the possibility of common method bias. The evidence from the Partial Least Squares regression analysis showed that students who reported higher levels of trait and state mindfulness while speaking English tended to experience less anxiety during their presentations. The students who reported low anxiety also obtained higher scores on their presentations than did those who reported high levels of anxiety. The analysis also found that state mindfulness appeared to have stronger explanatory power in predicting ESL public speaking anxiety than did trait mindfulness.