In this chapter, the background of the study, statement of the problem, purpose of the study, significance of the study, research questions, and definition of key terms were introduced.
Background of the Study
Nowadays, the business, industry, and the labor market around the world had been dramatically changed and more vying than ever before since great developments in information technology, globalization and transportation today. Thanks to enormous influences on global economy by the phenomena above, there were vast changes in business, industries, and other specific areas in the first decade of the 21st century (Brown, & Adler, 2008; Chen & Young, 2012; Friedman, 2006; The International Research Foundation for English Language Education, 2012). The world was constantly changing that the concept of globalization was widely addressed in recent years. Clayton (2004) stated that the term globalization originally indicated economic progresses at an international level; further, several researchers considered globalization an unstoppable phenomenon integrating global economic and labor division in the world (Boswell & Chase-Dunn, 2000; Sklair, 1999).
With the generality and growth of globalization, information technology, transportation, and global economy were interdependent leading to outsourcing of the manufacturing internationally. The phenomena also reflected that there were more dependence on foreign workers, more products were developed by companies from different nations, and more internet-based cooperation was done through international transactions. Furthermore, all of these had become indispensable and interdependent
factors composing the global economy and workplace today (Graddol, 2006;
GlobalEnglish, 2011).
Thus, English played an essential role in global economy, business, and workplace in 21st century since it had set up a connection linking language, non-work-related situations, and work-related situations. It was also considered as a lingua franca since it was widespread across the world (Riemer, 2002). Lingua franca was defined as a language that was adopted as a common language between speakers whose native languages are different (Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary, 2013).
It ranged over long-term overseas assignments, workplace, and non-workplace (Baker, 2009; Lin, Chen, & Song, 2012).
Workers around the world were involved in a circle utilizing English effectively to interact with others from culturally diverse settings. For the sake of being successful and efficient in cooperating with others internationally, a widely spoken common language between each other is a must. It was widely considered that English was clearly a widely spoken common language used by more than two billion users who were not mother tongue of English (Crystal, 2008; TIRF, 2012; Graddol, 2004, 2006; GlobalEnglish, 2011; Kassim & Ali, 2010; Trilling & Fadel, 2009).
English skills were pervasively highlighted recently that it had been sighted to be rather a skill of an era than a personal skill that workforce in the 21st century should obtain. In the global economy driven by abilities, knowledge, and skills, individuals should obtain employability by attaining required knowledge, skills, abilities, and competences in order to retain competitive advantage in labor market. (Brown &
Lauder, 2001; DfEE, 2000; CBI, 2001; Michaels, Handfield-Jones, & Axelrod, 2001).
However, workers may still have language anxiety when communicating or meeting with foreign clients by face-to-face, calling, or internet (Chen & Young, 2012;
Woodrow, 2006). This anxious feeling individuals perceive during utilizing English in
actual communication might further affect job performances; furthermore, it has negative impact on individuals’ employability.
Since the dramatic change in the world and economy, there was no longer long-term employment in business and most organizations. The main goal for workers was to stay attractive and valuable in the labor market around the world (Rothwell &
Arnold, 2007). Hence, this global trend warned workers around the world to be equipped with good employability and urged them to work across organizational or even national boundaries in the workplace today (Riemer, 2002). In addition, in order to survive the changeable working environment in the world, individuals ought to overcome language anxiety to conduct their tasks in English well. Moreover, they should obtain prerequisites such as certain English language proficiency test to enhance the flexibility and adjustment to sharpen their own competiveness to effectively deal with the career-related changes occurring in today’s economy such as the prerequisite of English language proficiency and to keep or get the jobs they desire in labor market (Hall, 2002; Fugate, Kinicki, & Ashforth, 2004; Pulakos, Arad, Donovan, & Plamondon, 2000; Rothwell & Arnold, 2007).
Statement of the Problem
There are several gaps this study aims to make up. First, the literature on the linkage between language anxiety and employability is scarce, so there was a gap between these two variables. Relevant empirical studies demonstrated that language anxiety occurred inside the classroom settings. For instance, Horwitz, Horwitz, and Cope (1986) proposed the theory of language anxiety occurred in foreign language classroom. Language anxiety on other language skills was also proposed, including writing (Cheng, Horwitz, & Schallert, 1999), reading (Saito, Horwitz and Garza 1999), and listening (Kim 2000). However, most literatures about language anxiety only focused on a one-dimensional domain anxiety, which was the anxiety occurring in
classroom settings (Woodrow, 2006), which caused there was limited literatures discussing language anxiety on practical issues such as employability. Most Taiwanese start learning English since they were in junior high school, but English was not mother tongue for Taiwanese. Being afraid to speak English with ungrammatical sentences, inappropriate vocabularies, and unacquainted sentence patterns to make others confused or even misunderstood, individuals might be anxious when talking or communicating with others in English, namely language anxiety.
Furthermore, it affects the workers to be employed or paid attention by the employers in the workplace.
Second, though employability was discussed by previous studies in many aspects, such as the relationship among public policy, employment, and employability (Kossek, Huber, & Lemer, 2003), and the relationship between economics and employability (Lefresne, 1999), few literature clearly showed the direct relationship between language issues and employability.
Third, the previous studies demonstrated that English language proficiency was the key factor to influence on individual’s career success. However, scarce literature proved that English language proficiency served as the moderator.
Purpose of the Study
The purpose of the study was to investigate the relationship among language anxiety, employability, and English language proficiency on Taiwanese workers. This study aimed to explore the negative relationship between language anxiety and employability. Furthermore, the moderating effect of English language proficiency on the relationship between language anxiety and employability were discussed as well.
Significance of the Study
theoretical and the other was practical part. The theoretical part was to (1) examine if individuals with higher language anxiety will have lower employability when they conduct actual communication in the workplace, (2) built the direct linkage between language anxiety and employability, (3) extended the research of language anxiety on workplace, and (4) made more supplemental literature on English language proficiency served as moderator.
On the other hand, the part of practical contribution, the outcome of this study helped Taiwanese workers dealt with language anxiety occurred during the work;
increased abilities and skills from present workplace to obtain the employability and attractiveness in labor market by strengthening their English language proficiency.
For corporations and organizations in Taiwan, this study helped them to focus on utilizing English language proficiency test (e.g. TOEIC) as the requirement and prerequisites in the process of recruiting and selecting international students since English was widely considered a skill must be obtained for the workforce in 21st century.
Research Question
1. Does language anxiety negatively relate to employability?
2. Does English language proficiency have a positive effect on the relationship between language anxiety and employability?
Definition of Key Terms Language Anxiety
Language anxiety was described as individual’s incapability to express their own opinions and thoughts in the target language, which might have debilitating impacts on individual’s language learning, self-esteem, performance, adjustment and the image of themselves (Scovel, 1978; Horwitiz, Horwitz, & Cope, 1986; Horwitz, 2001;
Kondo, 2010; Woodrow, 2006).
Employability
Employability was described as the capability or the skill individuals possess to maintain the job or to obtain the new job. (Rothwell & Arnold, 2007).
English Language Proficiency
English language proficiency defined in this study was TOEIC test score.