Edna Kurniawati , 2201411075 (2016) LANGUAGE ANXIETY OF ADULT LEARNERS OF ENGLISH AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE IN SPEAKING CLASS (The Case of Their Debate Performance). Under Graduates thesis, Universitas Negeri Semarang.

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Abstract

The phenomenon of language anxiety frequently happens in EFL speaking classes. The issue of foreign language anxiety is obviously one of the critical components that influences the learning effects, especially speaking proficiency of EFL learners in speaking language classroom. This study was aimed at investigating the phenomenon of foreign language anxiety (FLA) on students’ debate performance in their speaking class. Observation was conducted in a debate class at Semarang State University to reach the aim of this study. The observation was done to see how students experienced anxiety when they had to perform the target language in front of the audiences. Then, questionnaires had been delivered to the 20 students of the debate class. The questionnaires was aimed at finding the possible sources of language anxiety happened to the students adapted by the theory of Rita and Dalila (2008). A quantitative descriptive method was used in analyzing and presenting the data on the findings section, since the data deal with number and are explained descriptively which are supported by the excerpts of the observation. The results of this study reveals that the 20 students often experience different source of language anxiety during their performance in the debate class. The sources are less of preparation, tight deadline, worry of being overly critical, fear about not entertaining people, imitate other speaker, fear potential negative outcomes and difficulty in finding words, spend time over preparing instead of developing confidence, dislike in being the center of attention, and low selfconfidence. In conclusion, the students show different actions during their speaking performance which indicate their anxiety. The causes of each action are both coming from inside the students themselves (self-confidence; less preparation; fear of negative outcomes; pessimists of their own ability; difficulty in finding words) and outside the students (critics from the audience; too many points to be covered; and time limit). At last, the writer hopes that this study can be useful for the readers to enrich their knowledge about FLA.

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