Causes of Anxiety Among Engineering Students While Making Oral Presentations in English

Abstract

The technical and non-technical presentations made in English by the undergraduate engineering students at the University of Engineering and Technology (UET) Lahore include lab and survey report presentations, project presentations, mid-term or final term presentations in English. The goal of the study was to figure out the engineering students’ reasons behind feeling anxious while giving presentations in English at UET Lahore. For this purpose, 518 undergraduate engineering students from UET, Lahore filled a questionnaire and responded to an open-ended question to determine the causes of anxiety. The data was coded and categorized using in vivo coding system. Findings indicate that the participants mainly experience anxiety due to poor proficiency in English, fear of judgment by the audience, lack of confidence, lack of exposure to speaking English and making presentations in English at school or college level, poor preparation or practice, and insufficient linguistic input. The study has implications for specific lingual assessments, English as a foreign language, and psycholinguistics.