The Effect of Shyness on English Speaking Scores of Iranian EFL learners

Abstract

Many students receive low marks in EFL speaking classes. Teachers wrongly suppose that they are not competent enough, and teachers ignore shyness as an affective factor. This study aims to explore the relationship between shyness and English speaking scores of Iranian students in EFL classes. 165 Iranian students at grade 8 of junior secondary school in Mayamey, semnan province, were selected by cluster sampling. Persian translation of Stanford shyness scale was administered, the data were collected and shyness degrees were correlated with English speaking scores and there was a moderate negative correlation between them (r= - 0.4).Also there was a stronger negative correlation coefficient between variables in female subgroup(r = - 0.57) than male subgroup(r = - 0.29).  Speaking scores were correlated by scores given by teachers for finding its reliability(r=0.94). Shyness test reliability was 0.75 by split half test of spearman. And the finding shows that English speaking scores of student is dependent to their degree of shyness. It can be concluded it is important to consider shyness as an affective factor in EFL classes, and teachers should never underestimate shy students in their EFL classes.