EFL students’ views of willingness to communicate in the extramural digital context

This study examined factors that might have affected EFL learners' willingness to communicate (WTC) in the extramural digital (ED) environment, a rapidly emerging L2 communication context. The investigator conducted a semi-structured interview with 98 EFL students from three Korean universities. Drawing on grounded theory, socio-political (Korea's K-12 instruction), contextual (familiarity with interlocutors and communities), and individual variables (L2 self-confidence and anxiety) emerged as major sources of influence on participants' L2 WTC. Additionally, these sub-variables appeared to interact simultaneously during L2 communication in the ED context. This study contributes to further advancing our understanding of L2 WTC in a CALL environment. It also offers pedagogical insights into how L2 teachers can facilitate EFL learners' WTC in a range of extramural digital environments where their L2 WTC is very different from face-to-face classroom and extracurricular digital settings.