A STUDY ON THE VALIDITY AND RELIABILITY OF THE TURKISH FORM OF SPEECH ANXIETY SCALE FOR FOREIGN TURKISH LEARNERS

The goal of this study is to have an analysis on the Turkish adaptation, validity and reliability of “the Scale for Second Language Speaking Anxiety” developed by Woodrow (2006) in order to measure speech anxieties of foreign students of Turkish language. The study group of the research consisted of 75 students studying in TÖMER, Gazi University. The rotated principal components factor analysis was done on the data collected to have an idea about the validity of the scale. At the end of the analysis, a structure of 2 sub-factor was reached as it was in the original scale. As an evidence for material validity, the total material correlations of tests were calculated. It was determined that material test correlations varied between 0,55 and 0,72. The internal consistency coefficient Cronbach alfa was calculated in order to measure the validity of the scale. It was seen that the scale consisted of two factors composed of speech anxiety within the classroom and speech anxiety outside the classroom. The speech anxiety inside the classroom was 90, and that outside the classroom was 93, which composed a validity of 91 in total. The retest reliability coefficient was found to be 0,90. Under the light of these findings, the scores got in the Turkish forum of “the Scale for Second Language Speaking Anxiety” were found to be valid and reliable. Moreover, the speech anxiety of learners of Turkish as a second language did not show a significant difference in accordance with their gender, country or age variables. This showed that speech anxiety had no relation to in