EFL TEACHERS' VERBAL AND NON-VERBAL IMMEDIACY: A STUDY OF ITS DETERMINANTS AND CONSEQUENCES

Abstract

Student engagement with instructors on a personal level can appear in the form of teacher’s immediacy behaviors, which includes two main kinds of immediacy, verbal and non-verbal. Ellis (2004) found when instructors display communicative behaviors similar to immediacy; students’ motivation to learn is likely to increase. Previous immediacy research has neglected to address the determinants and consequences of English as a foreign language (EFL) teachers’ immediacy behaviors. Therefore, the present study aims to investigate its determinants as well as consequences by collecting data from a number of EFL teachers and their students. The qualitative data for this study were collected via semi-structured interviews and observations. Two models emerged out of the collected data, including a) the model of the determinants of EFL teachers' immediacy which comprised body gesture, vocal variety, rapport making … b) the model of the consequences of EFL teachers' immediacy including three main categories: affective, cognitive, and perceptive domains. The results of this study showed that among the determinants of teacher immediacy, body gesture and rapport making factors exhibited the highest frequency and among the consequences factors, affective and cognitive were found to be the most frequent ones. The findings can be of particular interest to teachers, educators, and policy makers and can help them in improving the quality of teaching and providing good environment for students to learn.  Article visualizations

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