The fear of public speaking in Vietnamese pedagogy freshmen

Abstract

Fear of public speaking, also known as Glossophobia which is defined as a form of social phobia leading to severely discourage speaking publicly owing to the dread of being ashamed or losing the respect of other people. The recent study used the Personal Report of Public Speaking Anxiety scale including 34 items to survey 374 pedagogy freshmen. The sample consisted of 374 students of which 144 students studying Social Science (38.5%), 140 students studying Natural Science (37.4%), and 90 students studying Educational Science (24.1%) of which were 86 males (23%) and 288 females (77%). The main finding of this study was that a large number of pedagogy freshmen suffered fear of public speaking. Besides, the result found that the difference between the three groups of majors in the levels of glossophobia just very slightly missed the significance level. Educational Science students suffered most public speaking anxiety in three groups of majors. To become professional educators in the future, pedagogy freshmen have to cultivate and self-improve speaking publicly skill which is one of the most essential and crucial soft skills. Additionally, the presentation skill is one of the compulsory academic activities and criteria for evaluation of the university of education. These findings contribute to developing courses aiming to reduce student’s public speaking anxiety and improve their presentation skill. Besides, educators could create an education curriculum that is most suitable for freshmen and not causes much pressure leading to their anxiety.