Universal Journal of Educational Research 8(8): 3360-3370, 2020 http://www.hrpub.org DOI: 10.13189/ujer.2020.080808 Factors Affecting ESL Students' Willingness to Communicate in English Classroom Discussions and Their Use of Linguistic Strategies Maryam Jahedi, Lilliati Ismail * Department of Language and Humanities Education, Faculty of Educational Studies, Universiti Putra Malaysia, Malaysia Received March 29, 2020; Revised May 20, 2020; Accepted May 27, 2020 Copyright ©2020 by authors, all rights reserved. Authors agree that this article remains permanently open access under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License 4.0 International License Abstract In the past few years, the importance of willingness to communicate (WTC) has received greater attention among scholars in the field as it has generally been found that WTC is closely related to the development of linguistic competence. This study employed the WTC Model (MacIntyre et al., 1998) and Halliday’s (1985) Systemic Functional Linguistics to examine Malaysian students’ WTC behavior through the analysis of classroom observations, journal entries and interview data. Thematic analysis was used to identify the situational factors affecting students’ WTC in classroom discussion interactions. Moreover, linguistic analysis of the data concentrated on interpersonal meaning of tenor to find out how students’ WTC was realized and how role relations were established among them through mood patterns and speech functions. The study found the major factors that increased the students’ WTC in the classroom discussions including topics of interest, relevance of the topic to one’s experience, teaching method, the relationship with peers, etc. Furthermore, the findings revealed that the students’ WTC was realized linguistically through the predominant use of declarative and interrogative discourse. Moreover, students tended to react more through supporting moves rather than confronting moves which showed a cooperative and positive atmosphere in the classroom. It can be concluded that students’ WTC in a particular situation is related to certain factors that promote their behavioral WTC to be manifested through language. Keywords L2 Learners, Situational Factors of WTC, Speech Functions, Systemic Functional Linguistics, Willingness to Communicate 1. Introduction Over the past few years, the importance of willingness to communicate (WTC) in the second language (L2) has been given particular importance and studies have tried to find ways to promote learners’ WTC, especially in classroom interactions. WTC is “conceptualized as a readiness to speak in the L2 at a particular time with a specific person, and as such, is the final psychological step to the initiation of L2 communication” (MacIntyre & Doucette, 2010, p. 162). Learners who do not participate in the second language interaction are considered passive and unmotivated (Cao, 2009). Therefore, there is a concern for the students who are unwilling to communicate in the L2 (MacIntyre, & Doucett, 2010) since lack of English proficiency can put them at a disadvantage in the job market (Nair et al., 2012). In order for students to reach the desired level of English proficiency, there is a need to encourage them to communicate more in the English language (Yousef, Jamil & Razak, 2013). As WTC is related to language teaching and learning, it is important to examine it in ESL or EFL classroom-based contexts (Abd Rahman, Abd Samad & Abu Bakar, 2020; Cao, 2009; Riasati & Noordin, 2011; Manipuspika, 2018; Riasati, 2018). Studies on WTC “centered mainly on the use of structural models and trait, self-reported measurements of WTC, but recent research has shown that WTC is also heavily dependent on the situation” (Robson, 2015, iii); yet, situational variables have not been addressed adequately (Yashima, MacIntyre & Ikeda, 2018). Moreover, WTC as a construct is treated more as “a measure of whether someone will initiate talk rather than how much the person actually speaks” (Dörnyei & Kormos, 2000, p. 286). Although the use of certain linguistic means and strategies contribute to students’ WTC in the English language classroom which can increase their English proficiency level (Nakatani, 2006), research on WTC from the linguistic point of view is scarce. Understanding the linguistic choices made by students to manifest their WTC can help English learners to “utilize their existing