ENGLISH REVIEW: Journal of English Education p-ISSN 2301-7554, e-ISSN 2541-3643 Volume 11, Issue 2, June 2023 https://journal.uniku.ac.id/index.php/ERJEE 469 WILLINGNESS TO SPEAK: WHAT FACTORS INFLUENCE EFL LEARNERS? Nyimas Triyana Safitri English Education Departement, Teacher Training and Education, Universitas Jambi, Jambi, Indonesia Email: triyana@unja.ac.id Habizar English Education Departement, Teacher Training and Education, Universitas Jambi, Jambi, Indonesia Email: habizar@unja.ac.id Melda Nifia Putri English Education Departement, Teacher Training and Education, Universitas Jambi, Jambi, Indonesia Email: Meldanifiaa@gmail.com APA Citation: Safitri, N. T., Habizar., Putri, M. N. (2023). Willingness to speak: What factors influence EFL learners?. English Review: Journal of English Education, 11(2), 469-478. https://doi.org/10.25134/erjee.v11i2.7572 Received: 18-02-2023 Accepted: 23-04-2023 Published: 30-06-2023 INTRODUCTION Transferring Information is seen as a kind of communication when both parties understand what is being said without any misunderstandings (Fatimayin, 2020). For this reason, the process of communication should involve group members interacting, creating meaning, and sharing ideas communicatively. In the educational setting, communication is another technique of knowledge transfer that frequently comes up in class discussions as it is a great way to learn and comprehend the new language. Furthermore, the excitement or willingness to engage in conversation with other interlocutor using a second language with a certain topic is one of the key components of communication. For this reason, students should participate in a class discussion they find fascinating in the learning process. (Rindiana and Wulandari, 2020; Fatimayin, 2020; Tuyen and Loan, 2019; Alimorad, 2021). The first definition of the concept of willingness to communicate includes the students' choice to speak or not, which is influenced by psychological and situational or environmental factors. According to Henry et al. (2021), willingness to communicate is someone’s decision to speak or remain silent. Since there are a number of variables that might either increase or decrease a student's readiness to communicate. In addition to this, Tuyen and Loan (2019) mentioned that the decision to communicate with someone else is influenced by a number of factors that may be pertinent to the scenario and occasion. These factors include an individual's present mood, views of the other person, and preferences, showing that the circumstances of the interaction may have an Abstract: The online learning mode has dramatically altered the manner of the way how communication is conducted in learning at higher education or schools for the past two years. It has led to a considerable change in how learning is carried out, transferring it from an offline to an online setting that permits long distance connection and communication. However, this has an effect on students’ engagement in class as many of them exhibit passive or unresponsive behavior in participating the online learning sessions. This qualitative study aims to explore the influencing factors affect students' willingness to participate in zoom sessions during online classes at English Department, Universitas Jambi. The data was gathered through the online classroom observations and interviews with the six EFL learners, and the data was then analyzed based on the theoretical built-themes of Willingness to Communicate (WTC). The finding reveals that 1) The demotivating factors influence EFL learners’ willingness to speak in zoom class were derived by the situational factor such as difficult task types and models, the unfamiliar topic of class discussion, the lecturers’ personal characteristics, the inconvenienced time or schedule of the class meeting and a trouble Internet connection. While 2) The depressing factors influenced by the psychological component, were comprised by the lack of self-confidence, low level of English language proficiency, L2 learning anxiety and students’ individual personality. Keywords: online learning; students’ willingness to communicate. Nyimas Triyana Safitri,, Habizar, & Melda Nifia Putri Willingness to speak: What factors influence EFL learners? 470 impact on the willingness to talk (Katsaris, 2019). However, the way how communication is conducted has been dramatically altered in learning process during The Covid-19 pandemic. The Pandemic has given a massive change in how learning is transformed from offline to online mode which provides long distance communication. The common learning with a face-to-face mode is increasingly turning into online learning that provides distance communication facilities such as Zoom Meetings, WhatsApp, Google Meet, etc. (Laili & Nashir, 2020). This is accomplished under the health department policy to keep the distance to avoid and reduce the spread of the Covid-19 virus. However, there is a changing in the ways of this communication is conducted in which the numerous students tend to be inactive and passive in speaking up through online learning class via zoom meeting platform (Clarin & Baluyos, 2022). Numerous studies have been done to identify various facets of students' willingness to communicative in online learning flatform for specific goals and objectives. At SMP Islam Al Azhar 21 Sukoharjo, Rindiana (2020) looked into the methods teachers used to increase their students' willingness to speak in online learning. The research revealed some ways for increasing students' willingness to communicate, including encouraging them to speak English through daily talk and conversation, implementing special bilingual programs, assigning group projects, maintaining humor and solidarity among students, giving rewards and punishments, hosting meet- and-greet events, and attending bilingual students' shows. At SMK Negeri 10 Malang, Rihardini, et al. (2020) performed a study to examine students' perceptions of their willingness to use English during class interactions during online class. The results demonstrate that tenth and eleventh grade students at SMK Negeri 10 Malang are affected by some of the variables included in the heuristic model, including communicative competence, desire to communicate with a specific person, motivation, anxiety, social situation, and topic of discussion. Factors Affecting EFL Students' Willingness to Communicate in Speaking during online classes at the Vietnamese Tertiary Level was examined in research by Tuyen and Loan (2019). The research found that students' desire and unwillingness to speak in English is influenced by three linguistic characteristics: Vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation in the language. In addition, five non-linguistic elements influence the students’ willingness to use English in communication were Interlocutor, motivation, anxiety, social environment, and topic interest. Some of these non-linguistic elements, anxiety and social circumstances were two of those five nonlinguistic elements that have an impact on students' learning as well. According to Tuyen and Loan (2019), It was discovered that situational factor of students’ willingness to communicate in L2 classrooms resulted from the interaction of linguistic factors, classroom environmental factors, such as topic, task, interlocutor, teacher, and group size, with individual characteristics such as self-confidence, personality, emotion, and perceived opportunity to communicate. According to the research, language instructors should be aware of how these several contributing factors interact to influence students' WTC in the classroom. More specifically, the changes in the learning atmosphere from direct to indirect meetings led to many changes to the learning process experienced by most of students and lecturers at English Department, Universitas Jambi as well. In online classroom practice, many lecturers complained about students who were frequently inactive and did not participate in online learning, despite the fact that there are several virtual meeting platforms that are frequently used as an alternative to in- person meetings. Moreover, many students tend to be more passive in online learning communication by turning off the microphone during the discussion. Some students also turned-off the camera that shows their participation and presence on their devices. Furthermore, when the teacher asked students, sometimes some students were silent and did not answer the teacher's questions. This phenomenon often creates an uncomfortable atmosphere in the learning process for both teachers and students. On the basis of the background to the present study mentioned above, this study was conducted to explore factors affecting Students’ Willingness to Communicate in Online Learning during Covid- 19 Pandemic. The initial finding of this study might answer to the question on “what are the factors affecting students’ willingness to communicate in online learning class at English Study Program Universitas Jambi? The findings are expected to provide a theoretical and practical insight and perspective on students’ willingness to communicate in online class during Covid-19 Pandemic in Indonesia and countries all over the world. According to Tuyen and Loan (2019), there are ENGLISH REVIEW: Journal of English Education p-ISSN 2301-7554, e-ISSN 2541-3643 Volume 11, Issue 2, June 2023 https://journal.uniku.ac.id/index.php/ERJEE 471 two factors that are considered influences students’ willingness to communicate, psychological and situational or environmental factor which is described as follows: Tuyen and Loan (2019) state that psychological variables are a group of human-related factors that affected the students' willingness to communicate. The first factor is lack of communication confidence, which has an impact on students’ desire to communicate. The desire to communicate with a particular person and low self-confidence is the most direct indicator of willingness to communicate. The second factor of these is a perceived communicative competence. Students' ability to speak L2 with other L2 users may be taken into account when evaluating their communicative competence. Students in L2 who believe they are either ineffective communicators or skilled communicators frequently have lower or higher willingness to communicate (Tuyen and Loan, 2019). The third factor concerns on L2 Learning Anxiety. Oral communication fear makes students less motivated to speak, which affects how they view their communication skills. The elements that have been connected to L2 learning anxiety include trait anxiety (a person's personality attribute), state anxiety, and situation-specific anxiety (Tuyen and Loan 2019). The fourth factor is students’ motivation which is regarded as essential in influencing students’ willingness to speak. The degree to which students work to learn the language out of a desire to do so and the satisfaction that comes from doing so and how motivated the students are affects by how prepared they are for communication. (Tuyen and Loan, 2019; Januariza and Hendriani, 2019; Aini et al. 2021; Indiana and Wulandari; 2020). The fifth factor is related to students’ personality. Personality qualities such as extraversion and introversion might be viewed as important indications of willingness to speak. Personality can help or impede willingness to talk and general language learning. Students' communicative openness is determined by their individual traits. Communication is more likely to occur when a person has strong levels of extroversion, self-confidence, friendliness, and flexibility, Rihardini. (2021). Alimorad, Z. (2021). The student's desire to speak with a particular individual in a particular circumstance or at a given time can be determined by environmental or situational factors and numerous elements are known to have an impact on students' willingness to communication. The first factor is influenced by the task types of learning. The planned learning activities in a class aimed at communicative competence or structural knowledge are referred to tasks. During the learning process, many tasks would be given to the students with many types. Task types are observable factors influencing students' willingness to communicate. According to Sylvia et al. (2020), the students’ will be more willing to communicate with a presentation task given by the lecturer. This is in line with Tuyen and Loan (2019), the degree of difficulty and the amount of time allocated for completing the work can all affect the students' motivation to communicate. The second factor is classroom topic discussion. The issue familiarity, topic interest, and topic preparation are the major factors that might boost students' self-confidence and willingness to communicate. Students may be encouraged to participate in the debate by certain subjects because they feel driven to do so, as they think the topic is both intrinsically and indirectly fascinating. (Tuyen and Loan, 2019; Alimorad, 2021; Suvongse and Chanyoo, 2022). The third factor focuses on the function of the teacher or teachers’ role. According to Tuyen and Loan (2019), in the L2 classroom, instructional methods, classroom rules, and the teacher's verbal and nonverbal behavior have an impact on the students' willingness to speak. Furthermore, Rindiana and Wulandari (2020) confirmed that one of the factors affecting students’ willingness to communicate is the teacher role. The teacher could give the motivation and the oral example of the English language while communicating or explaining the lessons. Some of the teachers’ behavior in the classroom includes offering opportunities for students to speak and delivering clear explanations, comments, or encouragement. The students will be more willing to speak when the teacher can conduct a conducive classroom atmosphere, Susanti (2019). Another factor is classroom atmosphere which covers the feeling, attitude, or circumstance that the class creates. As it is stated by Tuyen and Loan (2019) The classroom atmosphere is defined as the emotion, mood, or climate created and enjoyed by the class group which shows involvement and participation of all members in class.” (p.255). The classroom atmosphere is also one of the factors that affect students’ willingness to communicate. Referring to this point, Rindiana and Wulandari (2020) claimed that classroom atmosphere impacts students’ eagerness to communicate. it leads to students’ willingness to speak in English which Nyimas Triyana Safitri,, Habizar, & Melda Nifia Putri Willingness to speak: What factors influence EFL learners? 472 rise in a positive or engaging learning environment. This is in line with Tuyen and Loan (2019) noted that students’ L2 willingness to communicate is promoted by a friendly classroom atmosphere, while boring and silent classroom situations demotivate willingness to communicate. In addition, Le et al. (2019) highlighted that online learning provides a remote learning mode that allows the students to learn from home, and some environmental distractors sometimes couldn’t be avoided, such as interference from the family member, noisy environmental conditions. Moreover, the students need a quiet place to communicate and listen during oral online learning activities. They also students tend to be remaining silent in a non-private environment or with interference from the family members. (Ng, 2021; Le et al., 2018; Alimorad, 2021; Janah, 2021). This idea also supported by Agustina et al. (2020), learning at home in a setting that is not conducive tend to disrupt the learning process. Online learning is a model of virtual learning environment which serves copious learning activities through distance learning website flatform. It is often referred to as “e-learning,” among other terms, even thought is just one type of distance learning, the umbrella term for any learning that takes place across distance and not in a traditional classroom. In recent research, Arkorful and Abaido (2021) stated that online learning uses information and communication technologies to allow access to online teaching and learning resources including the process of instructing, teaching, and learning, which is conducted through the application of web-based or internet-enabled digital technologies to achieve various learning purposes. For this reason, the minimum requirements for online class are access to a computer, the Internet, and the drive to achieve in a non-traditional learning environment to enroll in an online course. Additionally, online leaning offers a great way to give training that is not restricted by time or place, making it possible for anybody, anywhere, to receive instruction at any time and its setting appeals to learners as a practical approach to accommodate remote learning. It also allows students to have a lot of lesson documentation as it provides students with a more relaxed atmosphere because they are learning from home. Students also don't need to go to campus daily, increasing time efficiency (Ayu and Pratiwi, 2021). On the other hand, Adijaya & Lestanto also explained that online learning can be done in an easy way because it only relies on applications that are connected to the internet (Swari, 2020). According to Nambiar (2020), some of the teacher found it more convenient in conducting classes by using online method since it saving travel time. To continue the learning process during this pandemic, many online platforms that can be used, such as zoom, Goggle classroom, Goggle meet, Moodle, etc. The online platforms promote both inquiries based learning and independent learning since the online platforms facilitate interactions between teacher and students although they are not in the same room (Nartiningrum, 2019; Clarin and Baluyos, 2022). The use of online learning media certainly requires a good internet network to support smooth online learning. This, of course, presents the advantages and disadvantages of distance learning. According to KEMENDIKBUD (2020), the main obstacle to online learning is the lack of internet facilities to support online learning. Major problems in online learning were the lack of internet connection and got disconnected to the classes (Yuzulia, 2021). The power of the internet network, which is not evenly distributed in every region in Indonesia, especially in remote areas, greatly affects students' learning process. However, some problems may occur due to unstable networking, insufficient quota inadequate speed of network connection, (KEMENDIKBUD, 2020: Putri, N. R. & Sari, F. M. 2021). METHOD A qualitative research design has been considered appropriate in this study. According to Anas and Ishaq (2020) “Qualitative research is a systematic scientific method of inquiry which seeks to build a holistic largely narrative, description to inform the researchers understanding of social or cultural phenomena” (p. 90). In the case with a qualitative study, this study attempted to understand the meaning for participants in the study, of the events, situations, and action they were involved with and the accounts that they give of their lives and experiences; attempted to understand the particular context within which the participants act, and the influence that this context has on their action. Every detail was thought to contribute for obtaining a better understanding of behavior. This study explored affecting factors influence students’ willingness to communicate in online learning class during the covid pandemic era in Indonesia. This study was conducted at English Study Program, Faculty of Teacher Training and Education Universitas Jambi. It involves six ENGLISH REVIEW: Journal of English Education p-ISSN 2301-7554, e-ISSN 2541-3643 Volume 11, Issue 2, June 2023 https://journal.uniku.ac.id/index.php/ERJEE 473 students who were enrolled in the academic year 2020/2021 with two years experienced in online learning environment. These participants were selected by using purposive sampling technique and assigned depending on their agreement on the inform concern form. Two data collection methods, interview and observation, were employed in this study. 19 question items made up the interview, which was addressed to six participants for lasted 20-30 minutes. The interview has undergone several changes and revisions by experts before it was administered. While the observation was carried out during the daily online class conducted. The collected data in this study was recorded in order to keep the authenticity. The data was then analyzed by using thematic analysis technique. Thematic analysis is a useful technique for closely examining qualitative data to identify patterns and explain the phenomenon in a form of the researcher's point of view. The steps of analyzing the data were included familiarizing the data, generating initial codes, searching for themes, reviewing potential themes, defining or naming themes and presenting the report. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION Results The findings of this study indicate that discouraging factors of students' motivation to communicate in an online learning environment is being attributed to a number of demotivating variables, including psychological and situational or contextual issues. These two main findings are described in the following discussion: The psychological factor Psychological factor refers to the set of factors from the individual that is correlated to students’ willingness to communicate in online class. These psychological factors are categorized into: Lack of self-confidence Self-confidence is seen as the combination between perceived communicative competence and lack of anxiety which tends to be reduced and enhanced at particular moments. There was found in this study that when the students felt low self- confidence, they tended to avoid talking in zoom room class. As stated by Katiandagho & Sengkey (2022), the lower students’ self-confidence they will have lower WTC. Students’ low self- confidence was also probably caused by several factors such as online classroom atmosphere, difficult task type or materials which make them difficult to speak up during the class. Some of them admitted that learning material were hard to understand, so they felt less confidents to talk to lecturers and class in zoom room and afraid of making mistake. Besides, students also often felt embarrassed seeing themselves on screen and being noticed by the other student. The students start to feel anxious when they have to speak in front of other people (Idzni & Setiawan 2021). They felt anxiety particularly when they think others might see them, as it was stated by participant P06 and P03: “If I don't really understand the teaching material, then I don't have high confidence enough to speak in the zoom room during learning”. “Speaking with lecturers who use challenging teaching materials makes me afraid to speak up. I'm quite hesitant to talk when I'm under pressure for fear of saying something incorrectly and embarrassing my friends. I am also felt shay to look at myself on a screen”. The desire to communicate with a particular person and low self-confidence are the most direct indicator of willingness to communicate. So, it can be concluded that students’ low self-confidence is one of the decreasing factors for students’ willingness to communicate in zoom class. The lack of students’ self-confidence also resulted from several factors which directly lead to inactive online learning environment. a) Low level of English language proficiency The students’ low communicative competence is one of the decreasing factors of willingness to communicate. When they perceived their communicative competence at a low level, they tended to contribute less during online class communication. As it was mentioned by participant P06 and P02: "I feel that I can't speak English well, I'm afraid to speak." Sometimes i have problem with vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation” “I occasionally decide not to speak much in zoom class due to my terrible English. Fear of being incorrect and embarrassed by friends and lecturer”. When students believe they have problem with communication skills, they experience speaking anxiety, which makes them reluctant to communicate during the class. These findings are in line with Ramli et al. (2021) that unwillingness Nyimas Triyana Safitri,, Habizar, & Melda Nifia Putri Willingness to speak: What factors influence EFL learners? 474 to speak affected by some linguistic problems such as lack of English vocabulary, weak grammar skills, and poor English pronunciation. L2 learning anxiety This study found that participants were fear of a negative evaluation by the lecturer or other students. It caused anxiousness and nervousness that led to the unwillingness to communicate in zoom class. The fear of negative evaluation would come after the participant or the other individual had a direct negative evaluation from the lecturer during class. As it is stated by participants P01 and P05: "I frequently get notices from lecturer since I don’t use English in classroom practice. I use Bahasa in zoom class dominantly so, I felt very uncomfortable with this lecturer and avoid to talk in zoom class”. “Sometimes I get a lot of corrections from the lecturer especially about assignments. This often make me a bit afraid and reluctant to communicate while studying’.” This finding leads to the conclusion that learning anxiety is one of discourages factor influencing students’ willingness to communicate. It was brought on by pressure or the fear of receiving a bad review. As Tuyen and Loan (2019) said that students' perceptions of their communication skills are impacted by oral communication anxiety, which affects their willingness to speak. Students’ individual personality The study also found that individual’ personality affected the willingness to communicate. When the they are quiet and introverted, the willingness to speak might potentially decreased and this was claimed by participant P06: "I'm an introvert personality and also it's quite affecting my willingness to speak because again I feel shy to talk and quite afraid to be the center of attention in class.” This point of view is confirmed by Tuyen and Loan (2019) that introversion and extraversion or personality traits can be seen as influential indicators of students’ willingness to communicate and the individual personalities can facilitate or hinder students’ willingness to speak up for general language learning. Meanwhile Zohoorian et al. (2022) stated the same idea that an extraverted person is talkative and sociable they tend to contribute to improve communication. 1. The situational or contextual factors This situational feature reveals whether the students are expected to interact with a particular person in a certain circumstance or situation. For this study, it was discovered that a number of situational elements have an impact on students' willingness to interact during online classes. Those elements are acknowledged as: The difficult task types or models This study discovered that the difficult tasks type is one of the factors affecting students’ willingness to speak in zoom class. The participants agreed that the challenging task made them prefer to remain silent. When they are given challenging assignments, their willingness to communicate get declining. The students would remain silent during the class lesson when they do not understand or comprehend the content of lesson, Suciati (2020) and this is claimed by participant P04: "I tend to speak less if the task is difficult because since I don't fully understand it. When I look at my friends remain silent during the zoom class, I often postpone to speak up and wait them to talk to. The hard work during the lesson often makes me lazy to speak up.” From the statements above, it can be said that when the participants are confused about the class tasks or assignment, they choose to remain silent. The hard work of the lesson makes them scared of a negative correction. This also makes participants afraid to talk or make mistakes. Therefore, the challenging tasks could be the reason why students’ willingness to communicate is declining. a) The unfamiliar topic of class discussion The study discovered that students’ willingness to speak is impacted by their enthusiasm in the issue or topic of class discussion. The majority of participants described how their motivation to talk in zoom class dropped when they lost interest in the subject. This is in line with Tuyen and Loan (2019) said that when students are given unfamiliar topic to discuss, they may be more avoid to engage in conversation with one another. As it was said by participant P01 and P06: “The topic of discussion in class greatly determines my participation in class. If the topic ENGLISH REVIEW: Journal of English Education p-ISSN 2301-7554, e-ISSN 2541-3643 Volume 11, Issue 2, June 2023 https://journal.uniku.ac.id/index.php/ERJEE 475 is less interesting, I tend not to talk much. I think it’s less interesting to discuss in class”. ”I prefer not to speak if the topic of discussion is not familiar.” The effect of topics discussion could have been a determinant of students’ willingness to speak since less interesting topics led to a decrease in students’ motivation to talk (Latifah, 2020). Meanwhile the familiar topic will increase their willingness to communicate as stated by Hanifah and Nainggolan (2021), students will be more willing to talk when they have a good understanding of the topic at hand. The lecturers’ personal characteristics The researcher found that the role of the lecturer influenced students’ willingness to communicate. Most of the participant explained that the negative lecturer’s behavior influenced their motivation to talk in class. A lecturer who has a bad temper and intimidates the students will lead to an unwillingness to communicate. As stated by one of the participants P04 and P02: "I'm afraid to talk in zoom class because the sort of lecturer who likes to be angry and irritable, I don't like it since it's terrifying." “I don't want to talk in online classes since the lesson is too hard, or the lecturer is scary sometimes.” As the students experienced anxiety about speaking in class with unfriendly lecturer, they became less motivated and reluctant to speak in class. One of the participants P03 said that: “Sometimes there are situations where lecturers prefer to switch off camera during lectures for certain reasons. This makes me and friends feel unmotivated because we were not directly supervised by the lecturers while studying.” From this point of view, it is clear that the way in which communication in a zoom class is conducted might be challenging if the lecturers show the unfriendly manner to students. As a result, there is inconvenience atmosphere in a zoom class as students frequently sit quietly. Sylvia et al. (2020) who also noted that students will not have a high willingness to communicate when the teacher is not pleasant to them, for example, when the teacher gets angry when the students make mistakes. In contrast, the students may be more interested to speak when the teacher is encouraging and warm (Lee, 2020). The learners will be more have a high enjoyment in communicating with foreign language with a friendly teacher who is not overly strict. ( Deewale, 2019; Suvongse and Chanyoo, 2022). b) The inconvenient time or schedule of the class meeting The study found that one of the elements affecting students' willingness to speak was the inconvenient schedule of virtual class meeting. Additionally, lack of a supportive classroom environment will have a detrimental effect on the students’ willingness to communicate (Sylvia et al. 2020). In addition to this, Lee (2020) mentioned that L2 students’ WTC were determined by classroom enjoyment and grit. This study also discovered that the length of the course and the number of course credits had an impact on students’ willingness to speak during the zoom class, consequently, students got fatigued and found it difficult to concentrate when the meeting was held at a vulnerable hour, including during lunch, in the evening, or in a lengthy sequential class. This is in line with the statement from Ng (2021), the length of time for online class in which students spend, may have an impact on how effective their learning is, and this was admitted by participant P01, P03, P06: "When lectures begin at inconvenient hour or time, such as at night or in the afternoon when I had previously attended lectures beginning in the morning, I find it difficult to speak. this condition is truly tiring.” “It depends on the time or hour of the meal; whether it's time to eat at 12, it's tired. I also often feel sleepy and hungry especially at 1 o'clock and I don’t to talk in class.” “The online zoom class often occurs at noon or one in the afternoon and it really makes me difficult to concentrate. For this time, I often keep silent in class.” A trouble internet connection The researcher discovered that students' willingness to communicate was impacted by a poor internet connection during the virtual meeting. It refers to the situation where the internet connection is inconsistent and interferes with learning. This statement was also claimed by participant P06 and P05: Nyimas Triyana Safitri,, Habizar, & Melda Nifia Putri Willingness to speak: What factors influence EFL learners? 476 "The internet connection frequently cuts out, which makes me lazy to speak up in class.” “The lecturer's voice is sometimes unclear or interrupted when explaining material due to signal interference, so i don't understand what's being explained and I am lazy to talk.” The majority of participants expressed that when the internet connection is inconsistent, they would be less participated in zoom class. This is aligned with Aini et al. (2021) highlighted that one of the main challenges of students have when utilizing the zoom platform to learn English is an unreliable internet connection. The students would then become uninterested in the subject matter, which would diminish their willingness to speak. As stated by Anwar & Wahid (2021), the engagement in online classroom environment is reduced during bad connection and lack of interaction among the students. The same idea was also expressed by Clarin and Bayuros (2022), students often ignore their teachers and turn off the camera when there are issues with the internet connection. CONCLUSION The Changes in the learning atmosphere from direct to indirect meetings lead to many changes in the ongoing learning process that the EFL learners’ experiences. This finding has discovered numerous discouraging factors influence EFL learners’ willingness to speak at online learning. These factors are derived by the psychological and situational or environmental aspect, which were described in the following table: Table 1. Factors which influence EFL learners’ willingness to speak at online learning Theme(s) Sub-theme(s The Psychological Factors  Lack of self- confidence  Low level of English language proficiency  L2 learning anxiety  Students’ individual Personality The Situational Factors  Difficult task types and models.  The unfamiliar topic of class discussion  The lecturers’ personal characteristics  Inconvenient time and schedule of the meeting  A trouble Internet connection The results of this study may provide a number of recommendations, including the need for lecturers in online learning environments to be able to interact positively with students and foster a friendly learning environment that will encourage students’ talk in zoom classes. To encourage EFL learners to talk more, the lecturers should also be able to constructively interact with the learners and foster a welcoming learning environment. Additionally, it is also expected that EFL learners might learn how to increase their level of participation in online classes to create an active zoom class atmosphere. To this end, the finding of this study might serve as a guide for future studies looking into related topics and being used as the reference for improving and evaluating of learning strategies in the online classroom atmosphere. ACKNOWLEDGEMENT We would like to express our gratitude and thankfulness to Universitas Jambi for the financial and guidance support to the completion of this research in 2022. REFERENCES Agustina, D., Matra, S., & Karimah, S. (2020). Challenges of having online learning activities: University students' perspectives. The International English Language Teachers and Lecturers Conference (pp. 9-14). INELTAL Conference. Alimorad, Z. (2021). A case study on willingness to communicate in English in the Iranian tertiary educational context. A publication on the teaching and learning of English, 1-28. 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