Attitudes of Indian and Saudi Students in Learning English as a Second Language (ESL)/English as a Foreign Language (EFL): A SWOT Analysis

Abstract

This research studies the similarities and differences in the attitudes of students who studied English as a Second Language (ESL) in India and students who studied English as a Foreign Language (EFL) in Saudi Arabia through the use of SWOT analysis. The data was collected from 165 ESL/EFL students through the use of two questionnaires that had 16 questions each. Out of the total of 16 questions, the first 3 were personal questions that included their names, courses they enrolled in, and their age, which were not mandatory to be answered. Of the remaining 13 questions, 4 had to be answered in order of their preference. The third part of the questionnaire had 5 questions based on LSRW skills, and 4 were open-ended questions based on SWOT (strength, weakness, opportunity, threat) analysis. SWOT is used in different fields these days but it hasn’t been used in the context of measuring students’ level of learning a language till date, which makes this study unique. The results of this study showed that ESL respondents’ views had been scattered over different ideas, but EFL respondents had been very focused about their strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats; though in most cases, both the category of respondents pointed out similar reasons. The attitudes of both the respondents towards learning English has been found to differ slightly depending upon their cultural backgrounds. The study stipulates some suggestions for helping students from both the backgrounds as well as their instructors in overcoming the issues that they majorly face in learning the English language.