The Effect of Short-term Stays in English
Speaking Countries on Attitudes
Toward Learning and Using English
Kenneth E. Williams
Introduction
Having taught English at the high school, junior college, anduniversity levels in Japan for twenty-ﬁve years I have noticed thatmany students who join my classes are better at conversational
English than in the past. This positive change can be attributed to avariety of factors, but the one that stands out to me is the increasing
number of students who have spent an extended amount of timein English speaking countries or who have been in non- English
speaking countries but have attended English-medium international
schools. Improvement in conversational English ability in relation
to extended exposure to English in situations such as these is notsurprising.
Besides the increase in the number of young Japanese of alllevels, elementary through high school, who have spent an extended
amount of time abroad in English speaking countries, there has
been an even greater number who have been to English speaking
countries for short-term stays. Most likely these short visits werevacation trips, but some students have gone abroad to participate insporting events, do volunteer work, attend conferences, along withother reasons. Various studies have examined the effect of longterm stays abroad on students primarily from Western countries(e.g., Aveni, 2005; Carlson, Burn, Unseem, and Yachimowicz, 1990;
Nash, 1976). On the other hand, little if any research has beenȖ¡¡125¡¡Ȗaccomplished on the effect of short-term stays of Japanese students
in countries where English is the ﬁrst language or the language ofinstruction in school (Kumagi, 1977).

Aim of the StudyIn these brief research notes, I would like to report on anongoing study I am conducting on the effect of short- term stays
abroad on Japanese learners of English. The purpose of the study isto determine if there is any effect on Japanese university students’attitudes towards speaking and listening to English in their formal
English classes and their general attitudes towards studying
English after they return to Japan from their short stay abroad. My
hypothesis is that even a short-term visit has a positive effect onstudentsʼ attitude towards learning and using English. In this study,a short-term visit is defined as a month or less, and it had to bewhen the student was in high school or later. The purpose of the visit
could have been for any reason except to study English, and the stayneeded to be in a country that used English as a ﬁrst language.

MethodɉParticipants . The participants in this study were 155 Japanese
university students enrolled in three coeducational elective
conversational English classes in Japan. Students were told thatparticipation was voluntary. All of the teachers were native English
speakers.

ɉData collection . An original anonymous questionnaire written inJapanese was used to collect data for this study. First, the questionnaire asked for the students’ age, gender, and year in school. Next
it asked if they had spent time out of Japan when they were a highȖ¡¡126¡¡Ȗschool or college student. If the response was yes, students wereasked what country they had gone to, how long they stayed there,
and what they did there. Space was allowed for students who had
been outside of Japan more then one time. Finally, 36 statements
were presented to gather information on the students’ attitudes
towards attending formal conversational English classes andexpressing themselves in English. Responses were measured on aﬁve-point Likert scale from strongly agree to strongly disagree.

ɉData analysis. The number of students reporting that they had
been outside of Japan was 87. Sixty-eight reported that they had
never left Japan. Questionnaires with information missing and thoseindicating that the student had been outside of Japan but did not ﬁt
the parameters of the study were eliminated. From the remaining
questionnaires, random samples of 42 from the been-abroad groupand 46 from the not-been-abroad group were analyzed. After tallying
the students’ responses, an average for each response was calculated,
and the averages of the two groups were compared.

Results
ɉThese research notes present only the preliminary results of thispilot study. I will present a broad picture of what was found so far,saving a detailed description for a later paper after having a chance
to analyze the questionnaire in detail, revise it, check it again, andadminister a ﬁnalized version to a larger number of students.

ɉDesire to attend English class. Nine percent of the students inthe been-abroad group reported that they strongly agreed with thestatement about desiring to attend English class which was nearly
identical to the 8 percent reported by the not-been-abroad group.

ɉDesire to study more English . Nine percent of the students inȖ¡¡127¡¡Ȗthe been-abroad group reported that they strongly agreed with thestatement about desiring to take more English language classes in
the future, which was nearly identical to the 10 percent reported by
the not-been-abroad group.

ɉPerception of spoken English ability. When asked if they felt that
other students spoke English better then they did, 30 percent of theBeen Abroad Group strongly agreed, in contrast to 16 percent of thenot-been-abroad group.

ɉSpeaking English in class. When asked if they had problems
speaking English in class, 10 percent of the been - abroad groupstrongly agreed in contrast to 3 percent of the not - been - abroadgroup. Other questions about classroom performance followed asimilar pattern.
For other parts of the questionnaire, the results were similar.

Preliminary Conclusion
ɉAs explained above, I have purposely not gone into detail in reporting these preliminary results. The overall results, however, do suggest that there is little if any difference between the two groups intheir attitude toward formal English learning in general. However,in regard to their attitude towards their ability to speak English,
the group that had spent a short time abroad in English speaking
countries responded more negatively about their perceived abilities
then those who had never left Japan. These preliminary ﬁndings run
contrary to the original hypothesis that a short-term stay abroad has
a positive effect on students’ attitudes towards learning and using
English. The next step in this research is to determine whether
these ﬁndings hold up to further analysis, and if so, what may be thepossible reasons for these results.

Ȗ¡¡128¡¡ȖÂäìïðøíæåèîæïõ
I would like to thank Melvin R. Andrade for his helpful advice.

Selected References
Aveni, V. (2005). Study Abroad and Second Language Use : Construct -ing the Self . Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Carlson, S. J., Burn, B. B., Unseem J., & Yachimowicz, D. (1990).

Study Abroad : The Experience of American Undergraduates .
New York: Greenwood Press.
Kumagai, F. (1977). The effects of cross - cultural education onattitudes and personality of Japanese students. Sociology ofEducation , 50(Jan.), 40-47.
Nash, D. (1976). The personal consequences of a year of study
abroad. The Journal of Higher Education , 47(2), 191-203.

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