Comparison of Communication Apprehe

Comparison of Communication Apprehension Scores across Year of Study: A Case of Malaysian Accounting and Business Students
Alex Tun-Lee Fooa, Hock-Siong Ongb
aUniversiti Tunku Abdul Rahman (UTAR), Malaysia. alexfoo@utar.edu.my
bUniversiti Tunku Abdul Rahman (UTAR), Malaysia. onghs@utar.edu.my
Abstract
Past literature has consistently highlighted the problem of oral communication apprehension (CA) among accounting majors. However, it raises generalizablity concern due to that findings were over-represented by those in developed countries. Due to this, a local study is necessary to extend the literature. Setting place in a large private higher education institution in Malaysia, a comparative research was set up, which aims to find out the possible difference between accounting and business students in terms of level of CA across all years of study. Closed-ended questionnaire survey is used to draw usable response consisting of 616 accounting and 474 business students. Data analysis reveals that accounting students, surprisingly, do not differ significantly in terms of levels of CA compared to that of business students. However, the reported CA mean scores were noticeably larger than the ones reported in past studies. Additional evidence shows that CA do not differ across student‟s age and year of study, which indirectly supports CA conceptualization as being trait-like in nature. Discussions of how personal variables are related to CA, and whether these indications are positive to the notion of future accountants as communicators are further elaborated.
Keywords: Communication competence, anxiety, avoidance, accounting education
Introduction Introduction Introduction IntroductionIntroductionIntroduction
Accountant’s Communication Competence
According to American Accounting Association (AAA), accounting is defined as “identifying, recording, and communicating economic events to interested users”. AAA‟s definition implies the need of communication competence in accounting career success, which confirms with the current trend of emphasizing accountants‟ personal competence on top of technical skills. Future CFO may need to be well equipped in communication to perform job satisfactorily (MIA, 2010). Hence, the role of accountant as communicator (or navigator) of financial affairs of companies can be logically deduced based on the definition above. This role should create awareness to existing and future accountants that they need to guide various stakeholders of organizations in terms of producing, delivering, and explaining financial information (and also non-financial information among management accountants) to them.
Challenges facing accounting educationist is not novel (De Lange and Watty, 2011; Albrecht and Sack, 2000). One challenge is the need of adapting accounting curriculum in light of possible
International Conference on Business, Accounting, Finance, and Economics (BAFE 2013)
Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman, Kampar, Perak, Malaysia, 4th October 2013
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changing roles of future accountants, e.g. accountant as communicator (Hancock et al., 2009; Courtis, 2002). Prior research showed that communication is viewed as important requisite skill among accounting students (Gray and Murray, 2011; Evans and Cable, 2011; Gray 2010; Schmidt et al., 2009; Kerby and Romine, 2009; Ballantine and Larres, 2009; Culpepper et al., 2006; Nellermoe et al., 1999; Morgan, 1997).
Communication apprehension (CA) can inhibit effective communication and development of appropriate communication skills, and many studies have been conducted to measure CA among students in different disciplines and in different settings. CA is important to be addressed as it represents one facet of communication competence (Morreale, 2007). According to Morreale, CA forms the negative motivation to communicative, which hinders and discourages meaningful communication. This anxiety or apprehension about communicating is a vital part of study as communication competence of accountant needs to be addressed, as pointed in earlier paragraphs.
Communication apprehension (CA), or communication anxiety, represents the negative motivation to communicate competently. Often referred to as a barrier to skill development, CA is defined as “an individual level of fear or anxiety associated with either real or anticipated communication with another person or persons” (McCroskey, 1977, 27, as cited in Beatty, McCroskey, and Pence, 2009). People with CA tend to avoid communication whenever possible, or suffer a variety of anxiety-type feeling when communication is unavoidable. CA is theorized as a normally distributed variable manifested in each individual. As reported by McCroskey, approximately one out of five persons residing in US has high levels of CA.
CA is generally enduring throughout university exposure, as Aly and Islam (2003) and Ameen, Guffeyand Jackson (2000) both suggesting that students‟ CA remained the same throughout the university study. A recent study by Ameen, Jackson andMalgwi (2010) also confirms such trend, based on two independent student samples across 8-year span. Overall, higher levels of CA are reported among accounting students.