The role of social phobia in limiting English learning skills

الملخص EN

This paper investigates the extent effect of social phobia on foreign language learning of English language students who study in one of the Libyan universities (Omer Almukhtar University).

The participants of the study were two female students in the third grade who were chosen intentionally by the researchers through observation.

An in-depth interview besides observation were used for collecting data, and a content analysis method was used for analyzing and interpreting the responses.

The findings show that learning foreign languages becomes more difficult when the social phobia is experienced, which subsequently causing deficiency in different aspects of personality resulting impediment in most life aspects including communication, work, and education, particularly foreign languages learning and practice such speaking and reading aloud.

The study also reveals inverse relationship between self-confidence and social phobia.