Willingness To Communicate (WTC)

Abstract

The Willingness to Communicate (WTC) scale, developed by James C. McCroskey and Virginia P. Richmond in 1987, is an established psychometric instrument designed to evaluate an individual’s stable, trait-like predisposition toward initiating oral communication across diverse interpersonal settings and receiver relationships. Grounded in contemporary communication theory, the scale operationalizes communicative choice as a behavioral intention under free-will conditions. The instrument comprises 20 items, structured into a balanced 4 × 3 matrix measuring four communication contexts (public speaking, large meetings, small group discussions, and interpersonal dyads) across three distinct receiver types (strangers, acquaintances, and friends). To mitigate response bias and social desirability artifacts, 12 target items are embedded alongside eight un-scored distractor items representing routine, transactional interactions. Respondents quantify their probability of initiating communication using a continuous percentage metric ranging from 0 (“Never”) to 100 (“Always”). Psychometric evaluations demonstrate strong internal consistency, with full-scale Cronbach’s alpha coefficients typically ranging between .85 and .94, and test-retest reliability estimates spanning .68 to .86 over multi-week intervals. Construct validity is supported by strong negative correlations with communication apprehension and robust positive associations with self-perceived communication competence (SPCC). Confirmatory and exploratory factor analyses affirm a hierarchical factor structure featuring a robust general factor alongside coherent context- and receiver-specific subdimensions. Widely applied across organizational communication, instructional environments, cross-cultural linguistics, and second-language acquisition paradigms, the WTC scale remains an indispensable tool for diagnosing communicative reticence and predicting communicative participation.

Keywords

Willingness to Communicate, WTC, James C. McCroskey, Virginia P. Richmond, Communication Apprehension, Self-Perceived Communication Competence, Interpersonal Communication, Public Speaking Anxiety, Psychometrics, Trait-like Communication Predisposition

Authors

The Willingness to Communicate (WTC) scale was conceptualized and validated by two prominent figures in the field of communication studies:

• James C. McCroskey, Ed.D. (1938–2012): McCroskey was an internationally recognized scholar and Professor Emeritus of Communication Studies at West Virginia University. Serving as the author or co-author of more than 40 books and over 200 scholarly journal articles, McCroskey pioneered the systematic conceptualization and measurement of communication apprehension (CA), instructional communication, and communicative avoidance. His theoretical work laid the foundation for scales including the Personal Report of Communication Apprehension (PRCA-24) and the Self-Perceived Communication Competence (SPCC) scale.
• Virginia P. Richmond, Ph.D.: Richmond is a Professor of Communication Studies, having held distinguished faculty and administrative appointments at West Virginia University, Ohio State University, and the University of Alabama at Birmingham. A past president of the Eastern Communication Association and a prolific researcher, Richmond is widely known for her investigations into nonverbal communication, organizational power dynamics, teacher-student classroom interactions, and the behavioral consequences of communication avoidance.

Inquiries regarding historical documentation and archival access to Dr. McCroskey’s research instruments can be directed through the Department of Communication Studies at West Virginia University or accessed via the academic memorial archives maintained at jamescmccroskey.com.

Purpose

The Willingness to Communicate (WTC) scale was created to address a critical theoretical gap in instructional and interpersonal communication research: explaining why individuals who possess equivalent cognitive ability, verbal skills, and situational opportunities demonstrate vastly disparate tendencies to initiate verbal interaction. Prior to the formulation of the WTC construct, researchers primarily focused on negative affective states, such as communication apprehension, speech anxiety, or social reticence. While these constructs effectively cataloged affective discomfort and neurotic withdrawal, they failed to account for individuals who, despite low anxiety, actively chose silence over discourse due to dispositional or cognitive orientations. Conversely, other models focused strictly on objective communication competence, overlooking the reality that many demonstrably skilled communicators routinely opt out of social engagement.

The primary purpose of the WTC is to quantify an individual’s global and context-specific behavioral intention to speak when entirely free to choose between talking and remaining silent. McCroskey and Richmond (1987) posited that communicative choice represents the final common pathway through which cognitive orientations, affective responses, and situational parameters translate into overt verbal behavior. By measuring this construct, the instrument serves several vital empirical, educational, and clinical purposes:

• Empirical Research into Human Interaction: The scale enables researchers to disentangle communicative capability from behavioral execution. It functions as a dependent, mediator, or independent variable in complex structural equation models exploring leadership emergence, small group decision-making dynamics, workplace socialization, and academic engagement.
• Instructional and Second Language Acquisition (SLA) Diagnostics: In pedagogical contexts, particularly within foreign and second language learning (L2), the WTC construct—subsequently expanded by Peter D. MacIntyre and colleagues—provides a framework for assessing why learners with high linguistic aptitude frequently fail to engage in authentic communicative exchange. It provides educators with actionable diagnostic profiles to structure safer classroom interventions.
• Organizational Communication and Team Architecture: In corporate and organizational psychology, the WTC serves as a reliable metric for understanding employee voice behaviors, willingness to whistle-blow, engagement in horizontal and vertical organizational communication, and participation within multidisciplinary teams.
• Clinical and Remedial Assessment: Speech-language pathologists, educational psychologists, and communication consultants utilize the sub-scores of the WTC to pinpoint whether an individual’s communicative avoidance is receiver-driven (e.g., paralyzing reticence around authority figures or strangers) or context-driven (e.g., situational avoidance restricted strictly to public speaking or large assembly meetings).

Ultimately, the theoretical rationale for the WTC is grounded in the recognition that talkativeness is not a randomized behavior, but a predictable manifestation of a stable, trait-like communicative orientation. By capturing subjective estimates of likelihood across standardized scenarios, the WTC supplies an empirical bridge connecting personality theory with observable communicative acts.

Psychological Construct

The psychological construct assessed by the WTC scale is defined as an individual’s trait-level, dispositional inclination to initiate verbal communication when presented with the opportunity to do so under conditions of free will. Unlike state-dependent communicative impulses that fluctuate wildly based on transient variables—such as immediate mood, physiological fatigue, or immediate ambient noise—the WTC construct reflects an enduring personality predisposition that remains relatively stable across chronological time and environmental conditions.

The construct is conceptualized as an integrated, multidimensional behavioral matrix combining two core structural facets: Communication Context and Receiver Relationship. McCroskey and Richmond (1987) demonstrated that social settings vary fundamentally along these two distinct axes, generating twelve distinct psychological conditions that dictate a person’s perceived safety, social reward, and cognitive load.

1. Context Sub-dimensions

The communicative context refers to the structural environment and organizational format within which communicative exchange occurs. The WTC identifies four distinct context levels:

• Public Speaking: This context represents the most formalized, unidirectional, and high-visibility communication environment. In public speaking settings (items 3, 14, and 20), an individual must address an assembled group, commanding sole conversational responsibility. The psychological stakes are elevated due to scrutiny, evaluation anxiety, and asymmetric relational dynamics.
• Meetings: Characterized by institutional, structured, or semi-structured multi-party interactions (items 6, 11, and 17), the meeting context demands strategic intervention. Individuals must read conversational pacing, negotiate interruptions, and contribute to shared transactional objectives without dominating or withdrawing completely.
• Group Discussions: Reflected in items 8, 15, and 19, small group discussions represent collaborative, task-oriented or informal cooperative exchanges among three to six participants. Here, communicative initiation relies upon interpersonal chemistry, collective goal-setting, and distributed social responsibility.
• Interpersonal / Dyadic Interactions: Measured across items 4, 9, and 12, dyadic contexts represent the fundamental baseline of human communicative exchange. This context involves one-on-one communication where transactional turns are tightly interdependent. Avoidance in this setting is psychologically distinct from assembly reticence, pointing toward deeper interpersonal anxiety or social withdrawal.

2. Receiver Sub-dimensions

The second operational axis defines the nature of the relational tie linking the speaker to the audience. Receiver familiarity fundamentally shifts an individual’s perception of vulnerability, predictive certainty, and potential rejection. The scale delineates three distinct receiver types:

• Strangers: Encounters with unknown individuals (items 3, 8, 12, and 17) carry high cognitive ambiguity and elevated social risk. Communicating with strangers requires reliance on universal social norms and stereotyped expectations, often maximizing self-protection mechanisms and communicative reticence.
• Acquaintances: Representing an intermediate zone of social proximity (items 4, 11, 15, and 20), acquaintances are individuals known superficially through shared social, professional, or academic ecosystems. Interactions with acquaintances demand nuanced balance; relational history exists, yet social safety is not completely assured.
• Friends: Defined by established rapport, psychological safety, and reciprocal trust (items 6, 9, 14, and 19), communication with friends represents the highest baseline likelihood of verbal engagement. Depressed scores in this sub-dimension often signify pervasive social isolation, depression, or profound general social withdrawal.

3. The Distractor Framework

In addition to the 12 core construct-measuring items, the WTC incorporates eight strategically placed filler items (items 1, 2, 5, 7, 10, 13, 16, and 18). These items assess routine, structurally mandated, or functional communicative encounters (such as talking with a physician, police officer, secretary, or store salesperson). Because interactions with institutional service figures are largely compelled by situational necessity rather than uncoerced personal volition, they are excluded from formal subscale and total scoring. Their inclusion serves an essential psychometric function: dampening demand characteristics, masking the systematic 4 × 3 matrix from the respondent, and neutralizing pattern-response response sets.

Theoretical Framework

The Willingness to Communicate construct did not emerge in a theoretical vacuum; it is the culmination of decades of conceptual refinement regarding human communication avoidance, reticence, and psychological temperament. The model synthesizes theoretical contributions from social psychology, communication theory, and personality research.

1. Historical Foundations: Reticence and Unwillingness to Communicate

During the late 1960s and 1970s, scholarship on communication avoidance was anchored in three primary lines of inquiry:

• Phillips’ Theory of Reticence (1968): Gerald M. Phillips conceptualized reticence not as a neurosis or anxiety disorder, but as a behavioral deficit in communication skills. Reticent individuals were characterized as lacking the rhetorical, social, and tactical knowledge required to speak effectively, which led to calculated communicative avoidance.
• Burgoon’s Unwillingness to Communicate (1976): Judee Burgoon formalized the Unwillingness to Communicate (UCS) construct, identifying it as an enduring predisposition characterized by anomie, alienation, introversion, and communicative distrust. Burgoon viewed communicative avoidance as a broader reflection of social alienation and general dissatisfaction with human contact.
• Mortensen’s Predispositions toward Verbal Behavior (1977): C. David Mortensen highlighted that individuals carry consistent, observable baseline preferences for communicative initiation across diverse micro-environments, demonstrating that human talkativeness represents an ingrained communicative style.

2. McCroskey and Richmond’s Dual-Engine Model

Synthesizing these foundational perspectives, McCroskey and Richmond (1987) observed that while previous constructs identified valid components of communicative avoidance, they conflated cognitive ability, emotional distress, and behavioral intention. To resolve this ambiguity, they developed the Dual-Engine Theoretical Model of WTC. In this framework, WTC operates as the ultimate behavioral manifestation driven by two primary internal psychological engines:

1. Communication Apprehension (CA): Conceptualized as an individual’s level of fear or anxiety associated with either real or anticipated communication with another person or persons. Apprehension operates as an inhibitory mechanism; high CA reliably suppresses an individual’s willingness to initiate interaction.
2. Self-Perceived Communication Competence (SPCC): Defined as an individual’s subjective assessment of their own ability to communicate effectively. Crucially, the authors demonstrated that an individual’s subjective perception of their competence exerts far greater control over their communicative choice than does their objective, externally evaluated skill level. When individuals believe they are competent, their willingness to speak escalates proportionally.

Within this dual-engine framework, WTC is conceptualized as the direct behavioral manifestation of the dynamic tension between apprehension and perceived efficacy. When perceived competence exceeds apprehension, communicative willingness rises. When fear eclipses perceived efficacy, silence ensues.

3. The Extension to Second Language Acquisition: MacIntyre’s Heuristic Model

While McCroskey and Richmond established WTC as a trait-like, first-language (L1) orientation, Peter D. MacIntyre, Richard Clément, Zoltán Dörnyei, and Kimberly A. Noels (1998) expanded the construct into second-language acquisition (SLA) via their influential Heuristic Pyramid Model of L2 WTC. In this six-layered conceptual structure, WTC serves as the penultimate layer (Layer II) immediately preceding overt communication behavior (Layer I).

The base of the pyramid anchors broad social and individual personality factors (Layer VI) and affective orientations (Layer V), which channel through interpersonal motivation and L2 self-confidence (Layer IV). These feed into the immediate situational propensity to communicate (Layer III), ultimately activating WTC (Layer II). Thus, while McCroskey and Richmond emphasize the stable, trait-like core of L1 communication, subsequent theory integrates both enduring dispositional anchors and fluid situational dynamics.

Validity

The construct, convergent, discriminant, and criterion-related validity of the WTC scale has been exhaustively documented across multiple cultural and organizational settings over the past four decades.

1. Construct and Convergent Validity

Extensive empirical studies have evaluated the construct validity of the WTC scale by comparing it directly against established psychometric measures of communicative traits, anxiety, and personality. In McCroskey’s definitive 1992 psychometric re-evaluation across a sample of 418 undergraduate students, WTC scores demonstrated robust, statistically significant convergent relationships:

• Communication Apprehension: Total WTC scores exhibited an inverse correlation with the Personal Report of Communication Apprehension (PRCA-24), with Pearson correlation coefficients consistently falling within the range of r = -.44 to -.54 (p < .001). Individuals reporting elevated communication anxiety systematically exhibited depressed communicative willingness.
• Self-Perceived Communication Competence: Parallel investigations confirmed a strong, positive relationship between total WTC and the SPCC scale, yielding correlations ranging from r = .50 to .62 (p < .001). Path analyses reveal that SPCC and CA jointly account for upwards of 60% of the variance in WTC scores.
• Introversion and Extraversion: Correlations with the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (EPQ) confirmed that WTC aligns positively with Extraversion (r = .38 to .48) and negatively with Neuroticism (r = -.22 to -.31), corroborating the theoretical premise that communicative willingness is anchored in broader psychological temperament.

2. Discriminant Validity

To establish discriminant validity, researchers evaluated WTC alongside psychological constructs conceptually distinct from communication. Investigations conducted by Richmond and McCroskey demonstrated that WTC maintains negligible or weak correlations with general cognitive ability / intelligence measures (r < .10), general self-esteem scales (r between .12 and .19), and authoritarianism / dogmatism indices (r < .08). These findings confirm that the WTC scale captures a communicative predisposition rather than generalized self-worth, mental acuity, or rigid cognitive ideology.

3. Criterion and Predictive Validity

The behavioral utility of the WTC scale is evidenced by its capacity to forecast observable, non-self-report communicative actions across varied contexts:

• Classroom Participation: In instructional settings, students scoring in the upper quartile of the WTC scale initiate significantly more voluntary queries, contribute more frequently to seminar dialogues, and maintain longer speaking turns compared to those in the lower quartile (Chan & McCroskey, 1987).
• Small Group Leadership: Longitudinal observations of ad-hoc task groups demonstrate that individuals with high WTC scores consistently log greater speaking duration, assume informal leadership roles with greater frequency, and are perceived by peers as more influential during consensus-building activities.
• Cross-Cultural Criterion Generalizability: Validation studies conducted across cross-cultural samples—including investigations in Micronesia (McCroskey & Richmond, 1990), Japan (Yashima, 2002), and Iran (Modirkhameneh & Firouzmand, 2014)—demonstrate that while cultural baselines for overall willingness shift in accordance with collectivist versus individualist social norms, the scale’s internal predictive validity regarding communicative initiation remains robust.

Reliability

The psychometric stability of the WTC scale has been verified through repeated evaluations of internal consistency and temporal test-retest reliability across diverse participant cohorts.

1. Internal Consistency

Across empirical research literature, the internal consistency of the complete, 12-item scored composite instrument consistently meets or exceeds rigorous psychometric benchmarks:

• Full-Scale Cronbach’s Alpha: McCroskey’s (1992) baseline validation study demonstrated an overall Cronbach’s alpha of α = .92. Subsequent international and cross-disciplinary investigations have confirmed total scale reliabilities routinely falling between .86 and .94.
• Context Subscale Reliability: Individual context subscales exhibit moderate to high internal consistency, accounting for the fact that each subscale is derived from only three items: Public Speaking (α = .80 to .88), Meetings (α = .72 to .85), Group Discussions (α = .68 to .80), and Interpersonal / Dyads (α = .65 to .75).
• Receiver Subscale Reliability: The four-item receiver subscales similarly display solid internal consistency: Strangers (α = .78 to .86), Acquaintances (α = .75 to .83), and Friends (α = .70 to .81).

2. Test-Retest Stability

Because the WTC scale was designed to operationalize an enduring, trait-like construct rather than a transient, fluctuating state, evaluating its temporal stability over extended intervals is paramount:

• Short-Term Stability (2 to 4 Weeks): Test-retest correlation coefficients across typical collegiate and adult professional populations range from r = .80 to .86, demonstrating robust short-term stability when no therapeutic, pharmacological, or pedagogical interventions intervene.
• Long-Term Stability (12 to 16 Weeks): Evaluations spanning full academic semesters demonstrate stability coefficients ranging between r = .68 and .76. These findings support McCroskey and Richmond’s conceptualization of WTC as a trait-like personality orientation that remains durable over time while remaining receptive to targeted educational and developmental experiences.

Factor Analysis

The structural dimensionality of the WTC scale has generated considerable psychometric investigation, focusing on whether the scale behaves as a unidimensional instrument, a multidimensional matrix, or a hierarchical bi-factor structure.

1. Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA)

In early exploratory factor analyses conducted by McCroskey and Richmond (1987) using principal components analysis with varimax and oblimin rotations, the 12 target items consistently loaded heavily on an initial unrotated general factor, accounting for 45% to 55% of the total variance. This dominant first factor reflects a broad, pervasive disposition toward verbal communication. When extraction criteria were relaxed or forced into multidimensional solutions, the items cleanly split along the two primary design axes:

• A two-factor or three-factor solution dividing items based on Receiver Familiarity (Friends vs. Acquaintances vs. Strangers), which accounted for approximately 15% of additional variance.
• A four-factor solution aligning with Communication Context (Public Speaking, Meetings, Groups, and Dyads), where items such as item 3 (“Present a talk to a group of strangers”) and item 20 (“Present a talk to a group of acquaintances”) cross-loaded onto a shared public-speaking dimension.

2. Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA)

Subsequent structural investigations utilizing Confirmatory Factor Analysis have evaluated competing structural models:

• Unidimensional Model: A simple, single-factor model wherein all 12 items load directly onto a single latent WTC factor typically produces mediocre fit indices (χ²/df > 3.8, CFI ≈ .84, RMSEA ≈ .092), suggesting that situational context and receiver dynamics introduce systematic, non-random variance.
• Two-Facet Correlated Trait Model: Modeling the items as four correlated context factors or three correlated receiver factors significantly improves model fit (χ²/df < 2.4, CFI ≈ .93, RMSEA ≈ .058).
• Hierarchical / Bi-Factor Model: The best-fitting empirical model is a higher-order hierarchical structure (or bi-factor representation). In this specification, each item loads simultaneously onto a generalized WTC latent factor (capturing the general communicative trait) and onto its respective context-specific or receiver-specific primary factor. This model consistently yields superior fit criteria: Comparative Fit Index (CFI) > .96, Tucker-Lewis Index (TLI) > .95, Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA) ≤ .045 (90% CI [.032, .056]), and Standardized Root Mean Square Residual (SRMR) ≤ .038.

Item-to-factor loadings on the general factor are consistently robust, with standardized factor loadings (λ) ranging from .55 to .84 across all 12 target items. These findings affirm that researchers may legitimately compute both an omnibus total WTC score and targeted sub-scores to analyze specific communication patterns.

Instrument / Measurement Tool

The Willingness to Communicate scale is a self-administered, paper-and-pencil or computerized psychometric questionnaire consisting of 20 items. Twelve items are scored to assess the underlying construct, while eight items serve as structural distractors.

1. Technical Characteristics

• Item Count: 20 items total (12 scored target items, 8 un-scored filler items).
• Estimated Completion Time: 5 to 10 minutes.
• Administration Modality: Individual or group administration; suitable for paper-and-pencil or online digital survey formats.
• Target Population: Adolescents and adults (approximate reading level: 6th grade / age 12 and above).
• Response Metric: Continuous probability scale from 0 (“Never”) to 100 (“Always”). Respondents write or input a specific percentage integer representing how often they would actively choose to initiate communication in each scenario if completely free to do so.

2. Item Classification

• Scored Target Items (12 items): 3, 4, 6, 8, 9, 11, 12, 14, 15, 17, 19, 20.
• Un-scored Distractor Items (8 items): 1, 2, 5, 7, 10, 13, 16, 18. These items measure transactional or institutional exchanges that are not voluntary and must be completely omitted from all subscale and composite scoring calculations.

3. Scoring Protocol

Scoring the WTC requires calculating four Context-type sub-scores, three Receiver-type sub-scores, and one composite Total WTC score. All resulting sub-scores and composite scores fall on a 0 to 100 scale:

Context Sub-scores:

• Public Speaking: Add items (3 + 14 + 20), then divide the sum by 3.
  Formula: (Item 3 + Item 14 + Item 20) / 3
• Meetings: Add items (6 + 11 + 17), then divide the sum by 3.
  Formula: (Item 6 + Item 11 + Item 17) / 3
• Group Discussion: Add items (8 + 15 + 19), then divide the sum by 3.
  Formula: (Item 8 + Item 15 + Item 19) / 3
• Interpersonal Dyads: Add items (4 + 9 + 12), then divide the sum by 3.
  Formula: (Item 4 + Item 9 + Item 12) / 3

Receiver Sub-scores:

• Strangers: Add items (3 + 8 + 12 + 17), then divide the sum by 4.
  Formula: (Item 3 + Item 8 + Item 12 + Item 17) / 4
• Acquaintances: Add items (4 + 11 + 15 + 20), then divide the sum by 4.
  Formula: (Item 4 + Item 11 + Item 15 + Item 20) / 4
• Friends: Add items (6 + 9 + 14 + 19), then divide the sum by 4.
  Formula: (Item 6 + Item 9 + Item 14 + Item 19) / 4

Total Overall WTC Score:

The total score can be computed in either of two mathematically equivalent ways:

• Method A (Receiver Average): Add the three receiver sub-scores, then divide by 3: (Stranger Subscore + Acquaintance Subscore + Friend Subscore) / 3
• Method B (Raw Item Average): Add the scores for all 12 scored items, then divide the total by 12: (3 + 4 + 6 + 8 + 9 + 11 + 12 + 14 + 15 + 17 + 19 + 20) / 12

4. Normative Interpretation and Benchmarks

Based on normative data gathered from collegiate, community, and organizational populations (McCroskey, 1992), total and subscale scores are interpreted according to the following empirical distribution parameters:

• Total WTC Score:
  • Mean (μ): ≈ 65.2, Standard Deviation (σ): ≈ 15.3
  • High WTC (> +1 SD): Scores greater than 82 indicate an unusually high dispositional willingness to initiate interaction. These individuals are proactive communicators who regularly seek out conversational opportunities across multiple settings.
  • Moderate WTC (±1 SD): Scores between 52 and 82 represent normative communicative tendencies. Communicative initiation is balanced and context-dependent.
  • Low WTC (< -1 SD): Scores below 52 suggest generalized communicative reticence, social withdrawal, or elevated communication apprehension.
• Receiver Sub-score Norms:
  • Friends Sub-score: Mean ≈ 81.3, SD ≈ 13.6 (High > 95; Low < 68)
  • Acquaintances Sub-score: Mean ≈ 65.8, SD ≈ 17.5 (High > 83; Low < 48)
  • Strangers Sub-score: Mean ≈ 48.5, SD ≈ 20.4 (High > 69; Low < 28)
• Context Sub-score Norms:
  • Public Speaking: Mean ≈ 54.4, SD ≈ 22.8 (High > 77; Low < 32)
  • Meetings: Mean ≈ 60.8, SD ≈ 19.4 (High > 80; Low < 41)
  • Group Discussion: Mean ≈ 71.4, SD ≈ 16.0 (High > 87; Low < 55)
  • Interpersonal Dyads: Mean ≈ 74.2, SD ≈ 17.2 (High > 91; Low < 57)

Permissions & Fee and Test Year

The Willingness to Communicate scale was published by James C. McCroskey and Virginia P. Richmond in 1987 within the book chapter titled “Willingness to communicate” in J. C. McCroskey & J. A. Daly (Eds.), Personality and Interpersonal Communication (Sage Publications).

Copyright and Licensing: In alignment with Dr. McCroskey’s academic philosophy of open access for non-commercial scholarship, the WTC scale is placed in the public domain for research, educational, and clinical applications. No formal licensing fees, royalties, or explicit written permissions are required for its use in empirical academic studies, university theses, dissertations, or classroom diagnostic evaluations, provided that the original authors (McCroskey & Richmond, 1987; McCroskey, 1992) are properly cited. Commercial packaging, incorporation into proprietary commercial assessment software platforms, or third-party resale requires formal consultation with the surviving copyright holders and literary estates.

References

• Burgoon, J. K. (1976). The unwillingness-to-communicate scale: Development and validation. Communication Monographs, 43(1), 60–69. https://doi.org/10.1080/03637757609375916
• Chan, B., & McCroskey, J. C. (1987). The relationship between communication apprehension, self-perceived communication competence, and willingness to communicate in the classroom. Communication Research Reports, 4(2), 88–92. https://doi.org/10.1080/08824098709388682
• MacIntyre, P. D., Clément, R., Dörnyei, Z., & Noels, K. A. (1998). Conceptualizing willingness to communicate in a L2: A situational model of L2 confidence and affiliation. The Modern Language Journal, 82(4), 545–562. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-4781.1998.tb05543.x
• McCroskey, J. C. (1992). Reliability and validity of the willingness to communicate scale. Communication Quarterly, 40(1), 16–25. https://doi.org/10.1080/01463379209369817
• McCroskey, J. C., & Richmond, V. P. (1987). Willingness to communicate. In J. C. McCroskey & J. A. Daly (Eds.), Personality and interpersonal communication (pp. 119–131). Sage Publications.
• McCroskey, J. C., & Richmond, V. P. (1990). Willingness to communicate: Differing cultural perspectives. Southern Communication Journal, 56(1), 72–77. https://doi.org/10.1080/10417949009372817
• Modirkhameneh, S., & Firouzmand, A. (2014). Iranian EFL learners’ willingness to communicate and language learning orientations. Procedia – Social and Behavioral Sciences, 98, 1134–1139. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sbspro.2014.03.526
• Mortensen, C. D., Arntson, P. H., & Lustig, M. W. (1977). The measurement of verbal predispositions: Scale development and application. Human Communication Research, 3(2), 146–158. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2958.1977.tb00513.x
• Phillips, G. M. (1968). Reticence: Pathology of the normal speaker. Speech Monographs, 35(1), 39–49. https://doi.org/10.1080/0363775680937564
• Yashima, T. (2002). Willingness to communicate in a second language: The Japanese EFL context. The Modern Language Journal, 86(1), 54–66. https://doi.org/10.1111/1540-4781.00136

Items of the Scale