Navigating Identity: The Emotional Impact of English Medium Instruction on Saudi Undergraduate Students in a Rapidly Modernizing Society
Bibliographic record
Abstract
This study examines the socio-emotional impact of English Medium Instruction (EMI) on undergraduate students in Saudi Arabia and how various social and educational trends influence their attitudes, emotions, and perceptions of cultural identity. Using a qualitative research approach, the study employs focus group discussions and thematic analysis to explore students’ experiences. Three focus group sessions were conducted, each comprising five female students from different faculties and academic years, totaling 15 participants. Data collection involved semi-structured interviews, allowing for in-depth discussions on students’ challenges and coping mechanisms. Findings reveal that while students recognize the advantages of English proficiency for academic success, employment, and communication, they also experience anxiety, cultural tensions, and societal pressure related to English language use. Students report feeling more comfortable using English in informal settings, such as conversations with friends, but experience heightened stress in formal or professional environments. The results suggest that to alleviate the emotional and psychological burdens of EMI, educational institutions and policymakers should implement supportive strategies that address language anxiety and social isolation. The study highlights the need for inclusive learning environments that foster linguistic confidence and cultural integration while navigating the complexities of English as a dominant academic language in Saudi Arabia.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame distilled prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. Learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and 10,348 direct Gemma labels. Candidate is the union of thresholded teacher heads; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels or direct frontier model labels.
Codex and Gemma teacher scores by category
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.002 | 0.002 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.002 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one teacher head, not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".