ONLINE LANGUAGE COURSES DURING THE COVID-۱۹ OUTBREAK AND IRANIAN EFL LEARNERS' EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE: A COMPARATIVE STUDY BETWEEN SYNCHRONOUS AND ASYNCHRONOUS TEXT-BASED COMPUTER-MEDIATED COMMUNICATIONS

Following the COVID-۱۹ outbreak, all learning courses were switched to the virtual mode. The present study is an attempt to find out which mode of online language learning courses, namely synchronous or asynchronous, has a more significant impact on increasing Iranian EFL learners’ emotional intelligence during the COVID-۱۹ pandemic.To this end, Iranian EFL learners, who were homogeneous in terms of their language proficiency, were chosen as the participants of the study. These learners were assigned to two classes that had the same educational purpose and were taught by the same teacher. The synchronous course was conducted using WhatsApp mobile application where thestudents and the teacher could chat simultaneously in a class group, but the asynchronous course was held using direct massaging via WhatsApp. Moreover, the Persian version of Emotional Quotient Inventory (EQ-i) (Bar-On,۱۹۹۷a) was used as the pre-test and posttest in order to assess the participants’ emotional intelligence before and after online classes. The subsequent data analysis using an independent ttest revealed that there was a significant difference between the two classes. Indeed, in the synchronous class, the language learners’ emotional intelligence dramatically improved as a result of the possibility of peer interactions and immediate feedback on their performance. At the end of the article, the theoretical and pedagogical implications of the study are further discussed.

Keywords:

emotional intelligence , synchronous communications , asynchronous communications , Iranian EFL learners