Attitudes and Discourse: Spanish Practitioners’ and Undergraduates’ Survey Results

Abstract

The emergence of English as the international language of communication has increased the attention and concern given its teaching and learning. This survey-based study explores the attitudes of Spanish practitioners and undergraduate students towards English as the vehicular language in the field of medicine and towards Medical Electronic Popularizations as an alternative to medical research articles. The survey results point out that these subjects’ perception of English as the vehicle of communication in the medical field and their conceptualization of medical electronic popularizations are positive. Pedagogical implications can be drawn from this study since it confirms our students’ awareness of the use of English and the new-born genres or communication channels.

Keywords

• New-born genres
• practitioners’ and undergraduates’ attitudes towards written discourse and towards English
• survey-based study