English email communication barriers faced by Thai support staff and their coping strategies in communicating with international students

The main purpose of this study was to explore the barriers faced by Thai support staff at a public university regarding English email communication with international students and the strategies they used to overcome them. The study involved 96 Thai support staff who had English email communication with international students in the past three months. A questionnaire was used to collect their English email communication barriers and solution strategies. The results revealed that Thai support staff encountered four main barriers in English email communication. Ranked by mean score, the top communication barriers were a lack of proficiency in the language (mean = 3.82, SD = 0.90), cultural differences (mean = 3.74, SD = 0.97), email limitations (mean = 3.58, SD = 0.98), and email format (mean = 3.42, SD = 1.01). The mean scores of four barriers ranged from 3.42 to 3.82 on a 5-point Likert scale, suggesting that Thai support staff commonly encounter these barriers in English email communication with international students. The study also identified several strategies that Thai support staff used to overcome the barriers, which tended to be short-term strategies rather than long-term strategies, such as double-checking before sending (mean = 4.74, SD = 0.53), using Google for help (mean = 4.72, SD = 0.63), and looking up unknown vocabulary online (mean = 4.42, SD = 0.74). The findings suggest a need for support—such as targeted English email writing training—to enhance the English professional communication skills of Thai university support staff within academic contexts.