In a globalized world of competitive requirements, acquiring adequate communicative competence in English as a lingua franca has become a success indicator. What does the acquisition of adequate communicative competence reflect? As seen by the author of this paper amongst others, adequate communicative competence embodies one’s ability to manipulate language fluently, accurately, and appropriately. Concerned with oral communication specifically, the current paper delineates how using speech fillers can be minimized to ensure effective communication.

Comprising linguistic and paralinguistic devices, oral communication is influenced by different factors such as the speaker’s language proficiency, mood, culture, and background amongst other factors. While orally communicating with others, several people resort to using speech fillers. Speech fillers can be defined as unneeded sounds, words, or discourse markers which a speaker uses due to several reasons such as poor language skills (Al-Alami, 2025). Using speech fillers, if excessive, yields speech disfluency. Speech disfluency is seen as using anything that would disrupt the regular flow of speech (Fraundorf and Watson, 2011). It should be borne in mind that the excessive use of speech fillers whilst communicating within formal contexts reveals a lack of communicative competence, particularly in terms of language fluency.

There are several reasons for producing speech fillers, amongst the most prominent of which are weak language skills, nervousness, use of infrequent terms and structures, lack of attention and interest, poor preparation, low self-confidence, and glossophobia (Duvall et al., 2014). Relating the discussion to suggestions on how to minimize the excessive use of speech fillers, Zandan (2022) proposes enriching language knowledge, developing language skills, receiving appropriate training, pausing to organize one’s thoughts while speaking, slowing down while delivering a speech, and consulting a speech pathologist in case of severe cases.

To conclude, speech production is a complex process as it involves phonatory, respiratory, and articulatory components, all of which should be carefully timed to smoothly produce acoustic signals that express the message a speaker intends to convey. Using speech fillers while communicating, especially within formal contexts, needs to be avoided. If not put under control at an early or relatively early stage of acquiring English, producing speech fillers may sometimes become a bad speaking habit. Efforts made by both university instructors and students alike should be geared toward reducing the use of speech fillers. Undoubtedly, minimizing speech fillers to ensure effective communication is a success measure in a globalized world of demanding standards and challenging aspirations.

References:

• Al-Alami, S. (2025). The Impact of Using Speech Fillers on the Adequacy of Communicative Competence in English as a Lingua Franca. Theory and Practice in Language Studies, 15(1), 36-44.
• Duvall, E., Robbins, A., Graham, T., and Divett, S. (2014). Exploring Filler Words and Their Impact. Schwa, Vol. 11, 35-50.
• Fraundorf, S.H., and Watson, D.G. (2011). The Disfluent Discourse: Effects of Filled Pauses on Recall. Journal of Memory and Language, 65(2), 161-175.
• Zandan, N. (2022). How to Stop Saying “Um,” “Ah,” and “You Know”. Retrieved January 20, 2024 from https://hbr.org/2018/08/how-to-stop-saying-um-ah-and-you-know.