Fillers in the speech of trainee english teachers.

Abstract

Oral communication is a fundamental competence in English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learning. However, non-native English speakers commonly use fillers during spontaneous speech, which may influence fluency, comprehensibility, and listeners’ perceptions. This systematic review analyzes the available scientific literature to identify the main causes, types, and functions of fillers in the context of EFL speaking skills. The review followed the PRISMA guidelines and examined a corpus of 66 scientific articles published in the period 2000-2025 in journals, 6 indexed in Scopus and 60 in Google Scholar. The search strategy included terms related to fillers, English language speaking, university students, and speaking skills. Other publications indicate that the excessive use of fillers can negatively affect speaker credibility, discourse clarity, and audience comprehension. Nevertheless, when learners use moderately fillers can serve important cognitive and communicative functions, such as providing planning time and increasing naturalness of oral discourse. These findings highlight the need for EFL teachers to address fillers explicitly in the classroom, not with the purpose of eliminating them entirely, but of helping learners regulate and use them strategically. Such instruction may contribute to more fluent, confident, comprehensible, and natural oral communication.