Why Code-switch on WhatsApp? A Quantitative Analysis of Types and Influences of Code-switching

Abstract

This paper examines an asynchronous computer-mediated communication (CMC) between bilingual university students in Malaysia, in particular via Whatsapp by appropriating a functional approach in scrutinizing the diverse types and influences for codeswitching (CS). A quantitative methodology was employed wherein a survey was designed and administered to undergraduate students from the Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM). A dataset from a total of 90 respondents was collected from five faculties; Academy of Language Studies, Faculty of Law, Faculty of Communication and Media Studies and Faculty of Education. The yielded findings postulate that inter-sentential code-switching was the most used type of code-switching among the respondents and habitual expression is the main factor that influence them to code-switch.