PERTANIKA JOURNAL OF SOCIAL SCIENCES AND HUMANITIES

Teachers' beliefs influenced the interpersonal behaviours they exhibit which significantly affect, correlate and predict students' achievement, motivation and behaviour. The interpersonal teacher circumplex model identifies eight possible interpersonal teacher behaviours which represent the control and affiliation dimensions. Despite various findings on the connection between teacher's interpersonal behaviours and their benefits to students, studies recorded in Malaysia and on tertiary education are limited. Past studies have found no connection between positive interpersonal behaviour and students' achievement. Hence, this study aims to find out whether students of different academic achievement significantly perceive the interpersonal behaviour of their English lecturer differently. The adapted Malay version of the Questionnaire on Teacher Interaction (QTI) was administered to 128 students of a university college in Malacca, Malaysia. The respondents were categorised as poor, average and excellent achievers according to the final grade they received. It was found that the English lecturer was mostly understanding and least reprimanding in behaviour as well as exhibiting positive control and affiliation over the students, behaviours that were different than the expected behaviour of ASEAN teachers. A one-way ANOVA test found that respondents from poor achievement group significantly perceived the English lecturer to be more reprimanding, uncertain, dissatisfied yet accommodating compared to average and excellent achievers. This finding suggests that positively associated teacher behaviours like steering, understanding and friendliness do not result in grade improvements among students.