Captions and reduced forms instruction: The impact on EFL students’ listening comprehension

Abstract

For many EFL learners, listening poses a grave challenge. The difficulty in segmenting a stream of speech and limited capacity in short-term memory are common weaknesses for language learners. Specifically, reduced forms, which frequently appear in authentic informal conversations, compound the challenges in listening comprehension. Numerous interventions have been implemented to assist EFL language learners, and of these, the application of captions has been found highly effective in promoting learning. Few studies have examined how different modes of captions may enhance listening comprehension. This study proposes three modes of captions: full, keyword-only, and annotated keyword captions and investigates their contribution to the learning of reduced forms and overall listening comprehension. Forty-four EFL university students participated in the study and were randomly assigned to one of the three groups. The results revealed that all three groups exhibited improvement on the pre-test while the annotated keyword caption group exhibited the best performance with the highest mean score. Comparing performances between groups, the annotated keyword caption group also emulated both the full caption and the keyword-only caption groups, particularly in the ability to recognize reduced forms. The study sheds light on the potential of annotated keyword captions in enhancing reduced forms learning and overall listening comprehension.

Promoting Grammatical Development Through Textually Enhanced Captions: An Eye‐Tracking Study

“…Guillory () observed an advantage for keyword over full‐text captions when the highlighted words were relevant to the comprehension questions. In Yang and Chang's () study, full captions and keyword‐only captions proved less effective in promoting listening comprehension than annotated keyword captions, where pictorial symbols were added to increase the salience of reduced forms in the keywords (e.g., a blue dot was added above those letters of the keywords where the corresponding sound was assimilated in the aural text).…”

Investigating the effects of multimedia input modality on L2 listening skills of Turkish EFL learners

“…Studies done by Chang, Tseng and Tseng (2011), Guichon and McLornan (2008), Kozan (2009), Kozan, Ercetin, and Richardson (2015), Sydorenko (2010) have also emphasized the importance of input modality. Hsu et al (2013), Hsu et al (2014), Hwang (2003), Perez et al (2014), Rooney (2011), Tsai (2010, Winke, Gass and Sydorenko (2010), Yang & Chang (2014) investigated the effects of captioning on listening comprehension through the use of authentic film clips and videos. Mohsen (2015), on the other hand, looked at the use of help options in multimedia listening environments to aid language learning.…”

The Use of Keyword Video Captioning on Vocabulary Learning Through Mobile-Assisted Language Learning

“…In addition, almost all of the previous studies were conducted with the help of a computer. However, as far as the author knows, there is only one study that investigated the effect of keyword captions on vocabulary learning (i.e., Yang & Chang, 2013). They proposed three modes of captions: full, keyword-only, and annotated keyword captions and investigates their contribution to the learning of reduced forms and overall listening comprehension.…”