The Effects Of Presentation Modes Of English Listening Questions On English Listening Comprehension

The paper reports a study which investigates the effect of presentation modes oflistening questions on English listening comprehension. The study is based on themodality effect of cognitive load theory, which suggests that learning is efficient byappropriately allocating and utilizing the cognitive resources. The modality effectsuggests that learning can be facilitated by presenting information in both visual andauditory channels, compared with presenting information in a single channel, becausecognitive load is reduced under the condition of dual mode. Since conflicted resultswere got from the previous studies on the modality effect, the study attempts toinvestigate if listening performances differ by presenting listening questions into text,audio, and text+audio modes to explore whether the modality effect can facilitatelistening comprehension. In addition, the paper explores correlation between cognitiveload and listening performance, and test-takers’ attitudes towards each presentationmode of listening questions.The study subject consisted of ninety senior middle-school students in Grade Threeand they were from three parallel science classes. There were three groups: text group(TG), audio group (AG), and text+audio group (TAG)，and there were30students foreach group. TG listened to the material when listening questions were presented in textmode, AG were given the listening material with listening questions presented in audiomode, and for TAG, the listening questions were presented in both text+audio mode.Before the experiment, test-takers were homogenized by a pretest testing students’listening abilities, and participants of AG and TAG also received treatment so that theywere familiar with the listening presentation mode. In the experiment, test-takers ofeach group first had a listening test, then finished the Cognitive Load SubjectiveRating Scale (CLTRS), and finally completed the questionnaire on their attitudestowards the presentation mode they received. The data was analyzed by one-wayANOVA, and correlation analysis of SPSS software.The results were shown as follows:(1) Listening performances varied with the presentation modes of English listeningquestions. Test-takers in TG gained highest listening scores, followed by TAG, andtest-takers of AG performed worst, although there was no significant differencebetween TG and TAG.(2) There was negative correlation between cognitive load and listening performance. There was lowest cognitive load produced for TG, followed by TAG, andthe cognitive load in TAG was heaviest.(3) Test-takers’ attitudes towards text presentation mode were positive, theattitudes towards text+audio presentation mode were nearly positive, but there werenegative attitudes towards audio presentation mode.Therefore, the modality effect was not confirmed in the study. The text presentationmode of listening questions was more efficient in listening comprehension, and it wasthe favorite mode. Besides, there are some limitations in the thesis. The participants ofthe study are small in size and scale. The study is short in time. Whether the studentshad listened to the material before the experiment has not been treated as a variable ofthe experiment. All these questions need further analysis and improvement.