EFL Learners’ Metacognitive Strategy Use in Academic Listening Tasks

Abstract

This study sought to investigate metacognitive listening strategies as used by Iranian EFL university students as well as the relationship between using such strategies and listening comprehension. To this end, 36 EFL university students were selected from existing classes according to their performance on the listening section of the TOEFL. Two instruments were employed in the study: Metacognitive Awareness Listening Questionnaire (MALQ) (Vandergrift, et al., 2006) and the listening section of a retired TOEFL. Descriptive statistics and Spearman’s correlation coefficient were used to determine how metacognitive strategies were used and whether there was a significant correlation between the participants’ listening comprehension scores and their metacognitive listening strategy use. Results revealed that ‘problem-solving strategies’ were most frequently used and ‘mental translation strategies’, least frequently. It was also found that there was a statistically significant positive correlation between students’ awareness of metacognitive listing strategies and their listening comprehension. Findings imply that strategy training need to be an integral part of language teaching programs.