Seventy students participated in an experiment to measure the effects of either providing explanations or listening during small group discussions on recall of related subject-matter studied after the discussion. They watched a video of a small group discussing a problem. In the first experimental condition, the video was stopped at various points…

It's easy to imagine that a deep silence hangs over people with autism, but nothing could be further from the truth, at least in the author's case. His son Cameron has always been a noisy, histrionic person. He speaks most volubly with his body, and over the years the author and his wife Leslie have learned to interpret his gleeful…

Given the well-documented understanding that stuttering behavior elicits stereotypically negative responses from listeners, two experiments explored the equivocal results of earlier investigations concerning the potential for self-acknowledgment and modification of stuttering to elicit positive responses from naive (unfamiliar with stuttering)…

This investigation examined the listening comprehension (LC) performance of two groups of adolescent struggling readers, one group with word-finding difficulties (WFD) and one with no word-finding difficulties (NWFD). Of interest was whether the expressive language difficulties of the WFD group would interfere with their success on a LC assessment…

This article reviews some of the controversy surrounding the use and effectiveness of active listening or the Speaker-Listener Technique (SL) in relational counseling. The purpose and function of SL is described and two case studies are presented to illustrate how SL operates in a therapeutic setting and how the outcomes can vary. These case…

This volume offers research-based studies on English for Specific Purposes in higher education from across the world. By drawing on international studies, the book brings together diverse ESP practices and aspects of relevant issues in the development of ESP programs, teachers and learners in a coherent fashion. There is a growing need for…

One of the factors that may affect the success of the learning process is the use of learning media. Therefore, this research aimed to implement and evaluate the interactive multimedia learning materials using Wondershare Quizcreator program and audio materials in teaching "English listening skills". The research problem was whether or…

What appeared decades ago as solely a European model--Thatcherism--is now a global trend with no apparent end in sight. Neoliberalism in the public sector, and within the educational sphere particularly, pervades within a larger pattern of hegemonic ideologies. In sum, market forces and global capitalism make it quite difficult for public…

This study examines the outcomes of having recourse to listening skills as support to improve oral skills in English language teaching. In this context, data from 120 students at a specific higher education institution was analyzed; 60 of whom were provided with totally listening-focused instruction and activities, while a separate group of 60…

The present study examines and compares the extent to which advanced L2 learners of Spanish and Spanish heritage speakers acquire the syntactic and semantic properties that regulate the grammatical representation of double complementizer questions in Spanish, a CP-related structure not present in English. Results from an aural sentence completion…

This study explores which features of Spanish as a foreign language (SFL) pronunciation most impact raters' evaluations. Native Spanish speakers (NSSs) from regions with different pronunciation norms were polled: 147 evaluators from northern Mexico and 99 evaluators from central Argentina. These evaluations were contrasted with ratings from…

The primary goal was to expand our understanding of text-reading fluency (efficiency or automaticity): how its relation to other constructs (e.g., word-reading fluency, reading comprehension) changes over time and how it is different from word-reading fluency and reading comprehension. The study examined (a) developmentally changing relations…

An important gap in the field of second language vocabulary assessment concerns the lack of validated tests measuring aural vocabulary knowledge. The primary purpose of this study is to introduce and provide preliminary validity evidence for the Listening Vocabulary Levels Test (LVLT), which has been designed as a diagnostic tool to measure…

Research on teaching listening and speaking skills has been conducted at many levels. The purpose of this study was to analyze the current implementation of classroom and extracurricular activities, as well as the use of educational resources for teaching both skills in public senior high schools in the Amazon region of Ecuador, particularly in…

This article discusses perceptions of and performance in listening by a group of heritage and non-heritage learners of Portuguese. Our data include a survey containing background information and perceptions about listening, two listening tasks and a post-task self-report on how learners arrived at their answers. Quantitative and qualitative…