On the Cognitive Problems of Nautical Students’ Listening Comprehension

Abstract

This paper investigated the frequency of listening comprehension problems that low-ability FL listeners encounter in the early stages of learning English. In order to determine the frequency of FL listeners’ comprehension problems, all the subjects were asked to listen to a simple conversation, and write a summary. Following that, the transcription of the dialogue was exposed to the subjects. Finally, each subject was asked to fill out a closed questionnaire, comprised of eleven common listening problems found in a study by Goh (2000). The result revealed that recognition problems are the most experienced comprehension problems of low-ability FL listeners. The result further showed that the occurrence of recognition problems is in turn due to attentional failure, pronunciational difficulties, and unfamiliarity with the new words.