The effect of authentic video on communicative competence

Abstract

Given that exposure to video programming has been shown to increase students' listening comprehension, the subsequent effects of that increase on communicative competence were studied in order to assess the impact of exposure to authentic video on the language acquisition process. Following their contact with an authentic Spanish-language telenovela, student viewers demonstrated a statistically significant increase over their counterparts in a control group not only in listening comprehension but also in the number of words they used in discourse and in two component parts of communicative competence, specifically, their confidence in generating output and the scope and breadth of their discourse. This study shows that authentic television programming is a valuable tool that provides high levels of input and results in improvements in students' output. ©1999 The Modern Language Journal.