A Study on EFL Learners' Listening Comprehension Difficulties by Using Listening Diaries

The purpose of this study was to investigate the English-listening difficulties encountered by students at an institute of technology in order to better understand the listening process from the perspective of EFL learners. One class of third-year students from an institute of technology in northern Taiwan was recruited as subjects. The subjects were asked to keep a listening diary about (1) their English listening experience, (2) the strategies they used to comprehend English, and (3) their listening problems. From an analysis of the diaries of 32 EFL learners, listening comprehension problems were divided into 5 categories: text, listener, listening process, speaker, and task. It was found the learners' listening problems were mainly influenced by the text factor and the listener factor. The top five listening problems encountered by the subjects were unknown words in the text, the speedy delivery of listening text, the listeners' limited vocabulary knowledge, the listeners' insufficient practice, and the listeners' inability to pay attention to the next part of the text when thinking about the meaning of the previous text. The results of the study are expected to generate implications for EFL listening instruction. By identifying and clarifying students' listening comprehension difficulties, English teachers can help students overcome these difficulties by helping students develop necessary and effective listening comprehension strategies to improve their English listening abilities.