A Study Of Pragmatic Inference Strategy Use In College English Listening Teaching

Listening and speaking are two main means of communication, among whichlistening comprehension in part demonstrates language learners’ integrative competence.It also can influence the language learners’ development on other language skills.According to the “College English Curriculum Requirements” issued by EducationMinistry in2007, the target of college English teaching is to train students’ integratedEnglish language ability, especially the listening and speaking ability. In listeningteaching, the author found that it is the following reasons that lead to the failure oflistening comprehension, such as paying too much attention on the specific words,neglecting the background knowledge that relates to the listening material, separatingfrom the context, depending on their immediate memory mechanically and so on. Allthese have reflected that students have no idea about the essence of listeningcomprehension and they are lack of efficient learning strategies. Therefore, the teachersshould not only impart English language knowledge but also instruct correct andefficient strategies of listening comprehension to students.The research attempts to study the relationship between pragmatic inferencestrategy use and listening comprehension. Since pragmatic inference theory considersboth the literal meaning of the discourse and the relevance between discourse andcontext. In interpreting the contextual implication, the thinking process involves boththe use of knowledge and strategy. Based on Grice’s Conversational Implicature andSperber&Wilson’s Relevance Theory, this study aims to investigate whether pragmaticinference strategy use in college English listening teaching can improve students’listening comprehension ability. It explores how pragmatic inference strategies are usedin listening comprehension process and how strategy use help students analyze and inferthe real meaning from literal meaning, which in turn enhance their listening ability. A questionnaire, two listening tests (pre-test and post-test), strategies training andinterview are used in the study. The results are analyzed by SPSS.19.0. The testingsubjects are freshmen from the two classes of Chinese Literature Institute of ForeignTrade and Business College of Chong Qing Normal University. One of them israndomly chosen as the control class, and the other is the experimental class. Both ofthem are taught by the author. The study lasts15weeks including three phases: in thefirst phase, a questionnaire is carried out to investigate the problems that students facein their listening process and to find out if they have any knowledge of pragmaticinference theory. Then, students do the pre-test. In the second phase, the experimentalclass would receive the pragmatic inference strategy training, while the control class, asusual, is taught by the traditional teaching methods with no mention of pragmaticinference strategy. After the training, the two classes will accept the post-test and6students who are chosen randomly from the experimental class receive an interview.With the data collecting from the pre-test and the post-test, a qualitative and quantitativeanalysis will be given.The research shows that after15weeks’ training, students’ listening comprehensionability in experimental class has significant improvement, but the improvement incontrolled class is not obvious. The result proves that pragmatic inference strategy doeshave a positive effect on enhancing college students’ listening comprehension ability.Otherwise, from the interview we can find that most students in experimental class haveabandoned the incorrect methods in listening comprehension. They can preview thequestions and options in advance and listen with a particular purpose. They canreasonably use their background knowledge and combine with the cultural backgroundto help comprehending listening materials. When they meet new words or miss anyparticular message, they can infer based on the context rather than stop or give uphalfway. In addition, students can reasonably analysis and infer the real meaning bycombining the context and correctly understand the listening material by using theoptimal relevance. What deserved to be mentioned is that students have had a correctunderstanding of listening comprehension. They are no longer treating listeningcomprehension as a negative result of receiving information, but a positive process ofanalyzing and understanding the information. All these have showed that students havebasically acquired the skill of pragmatic inference. The author expects that teachersshould attach great importance to pragmatic inference strategy use in English listeningcomprehension teaching and enhance college students’ listening comprehension ability.