The Cognitive Effects Of Visual Cues In Different Types Of Videos On EFL Listening Comprehension

The advent of computer and Internet makes it possible that multimedia technology is widely used in college English teaching. The application of videos to EFL listening comprehension has become an important field of research. However, it is still disputable as to the effect of videos on listening comprehension in relative studies with insufficient explanation. One main reason is that the properties of discourse in videos are neglected. Until Bejar et al.(2000) and Ginther(2001) make an initial classification of non-linguistic visual information(“visual” for short) and divide them into two basic types: context visual and content visual, quite a few researchers use this taxonomy.However, though it is clear and simple when videos are categorized into two types,namely context video and content video, the dynamic relationship between verbal and visual content and the context effects generated by videos demand a more complex categorization. By reviewing relative theories, studies on relationship between verbal and visual content and the effects of visuals, the present study finds that the categorization of videos can be regarded as a continuum in terms of the relationship between visual information and discourse text in a video as context-related quality and content-related one are the two different types of functions of context in nature. Thus the dichotomy of video artificially separates the continuum of context effects emerging from non-linguistic visual information, adverse to a more clarified division as to audio-visual performance. Furthermore, things often happen where context visuals are involved in content videos and vice versa. Thus, according to three criteria:(1) the extent of direct correspondence between visual information and verbal content in a video;(2) the extent of supplementary function of visual information to verbal content;(3) the richness of useful visual information in a video, content videos are further divided four subtypes: direct redundancy content video, indirect redundancy content video; and context videos can fall into four classes: strong interpretative context video,weak interpretative context video, mono-context video and zero context video. By observing specific context effects generated from different types of videos and referring to theories of cognitive theory of multimedia learning and schema, the researcher adapts both quantitative and qualitative approaches to further explore the different cognitive effects generated from visual information in different types of videos. The researchquestions are as followed:(1) What are the effects of the differences among different types of videos on EFL listening comprehension? Why?(2) Do different types of videos have the same performance on different question types in EFL listening comprehension? Why?The subjects participating the present study are of junior students majoring English with the total number of 95. They are divided into two groups: video group with 49 subjects and audio group of 46 people. Six video clips are selected, respectively representing each type of video. These video clips are also edited in audio form for the audio group. Each clip is broadcasted only once. Four types of questions are presented and should be finished within 2 minutes after listening to each listening material. They are gist inference, detail inference, detail identification and word meaning inference.Immediate post-test interview is conducted after the listening test and 30 subjects who are randomly drawn join the interview. For the sake of clear information about the comment on each type of video, the video group is further divided into six groups, the difference is only the order of materials. Five subjects are randomly selected in each subgroup of the video group to respond to the questions about the last video clip presented in the main test. The implementation of interview is intended to explore the cognitive effects of visual information in each type of video and the roles of the visual content in each stage of listening comprehension.From data analysis, the indication of the results are as follow:(1) Positive effects of content videos are significantly obvious in listening comprehension while no significant difference is seen in the four context videos. The overall trend expresses that the difference of mean score between the two groups gets smaller and smaller from direct redundancy content video to zero context video. That is to say, the performance of video group lies in the properties and status of visual information and the number of useful contextual cues.(2) None of the six types has outstanding performance on gist and detail inference.Content videos perform notably well in detail identification, what’s more, the solution of word meaning guessing takes great advantage of visuals in direct redundancy contentvideo. It can be explained that direct content visuals would be more beneficial in helping easily decoded information processing and integrating, especially in the situation where the connection between visual and verbal codes is concrete. In addition,the nature of detail identification demands less cognitive resources and working memory. However, the fact that even in video group, the average score of direct redundancy content video is fairly low indicates that the verbal text should be easily visualized. In context videos, the cognitive effects change along with the different extent of relevancy between verbal and visual content, supplementary strength and richness of visual content. Beginning with strong interpretative context video, the detrimental effects of visual cues become more dominant in gist and detail inference.All of these suggest that there exist correlation between cognitive effects of visuals and types of tasks and purposes.The present study further investigates effects of different types of videos, which can provide practical support in material selection and design for foreign language teaching.