The Relationship between Listening Self-efficacy and Metacognitive Awareness of Listening Strategies

Abstract

Recent studies on listening comprehension have focused on finding factors that help EFL learners become more proficient and successful listeners; however, the interrelationship among these factors has been taken for granted in the SLA literature. The aim of the current study thus was investigating Iranian EFL learners’ listening self-efficacy and its relationship with their metacognitive awareness of listening strategies. Three hundred and seventy-one high-school students participated in the study. They filled in English listening self-efficacy questionnaire (Renzhi, 2012) and Metacognitive Awareness Listening Questionnaire (Vandergrift et al., 2006). Both questionnaires were administered along with a listening proficiency test (Preliminary English Test, 2010). The results revealed a positive and significant relationship between listening self-efficacy and metacognitive awareness of listening strategies in general. Further, listening self-efficacy was found to be significantly and positively related to planning-evaluation and problem solving strategies and inversely to mental translation strategies. As higher self-efficacy brings about more control over listening tasks and guarantees successful strategy use, particular attention should be devoted to the role of this construct in listening instruction research and practice.