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ROLE OF GESTURE AS VISUAL CUES IN LISTENING
COMPREHENSION BY SECOND LANGUAGE LEARNERS

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Ayano Sueyoshi

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THE ROLE OF GESTURES AS VISUAL CUES IN LISTENING
COMPREHENSION BY SECOND—LANGUAGE LEARNERS

By

Ayano Sueyoshi

A THESIS

Submitted to
Michigan State University
In partial fulﬁllment of the requirements
for the degree of

MASTER OF ARTS
Department of Linguistics and Germanic, Slavic, Asian and African Languages

2004

ABSTRACT
THE ROLE OF GESTURES AS VISUAL CUES IN LISTENING
COMPREHENSION BY SECOND-LANGUAGE LEARNERS
By

Ayano Sueyoshi

Despite a growing interest in the contribution of visual cues to second-language (L2)
speech processing, little research has been done to compare the effects of nonverbal
cues such as a speaker’s hand-arm gestures and lip movements in L2 listening
comprehension. The present study focuses on the contribution of hand gestures and
lip movements in L2 learners’ listening comprehension of a lecture presented by a
native speaker of American English in a classroom setting. A total of 42 learners from
beginning and advanced classes in English as a second language in the US.
participated. They were randomly assigned to three stimulus conditions: AV-gesture
(auditory and visual presentation of hand gestures and facial cues), AV-face (auditory
and visual of facial cues only), and A-only (auditory-only input), and completed a
multiple-choice comprehension task followed by a questionnaire on their attitudes
toward and use of gestures. Results revealed that comprehension was signiﬁcantly
better for the lower proﬁciency learners in the AV-gesture condition, whereas the
higher proﬁciency learners performed best in the AV-face condition suggesting that
gestures facilitate comprehension even at lower proﬁciency levels but more linguistic
experience is needed to enhance the information value of facial speech cues such as
lip movements. Questionnaire results indicated learners’ positive attitude towards
visual cues as aids to comprehension regardless of proﬁciency level. Findings indicate

the importance of raising learner awareness to nonverbal aspects of communication.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would like to express my appreciation and gratitude to Professor Debra M.
Hardison, my thesis chair advisor, for guiding me throughout this thesis, and also
Professor Charlene Polio for very helpful feedback. I would like to thank Jill McKay,
IAH instructor, for giving a lecture and allowing me to record it to create the video
stimuli. I am also grateful to Alissa Cohen, ESL instructor, for helping me revise the
listening comprehension questions, and also instructors at the English Language
Center for allowing me to announce this study to their students.

Many thanks to Chris Valvona for encouraging me to complete this thesis, and for
proofreading it. I would also like to thank my parents for supporting me to pursue my

study at Michigan State University.

iii

TABLE OF CONTENTS

LIST OF TABLES ............................................................................ v
LIST OF FIGURES ........................................................................... vi
KEY ABBREVIATIONS. ................................................................... vii
CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION ............................................................................. 1
Purpose and Research Questions .................................................. 11
CHAPTER 2
STUDY ........................................................................................ 14
Method ................................................................................ 14
Participants .................................................................. 14
Materials ...................................................................... 15
Stimulus preparation .............................................. 15
Recording and editing stimulus .................................. 16
Gesture types ............................................................... 18
Listening task ...................................................... 20
Background questionnaire ........................................ 21
Procedure ..................................................................... 21
The Listening comprehension task ................................ 21
The background questionnaire .................................... 23
CHAPTER 3
Results and Discussion ............................................................. 24
The Listening Comprehension Task ..................................... 24
The Background Questionnaire ........................................... 28
Questionnaire Items 6-9 .......................................... 29
Questionnaire Items 10-23 ....................................... 38
CHAPTER 4
CONCLUSION ............................................................................... 48
REFERENCES ................................................................................ SO
APPENDICES
Appendix A: Outline of the lecture ............................................... 54
Appendix B: Script of stimulus .................................................... 57
Appendix C: Picture of video stimuli ............................................. 65
Appendix D: Listening comprehension ........................................... 66
Appendix E: Background questionnaire .......................................... 72

iv

Table 1:

Table 2:

Table 3:

Table 4:

Table 5:

Table 6:

LIST OF TABLES

Frequency of Gesture Types in Each Clip ....................................... 20
Summary of Descriptive Statistics ................................................ 25
Summary of Two-way ANOVA of the Listening Comprehension Task:

Proﬁciency level x Stimulus Conditions .......................................... 26

Frequency of Rankings of General Activities Using English
That Contribute to Language Skill Development: Questionnaire 6-9 ........ 30

Summary of Responses to Questionnaire Items 10-18 and t-test Statistics
Comparing Higher and Lower Proﬁciency Groups ............................. 39

Summary of Responses to Questionnaire Items 19-23 According to
Stimulus Condition (A-only, AV-face and AV-gesture) and t-test
Statistics Comparing Higher and Lower Proﬁciency Group Scores .......... 42

Figure 1:

Figure 2:

Figure 3:

Figure 4:

Figure 5:

LIST OF FIGURES

Mean Listening Comprehension Scores:
Proﬁciency Group x Stimulus Conditions ...................................... 26

Rankings of Activities Contributing to Listening Comprehension Skills
by the Higher Proﬁciency Group: Questionnaire Item 7 ..................... 33

Rankings of Activities Contributing to Listening Comprehension Skills
by the Lower Proﬁciency Group: Questionnaire Item 7 ....................... 33

Rankings of Activities Contributing to Speaking Skills
by the Higher Proﬁciency Group: Questionnaire Item 8 ..................... 35

Rankings of Activities Contributing to Speaking Skills
by the Lower Proﬁciency Group: Questionnaire Item 8 ...................... 35

vi

KEY TO ABBREVIATIONS

A-only = Audio Only

AV-face = Audio and Visual Cue of Face
AV-gesture = Audio and Visual Cue of Gestures
EAP = Academic Purposes Program

EFL = English as a Foreign Language

ESL = English as a Second Language

FL = Foreign Language

IAH = Integrative Studies in the Art and Humanities
IEP = Intensive English Program

LOR = Length of Residence

L1 = First Language

L2 = Second Language

NS = Native Speaker

NNS = Normative Speaker

TOEFL = Test Of English as a Foreign Language

vii

Chapter One
Introduction

Why do second language (L2) learners want to avoid talking to somebody on the
phone in the L2? Why do they think watching a video is easier than listening to the radio
in the L2? There is an assumption that a good language teacher can make a message
more comprehensible to learners of English as a Second Language (ESL) than most
English native speakers. Is it because of a teacher’s hyperarticulated speech, or is there
any other information he or she is providing? Is the phenomenon known as “phone
phobia” explicable? Because of these questions, researchers started paying attention to
the effect and the nature of nonverbal communication. It has been suggested that the
visual cues of a speaker’s gestures and face facilitate the interlocutor’s comprehension.
The main objective of this study is to assess the contribution of visual cues such as lip
movements and hand-gestures to ESL students’ comprehension while completing a
listening comprehension task during a lecture.

The experiment involved ESL learners, and they were divided into two proﬁciency
groups: higher and the lower, depending on the courses in which they were enrolled. The
participants were further divided into three input conditions: stimulus of audio and visual
cues of speaker’s face and hand-arm gestures (AV-gesture), stimulus of audio and visual
facial cues (AV-face), and stimulus of auditory only (A-only). The lecturer’s lip
movements were less discemable in the AV-gestures versus AV-face condition because
of the distance between the camera and the lecturer (see Appendix'B). All stimuli were
presented via QuickTime and projected onto an overhead projector (OI-1P) screen. As for

the control group (A-only), the stimulus was presented using the same media but without

video. All participants in each group were assigned to complete a multiple-choice task to
check their comprehension of the stimulus. A background questionnaire, which followed
the listening task, investigated the participants’ attitudes towards visual cues in L2
comprehension in general, and the comments about and reaction to the stimuli in this

study

Deﬁnitions and functions of nonverbal cues and gestures

Nonverbal communication involves conveying messages to an audience through
channels such as body movements, facial expression and proximity between a speaker
and the interlocutor. Kinesics speciﬁcally refers to body movements including head
movements such as nodding, gesture (frequently with hands), facial expression, gazing,
posture, and interpersonal distance (Kellerman, 1992). Hand gestures can be divided into
several categories including iconic gestures and beat gestures. Iconic gestures include
semantic information of the verbal message delivered with it, whereas beating does not
usually have a semantic aspect but corresponds to speech rhythm, and is frequently used
when a speaker controls the pace of speech (Morrel—Samuels & Krauss, 1992). McNeill
(1992) uses four gesture types to describe hand gestures and functions. They are
Iconics—having a close association with the meaning of the message, Metaphorics—
having sirnilar functions as Iconics presenting an image of abstract concepts, Deictics—
involving pointing movements used for referring to speciﬁc objects or abstract things
which may not be present at the moment of the speech and Beats—‘biphasic movements’

of rhythmical hand gesture that are non-imagestic.

'Facial visual cues

The other visual source that may help the interlocutor’s perception is facial visual cues
including lip movements. It seems that being unable to read a speaker’s lip movements
results in ineffective conditions for nonnative interlocutors’ comprehension (Goto, 1971).
McDonald and McGurk (1978) found that the visual cues of a speaker’s face greatly
inﬂuenced the auditory perception of natural speech in their study of English speaking
undergraduate students in England. This effect was found especially in the bilabial
position which displays the most explicit visual sound articulation. A similar result was
found in Hardison’s (1999) study using ESL students; the most salient visual information
facilitated perception when the visual and the auditory cues matched, whereas visual
nonlabials dubbed over auditory labials produced a nonlabial percept indicating greater
information value for these visual nonlabial cues. L2 learners also beneﬁt from visual
and auditory cues in perception training versus unimodal training (Hardison,-2003). The
learners especially beneﬁt from the visual cues in the more phonologically challenging
areas based on their L1: In her study /r/ and /l/ in ﬁnal position for Korean participants

and in initial position for the Japanese participants.

Gestures and interaction

Visual cues appear to be helpful for communication. In other words, “eliminating the
visual modality creates an unnatural condition which strains the auditory receptors to
capacity” (von Rafﬂer-Engel, 1980, p235). McNeill (1992) argues there is some

evidence showing a strong association of gestures with speech. The majority of gestures

(90%) are produced with utterances and they are linked semantically and pragrnatically,
also prosodically in the case of beat gestures.

Hand gestures represent an interactive element during communication. For instance,
the types of gestures differ according to the speech type, and their frequency depends on
the presence of the audience. Beat gestures are employed more frequently when a
speaker is giving a narration whereas iconic gestures are used more oﬁen when a speaker
is describing speciﬁc things (Alibali, Heath & Myers, 2001). They also found that
speakers produced iconic gestures much more frequently when communicating face-to-
face than when interlocutors could not see each other. However, beat gestures appeared
regardless of availability of audience.

Various studies dealing with native speakers have shown that the presence of gesture
given with a verbal message brings a positive outcome to both speakers and listeners.
Morrel-Samuels and Krauss (1992) found that a gesture functions as a facilitator to
words/expressions a speaker intends to say. In narrative speech, gestures are
synchronized with speech, and are conveyed right before or simultaneously with a lexical
item. Gestures are also informational in the sense that they give a clue about what a
speaker is trying to do in the interaction. A gesture such as withdrawing eyes from the
recipient during a conversation shows the speaker is thinking or recalling what he or she
intends to say. In their study, Goodwin and Goodwin (1998) observed the interlocutor
attending the word-search when a speaker showed a ‘thinking-face’. In other words,
when the speaker paused due to his or her inability to recall a word to describe drawings
in the information gap activity, the presence of thinking facial expressions encouraged

the interlocutor to help by participating in the word search. A ‘thinking-face’ gesture

also gives a reason for the interlocutor to wait. However, when a speaker starts to engage
in gazing when word-searching, he or she is asking for the interlocutor to respond or
ﬁnish the sentence. Another beneﬁcial function given to a speaker is the increase in rate
of speech. Hadar, Wenkert-Olenik, Krauss, and Soroket (1998) found that gestures work
as an aid for verbal lexical messages to negotiate the meaning and they help speakers to
recall lexical items sooner than those who did not use gestures.

If nonverbal cues accompanied by verbal messages facilitate speakers in such ways, it
should help the speaker recipients as well. Graham and Argyle (1975) found great
differences in the presence of nonverbal cues in word-searching tasks. Gestures work
much more effectively when communicating in difﬁcult conditions such as talking in
noise. Riseborough (1981) examined the interaction of available visual cues in
recounting a story task. A story was told in four conditions: sound only, visual cues of
the speaker with no movement, vague body movement, and visual cues of gesture in three
presentations of different signal-to-noise ratios. The result was that the group which had
the visual cue of gestures performed signiﬁcantly better regardless of signal-to-noise ratio
whereas the scores of the other groups declined as the amount of noise increased. The
effectiveness of the presence of gestures in an in-noise condition was also found in
Graham and Argyle’s study using an information gap task. This suggests that visual cues
of gestures facilitate memory recall and comprehension in difﬁcult conditions. Also, the
availability of visual cues or visibility of the gestures of the speaker aided, and shortened

the time needed to complete information gap tasks (Graham & Argyle).

Gestures and language development

Not only do gestures facilitate both speakers and listeners in face-to-face
communication, they also function as an indicator of L1 language development.
Mayberry and Nicoladis (2000) found certain gestures such as Iconics and Beats have a
strong correlation with children’s language development. At the prespeaking stage,
children mainly use Deictics such as pointing, or simple gestures such as waving and
clapping. However, as the speaking ability develops, they start to use Iconics and Beats.
This tendency can be found in the development of gesture perception. For example,
comparing ESL children (Ll Spanish) and native English-speaking children, ESL
children comprehended much less nonverbal information than native speakers because of
the lower language proﬁciency (Mohan & Hehner, 1988). As linguistic knowledge
develops, L2 learners are able to make use of visual information. Japanese students who
lived in the U. S. for more than two years reported that they took advantage of eye
contact as a result of this experience allowing them to use visual information such as lip

movements (Hattori, 1987).

Culturally biased gestures

However, some research shows that cultural differences in nonverbal communication
may interfere with understanding a message due to the semantic variation of gestures
cross-culturally. Morris and Collett (1979) collected data in 40 locations in 25 different
European countries, which covered many adjoining but linguistically distinct areas. They
observed gestures during interpersonal communication and interviewed local people.

Twenty key iconic gestures were selected, and they were used for a survey clarifying

meanings in different regions during the interviews. They found that most gestures had
various meanings along a continuum within a region, although some gestures represented
only one meaning, and the distribution was complementary (with no other meanings in
the region). For example, the palm-back V-sign meant a “sexual insult” in Scotland,
Wales and England, and meant nothing else whereas in the majority of other European
countries, it indicated “victory” or “two”. Another study showed different frequencies of
gesture use according to the language spoken by a speaker. Italian participants used
gesture more frequently, and they took greater advantage of the visual cues of body
movements than American participants during information gap tasks (Graham & Argyle,
1975)

In addition to the semantic differences among iconic gestures, there may be a
difference in gesture function among cultures. Speakers in Asian cultures are known to
utilize their gesture and facial expressions more subtly than those of western cultures, and
they sometimes use gestures as social functions such as showing politeness, respect, and
formality; “Giving a bow” or “looking down slightly” is used to express respect to the
interlocutor (Kagawa, 2001) and engaging eye contact is frequently considered rather
‘rude’ in Asian culture. Not only do gesture functions differ, the interpretation of others’
facial expressions shows a gap across cultures. The perception of facial expression
differs between Americans and Japanese. A “Smile” was considered a positive facial
expression by American participants, who rated smiling faces more intelligent than
neutral faces whereas Japanese participants did not perceive them as relating to
intelligence (Matsumoto & Kudoh, 1993). Facial expressions in Korean culture are also

different from those of western culture weighting on subtleness. With regard to subtlety,

which may seem meaningless to one from another culture, sensing others’ feelings is
highly valued as explained by the expression “nun-chi” meaning sensibility or

perceptiveness (Yum, 1987).

Visual uses in L2 learning environment

Second language acquisition theory advocates verbal interactions (communication
between individuals in order to avoid a communication breakdown) in language learning
(e. g., Gass & Varonis, 1994; Mackey, 1999), an interaction offers learners opportunities
to receive comprehensible input and feedback (Gass, 1997; Long, 1996; Pica, 1994) and
also to make modiﬁcations in their output (Swain, 1995). This allows learners to notice
the gap between their interlanguage and correct output (Schmidt & Frota, 1986). These
interactions may be facilitated by visual cues such as hand gestures and facial expressions
provided by both speaker and hearer in both production and comprehension.

Many researchers suggest instruction involving any kind’of nonverbal use facilitates
students’ comprehension in the language learning environment. Introducing kinetic
gesture in language learning is important because it is natural input this way (Cabrera &
Martinez, 2001; English, 1982; Mueller, 1980; Saitz 1966), and improves the social
pragmatic competence of L2 learners (Saitz, 1966). The nonverbal element of
communication is at least as important as verbal communication in L2 instruction
because it is more powerful than verbal information and provides information in depth
(Perry, 2001). Without this, L2 learners’ communicative competence would be limited to

the linguistic component (Edwards, 1980).

A sample observation of classroom teacher Grant and Hennings (1971) found that
predominate teaching pattern of speech was accompanied by gestures. No other study
was found that analyzed teachers’ use of gestures in a routine classroom instruction.
Understanding or interpreting nonverbal messages accurately is crucial for students,
especially for L2 learners whose comprehension skill is limited. In addition, if not used
properly, it is highly possible that gestures presented by L2 learners may lead to major
misunderstandings or even an insult (Pennycook, 1985).

The importance of nonverbal cues is maximized in listening comprehension, where
gestures or other kinds of visual cues help students understand the content better since
completing an activity in the L2 constitutes a difﬁcult task; “it is easier to show a shape
than explain it” (Ducroquet, 1977, p252). Also the process of listening becomes more
active when accompanied by the visibility of motions and the nonverbal aspect of speech
cannot be separated from the whole communication process. As a consequence, previous
literature encourages integrating visuals such as video in the L2 teaching environment
because it is engaging, reinforces comprehensible input (Wood, 1999), and aids elaborate
verbal messages (Swaffer & Vlatten, 1997). Authentic TV programs in Spanish
signiﬁcantly improved L2 Spanish learners’ listening comprehension as well as their
vocabulary (Herron, York, Cole, & Linden, 1998). As a result, many language textbooks,
teacher’s handbooks, or commentary articles suggest that nonverbal communication is
essential in language instruction. Despite this attention to nonverbal communication in
language teaching, methodological problems in research studies to date have failed to
demonstrate a positive effect of the presence of gesture in ESL/EF L students’

comprehension.

Listening comprehension using gestures in L2 research

Research by Cabrera and Martinez (2001) revealed the positive effect of gestures on
students’ comprehension during story-telling in EFL at a primary school in Mexico. The
study was designed to compare a control group which had a story-telling class with
language modiﬁcations using “simpliﬁed input” to make the story more comprehensible,
and an experimental group which had interaction modiﬁcations including teacher’s
repetitions, comprehension checks, and gestures. They found that the latter group
comprehended the story much better than the control group. Even though their
conclusion emphasized the importance of body language instructions in foreign language
teaching, their result unfortunately failed to show the true value of body language. This
is because the experimental group also received repetition and comprehension checks,
which may have contributed to students’ comprehension. English (1982) also examined
the effect of instruction using a video lecture in academic listening. There were two
experimental groups and one control group: One received listening instruction focusing
on nonverbal cues cf the lecturer and another group received listening instruction
focusing on verbal discourse, and a control group received no speciﬁc listening
instruction. English reported no effect of visual instruction; however, the methodology
raises several concerns. The ﬁrst is the subjects’ proﬁciency level, which was already
high (TOEFL 418-557) and suggests a possible ceiling effect. Another is the fact that the
post-test was a note-taking task. It is likely that the subjects were unable to attend
adequately to the visual cues because they were focused on taking notes.

The main purpose of the present study is to examine the effects of visual cues (lip

movements and gestures) on ESL students’ listening comprehension by controlling types

10

of input, background knowledge, and selecting an appropriate comprehension task. The

effect of proﬁciency level on gesture use was also investigated using questionnaire.

Purpose and Research Questions
This study was motivated by the following research questions and hypothesis. The

ﬁrst two questions were addressed in the comprehension task, and the third was
addressed in the questionnaire responses.

1) Does more access to visual cues such as gestures and lip movements facilitate

ESL students’ listening comprehension?

Previous nonverbal communication studies have shown that visual cues of a speaker
facilitate a positive comprehension by listeners. Visual cues of a speaker’s face including
lip movements increased listeners’ perception for both native speakers and normative
speakers of English (Hardison, 1999; McDonald & McGurk, 1978). Other studies have
shown that gestures accompanying speech contain meaningful information, which helps
the comprehension of content (Cabrera & Martinez, 2001; Morrel-Sarnuels & Krauss,
1992). Since these two types of nonverbal cues (gestures and lip movements) have been
shown to be beneﬁcial to listeners, I hypothesized that the AV-gesture group presented
with the visual cues of both a speaker’s face and hand gestures would perform the best
followed by the AV-face group who saw visual stimulus of a speaker’s face only but did
not see the speaker’s gestures, and then the A-only group.

2) In the listening comprehension task, do lower proﬁciency ESL students rely

on visual cues more than higher proﬁciency students?

11

Previous studies indicated that visual cues were most beneﬁcial in difﬁcult tasks such as
an in-noise. In Riseborough’s (1981) study using English native speakers assigning a
retelling task in English, the in—noise condition group’s performance varied the most
depending on the stimulus; that is the gesture stimulus group, who had visual cues of a
speaker using hand gestures while speaking, performed signiﬁcantly better than the visual
cues of a speaker with vague or no movement, or the audio-only group with stimuli in-
noise condition. However, the accuracy of the retelling task was the same across
different stimulus conditions when noise was not added. Therefore, the positive effect of
visual cues appeared only in the challenging task, in this case in noise. A listening
comprehension task for ESL learners is similar to a task performed with stimuli in nose;
it is difﬁcult because of limitations in the participants’ language abilities, especially for
lower proﬁciency learners. Therefore, I hypothesized that the listening comprehension
scores of the lower proﬁciency group would be best facilitated when gestures and lip
movements were available to them than facial visual cues only. Visual cues were not
expected to help the higher proﬁciency group as much as the lower proﬁciency group.
3) Does proﬁciency level affect the leamer’s preference of input type for English,
and does it also affect their choice of activities in the development of listening
and'speaking skills, and vocabulary building? Does proﬁciency level affect the
perception of gestures in general, and the perception of their own gesture use both
with ﬁrst language (L1) and L2 speech?
According to the ESL/BF L listening comprehension literature, lower proﬁciency
learners should be provided with visual cues to make pedagogical materials

comprehensible. If this is true of the lower proﬁciency ESL learners, they will prefer

l2

being able to see gestures and put more value on the extra information because it helps
their listening comprehension. I hypothesized the higher proﬁciency learners would
show a more favorable attitude towards these cues as suggested by Hattori (1987) than

lower proﬁciency learners.

13

Chapter Two
Study
Method

Participants

A total of 45 ESL students (Male=13, F emale=32) were involved in this study. The
data from three participants were omitted from the analysis. Two participants in the AV-
group did not pay attention to the visual stimulus by looking down or closing their eyes
when the stimulus was being shown on the OHP screen. Therefore, when the response
sheets from these two participants were collected, I separated them from the others. The
proﬁciency of another participant was not compatible with the rest of the group, as she
was enrolled in two advanced linguistics courses. The reminding participants were
enrolled in either the Intensive English Program (IEP) or English for Academic Purposes
Program (EAP) at Michigan State University. All the IEP students took an in-house
placement test, and were placed in appropriate courses based on their listening, reading,
and writing skills. Some participants were placed in their current course after completing
the preceding level. Some of the EAP students were enrolled in the program in order to
meet the university language requirement to obtain undergraduate student status, whereas
others were enrolled to improve speciﬁc English skills depending on their needs. All
participants in this study were randomly assigned to three groups based on stimulus
conditions: AV-gestures, AV-face and A-only. Each group was subdivided into two
proﬁciency groups; the participants from Level 1 and 2 (the lowest and second lowest
level in the IEP) were considered the lower proﬁciency group and those who were placed

in Level 4 (the highest in IEP) or in EAP courses were considered the higher proﬁciency

l4

group. Their ages ranged from 18 to 27 years. The majority of these students had
Korean (N=35) as their native language and the others were Japanese (N=3), Chinese
(N=1), Thai (N=1), Italian (N=1) and non-speciﬁed (N=1). The students’ mean length of
residence (LOR) in the United States or other English speaking countries was 7.3 months.
Most students were attending only the English courses described above at the time of this
study except for four participants who were also attending academic courses such as
hospitality business, management.

All students participated in this study voluntarily outside of their usual classes. After

the experiment, the test results were given to the participants upon their request.

Materials

Stimulus preparation. A female graduate teaching assistant whose L1 is American
English was videotaped giving a lecture following a special outline containing pre-chosen
key information, which was planned for making listening comprehension questions;
however, the lecturer was allowed to expand or omit some content in the outline (see
Appendix A) depending on her conﬁdence in her topic knowledge (see Appendix B for
the script). At the time of the experiment, she was teaching an Integrative Studies in the
Art and Humanities (IAH) course involving issues of American history, society and
culture. An IAH instructor was chosen because the course is one of the university
required courses that all undergraduate students have to take in order to graduate;
therefore, the instructor was considered representative of academic lecturers. Prior to the
video recording session, I observed the instructor during her usual lecture schedule in

order to analyze her gesture use.

15

' The content of the lecture in this study was “Ceramics for Beginners”. This topic was
selected in order to avoid any previous knowledge bias, and to obtain sufﬁcient amount
of gesture use. In previous studies, listening comprehension tasks used lectures given on
topics of general academic content such as psychology, sociology however, these topics
are popular among university students, which suggests these ESL learners might have
learned about these ﬁelds in their home countries. In order to conﬁrm that there was no
previous knowledge of the lecture content, participants were asked to write down in the
questionnaire if they had had any instruction relating to ceramics or pottery—making.

Another important element concerning the topic was eliciting a variety of gestures
during the lecture. In this study, four types of gestures (Iconics, Deictics, Metaphorics,
and Beats) as deﬁned by McNeil] (1992) were used in the lecture. The frequency and
examples of each gesture type are discussed in the “Gesture type” section. The content of
the lecture covers deﬁnitions of terms and a brief history of ceramics, which tended to be
done in narrative form. Demonstrating how to make basic pottery involved description.

Recording and editing the stimulus. Two video recording sessions using the same
outline were scheduled, each lasting approximately 20 minutes. Sony Digital Video
Camera Recorders (Model DCR-TRV27) were used for recording; one was focused on
her upper body (waist and above) and the other one was focused on the lecturer’s face
(shoulders and above) in order to make two types of stimulus conditions: AV-gesture and
AV-face (see Appendix C). The lecturer was not told what kind of gestures to use or how
to them so in the AV-face condition, her hands were occasionally visible. This was not

planned but was inevitable in order to have naturalistic gesture quality. The recordings

16

were done in a small room, often used for writing tutorial sessions in the English
Language Center.

Previous nonverbal communication studies showed the importance of having an
interlocutor when eliciting natural gesture use from a speaker, and therefore during the
recording two observers were allowed in the room to listen to the lecture in order to
create a naturalistic atmosphere for the lecturer to use gestures. The lecturer was
instructed not to walk around but was allowed to shift her body position within a few
steps. She was also instructed to give a lecture as if she were lecturing to a whole class.
The lecturer was aware that the visual cues of hand gestures were one of the variables for
the video stimulus. The two video recordings were then compared in terms of frequency
of gesture use and quality of sound; one was selected for further use.

The video was edited with “i-movie”, a movie-editing program created by Macintosh.
Recordings for the two stimulus conditions (AV-gesture and AV-face) were made at the
same time and edited in the same manner. After both stimuli were imported into
“i-movie”, they were edited into ﬁve small clips for the purpose of reducing dependence
on memory for the listening comprehension task. In addition, to keep the content
coherent, the length of each clip varied from two to four minutes depending on the
subtopic of the clip. The contents of the ﬁve clips were: 1) the history of ceramics, 2)
tools and techniques, 3) hand-building procedures, 4) kneading the clay, and 5) shaping it
on the wheel. After editing, all clips were compressed (using IMA4: 1) from the original
ﬁlm and exported to “QuickTime”, an audio/video playback software program. The
maximal quality for showing and ideal size to avoid technical problems were taken into

consideration during the editing process and after several editing and testing sessions, I

17

decided on the Size and the quality; the sound property was set as 22050 Hz, the video
format was 320 x 240 by Sorenson video 3, and the video track format size was also 320
x 240 pixels. The stimulus for the A-only group consisted of the recording’s audio track
only. All three stimulus conditions were of the same quality.
Gesture types. The gestures used in the lecture were categorized into four types using
McNeill’s (1992) deﬁnition: Iconics, Metaphorics, Deictics and Beats.
1. Iconics refer to gestures that are strongly related to the speech semantically. Iconic
gestures used in this lecture were mostly accompanied by descriptions of ceramic tools,
shapes, and patterns. In addition, the lecturer used Iconics while demonstrating some
methods explained in the lecture and illustrating procedures of shaping or decorating a
ceramic piece. The following are examples of Iconics in the video; the ﬁrst one was used
to describe a tool, and the second one was used when demonstrating the procedure.
During the lecture, italicized words or phrases described below were accompanied by
hand-arm gestures.
In the loop tool explanation, pointing ﬁngers shaped a triangle and a circle. These
gestures accompanied the utterance, “They’re shaped with triangles or circles on
the top that are hollowed out by wires ...... ” (Clip 2) and a Sign similar to ‘OK’
was given with the word “hollow out”.
“ So, you allow yourself to kind of gently remove the machine from the clay and
slide the clay over to a. . .erm. . .piece of wax paper ...... ” (Clip 5) accompanied by
the gesture of two hands holding a circular object and moving it to the left.
2. Metaphorics represent a semantic message as Iconics do but they are used when

describing more abstract images. During the lecture, metaphoric gestures were used to

18

describe some motions involved in the procedures and to refer to an object. Occasionally
they were used for a conceptual indication such as a waving hand implying that
something was incorrect:

“. . .it does sound a little odd considering it has nothing to do with clay or pottery

in the name.” (Clip 1) accompanied by a moving the hand from side to side.
3. Deictics refer to objects or abstract things. The lecturer used this type of gesture to
compare and contrast especially when she talked about the history and characteristics of
ceramics in different regions. The gesture involved one hand movement indicating ‘this’
and another movement indicating ‘that’ to distinguish or contrast two things:

“Pot or clay” (Clip 1)

“It was something that was really used for a function rather than form.” (Clip 1)
The same gesture was employed to indicate difference or to change the topic.

“Urn color were [sic] varied, different from Mesopotamia era.” (Clip 1)
4. Beats are the most frequently type gesture and characterize rhythmical movements
that do not have semantic association with the speech. Beats were used throughout the
lecture; however, the lecturer tended to use beats more often when she emphasized
important information with constant movements of hands or emphasized one key term
with one hand movement accompanied by a higher tone of voice or stressed vowels:

“ ...... clay does not come in the shape you see it in... in all the stores as it’s

already formed.” (Clip 4)

The distribution of gesture types in each clip is described in Table 1. As you can see

Beats were the most frequently used (38%) followed by Iconics (31%) and Metaphorics

(24%). Deictics were the least frequent in this lecture (8%). Although there was a slight

l9

difference between the frequency of Beats and Iconics, Beats were more common
throughout the lecture and lasted longer each time than any other gesture. However, the
focus of gesture type in this lecture was Iconics because of strong association with the

meaning of the content, which may facilitate listeners’ comprehension.

Table 1
Frequency of Gesture Types in Each Clip

 

Clipl Clip2 Clip3 Clip4 Clip5 Total

 

Iconics 10 27 13 15 21 76 (31%)
Metaphorics 6 5 l 1 12 19 58 (24%)
Diectics 7 0 2 6 4 l9 (8%)

Beats 17 15 17 21 22 92 (3 8%)

 

Note. The “Total” column represents the total number of each gesture used throughout the lecture. The
percentage of the total number of gestures is given in parentheses.

Listening task. A multiple-choice comprehension task was employed in this study to
test participants’ comprehension of the stimulus. A multiple-choice format was used to
minimize the confounding of listening with other skills such as speaking or writing and
for effectiveness within time constraints (Dunkel, Henning, & Chaudron, 1993). There
were two types of questions: Asking for a main idea or detailed information about the
topic, and selecting the correct sequence of the procedures given by the lecturer. Some
questions involved information, which could be facilitated more by the availability of
visual information from the lecturer than the other items due to the nature of gestures
presented, although all questions were designed so that it was possible to answer without
visual cues. Four multiple-choice questions were prepared for each clip. All stimulus

groups had identical questions.

20

Background questionnaire. The background questionnaire (see Appendix E)
consisted of twenty-three items including questions about participants’ demographic
background, learning preferences, perceived effectiveness of visual cues in the listening
task, and attitudes towards visual cues or gestures. The ﬁrst six items asked about
participants’ background including their L1, the LOR in an English speaking country, and
their experience with courses related to ceramics. Item numbers seven through nine were
about perceived method efﬁcacy in improving certain English skills: Listening, speaking
and vocabulary building. Item numbers 10 through 18 were related to participants’ use of
visual cues in daily life and items 19 though 23 were about perceived efﬁcacy of visual
cues during the listening comprehension task in this study. Therefore, each stimulus
group (AV-gesture, AV-face, A—only) was asked different questions followed by an

open-ended question regarding how they felt about the task.

Procedure

The Listening comprehension task. The experiment was conducted in a regular
classroom equipped with a built-in computer, and a speaker that was suspended from the
ceiling in the middle of the room. Three sessions were conducted for each offered
stimulus condition and two extra sessions were scheduled for the participants who had a
conﬂict in their schedule. Each participant attended the session to which they had been
randomly assigned. The testing was done in small groups of ﬁve to eight participants.
The stimuli for the AV-face and AV-gesture groups were presented via computer
projected onto the overhead projector screen. The “QuickTime” software was used as a

medium to play the stimuli that had been already downloaded onto the computer prior to

21

the experiment. Both visual stimulus groups (AV-face and AV-gesture) were presented
with the audio material through a speaker while the video was projected onto the big
screen at the front of the classroom. In viewing, I chose “double size” instead of “full
size”, which covers a whole screen (the size options in QuickTime) to prevent the image
from blurring. In the AV-gesture condition, the size of the lecturer was approximately a
life-size image. AV-face was presented in the same manner, shown using the same frame
size; however, the lecturer’s face appeared much closer than in the AV-gesture because in
recording, the camera was focused much closer for the AV-face than AV-gesture. As for
the A-only group, participants were provided with the material in the same manner, using
the same medium and audio system but the visual image was not Shown.

A response sheet was distributed to the participants, which had written instructions on
the front page (see Appendix D). They were told to answer four multiple-choice
questions during a two-minute pause after each 2-4 minute clip. Participants were not
allowed to read the questions ahead of time; they listened/viewed the clip, and then were ‘
told to turn the page to answer the questions for that clip. The length of each clip was
kept short enough to minimize dependence on memory. In contrast to the study by
English (1982), participants were not allowed to take notes during the experiment to
maximize attention to the visual input for the AV-facc and AV-gesture groups. To assure
comparability across groups, the A-only group was not allowed to take notes either. I
observed participants during the experiment in order to remind the visual groups (AV-
face and AV-gestures) to pay attention to the visual stimulus. After the listening

comprehension task, participants were asked to complete the questionnaires and then they

22

were dismissed. The experimental session was completed in 30 minutes including
instructions at the beginning, the comprehension task, and the background questionnaire.

The Background Questionnaire. Following the listening comprehension task,
participants were asked to ﬁll out the questionnaire, which was included with the
response Sheet. They were given approximately 15 minutes to complete this task but if
they did not ﬁnish on time, they were allowed to continue until they had ﬁnished. They
were allowed to inquire when they did not understand the meaning of the questions in
this section.

Questionnaire items 1 to 5, addressing the background of the participants, involved
circling the items that best described them. Items 6 to 9 asked them to rank, on a scale of
1 to 3, what they felt were the most efﬁcient methods of improving different English
skills. Item numbers 10 through 23 used a 5-point Likert scale where participants were
asked to mark 5 for “strongly agree”, 3 for “neutral” and l for “strongly disagree” after

each statement.

23

Chapter Three
Results and Discussion
The data were analyzed in two stages: Analysis of the listening comprehension task

and analysis of the background questionnaire. The mean accuracy scores for the listening
comprehension task were tabulated according to the stimulus condition (AV-gesture, AV-
face, AV-only) and participants’ proﬁciency. The background questionnaire was
examined as both quantitative and qualitative data focusing on participants’ behavior
towards visual cues in listening tasks, which will be discussed following the results of the

listening comprehension task.

The Listening Comprehension Task.

Table 2 is the summary of descriptive Statistics of the listening comprehension task for
the two proﬁciency groups (higher and lower) across three stimulus conditions (AV-
gesture, AV-face and A-only). Overall, the groups that received input with visual cues
performed better than the group that received auditory-only input regardless of
proﬁciency level. As shown, the group mean score for the listening comprehension task
was the highest for the lower proﬁciency group in the AV—gesture condition, whereas
AV-face was the highest for the higher proﬁciency group. Figure 1 provides a graphic
display of the differences between proﬁciency levels across stimulus conditions. The
mean score of the lower proﬁciency group showed a gradual decline in performance from
AV-gesture (M =10.14, SD=1.95), to AV-face (M =8.71, SD=.64), to A-only (M =7.57,
SD=.48). This conﬁrms hypothesis 1, that the more visual information available to the

participants, the better the listening comprehension. However, the higher proﬁciency

24

group did not follow this trend; instead, the AV-face group received the highest group
mean score (M=13.29, SD=.84) followed by AV-gesture (M =1 1.14, SD=2.54) and A-
only (M =8.57, SD=.61). As mentioned, the greatest difference in the mean of the
proﬁciency groups was in the AV-face condition, where the difference was 4.58 (shown
in the “Difference” column in Table 2); whereas the other stimulus conditions, AV-
gesture and A-only did not show such a big gap (a 1.00 difference for both proﬁciency
groups). The reliability of the listening comprehension test was .60 (total item N=20,
M=9.90), which was acceptable in this study due to the small population (Nf42) of two

extreme proﬁciency levels and the small number of test items (N=20).

Table 2
Summary of Descriptive Statistics

 

Mean Accuracy ‘ S_D
Stimulus Higher Prof. Lower Prof. Difference (H-L) Higher Prof. . Lower Prof.
Condition

 

 

AV-gesture 11.14 10.14 1.00 2.54 1.95
AV-face 13.29 8.71 4.58 .84 .64
A-only 8.57 7.57 - 1.00 .61 .48

 

Note. N42. The total possible score for the listening task was 20. The “Difference” column is the mean
difference between the higher and lower proﬁciency groups calculated simply by subtracting the lower
proﬁciency score from the higher proﬁciency score. SD=Standard Deviation.

25

Figure 1: Mean Listening Comprehension Scores: Proﬁciency Group x Stimulus
Condition.

l ZOWLL,L_*k’,,LLL_,’L___ , l
‘ 18—‘ I
16- l
, E14 . 13.29 ‘
l = , | l
0 ' I

l 0 ‘ W 7..
l : ILow Prof.“
(I l

I hProf.‘
. g Hg ‘1
l 3 ‘

. s

 

   

AV—gesture AV-face A-only

Stimulus Conditlon

 

 

Table 3
Summary of Two-way ANOVA of the Listening Comprehension Task:
Proﬁciency Group x Stimulus Condition

 

 

ANOVA

Source of Variation SS df MS F P-value F crit
Stimulus 50.38095 1 50.38095 13.53518 0.00076 4.113161
Proﬁciency 71.47619 2 35.7381 9.601279 0.000455 3.259444
Interaction . 29.7619 2 14.88095 3.997868 0.027043 3.259444
Within 134 36 3.722222

Total 2_85.619 41

 

In order to see the effect of visual cues on listening comprehension, I conducted a
two-factor ANOVA [Proﬁciency Group (higher, lower) x Stimulus Condition (AV-
gesture, AV-face, A-only)]. Table 3 provides the summary of the two-way ANOVA
analysis. Analysis revealed the main effects of stimulus condition [F(1, 36)=13.54,

p<.001]. Post-hoe Tukey HSD tests were conducted to compare each stimulus condition.

26

The analysis revealed that the scores for the A-only group were signiﬁcantly different
from those of AV-face [F (2,36)=9.60, p<.001], and those of AV-gesture conditions

[F (2,36)=9.60, p<.01]. However, there was no signiﬁcant difference between AV-face
and AV-gesture conditions [F (2,36)=9.60, p=.877]. There was a main effect of level of
proﬁciency [F(2, 36)=9.60, p<.001] as hypothesized; ESL learners’ listening
comprehension was facilitated when visual cues of the speaker were present and scores
were higher for the higher proﬁciency group. This ﬁnding is comparable to the results of
other studies which claim that visual cues facilitate listeners’ comprehension (Graham &
Argyle, 1975; Riseborough, 1981), and demonstrates that the presence of visual
information itself helps ESL learners’ comprehension without repetition of a story or
comprehension checks (Cabera & Martinez, 2001). The fact that both proﬁciency groups
performed better on the task with visual cues suggests that listening to a lecture in the L2
is comparable to noise-added conditions for native speakers (N Ss) in other listening
comprehension studies (Kellennan, 1992; Saiz, 1996; von Rafﬂer-Engel, 1980).
Especially for the lower proﬁciency group, it can be said that the difficulty of the task
forced them to rely on visual information.

There was also a signiﬁcant interaction [F (2, 36)=4.00, p<.05]. The difference
between the two proﬁciency levels is greatest in the AV-face condition; the higher
proﬁciency group beneﬁted most from the AV-face stimulus followed by AV-gesture and
then A-only. This order was not as predicted. However, this result is supported by other
studies, which indicate the positive effects of lip movements on perceptual accuracy
(Hardison, 1999; Hardison, 2003; McDonald & McGurk, 1978). One of the reasons for

this ﬁnding may be that lip movements are often found less informative for the lower

27

proﬁciency learners, which have less experience with L2 input. As reported by Hattori
(1987), L2 learners with greater linguistic experience seem to obtain the beneﬁt of more
subtle visual cues such as lip movements or other facial expressions. Considering that
only the higher proﬁciency group performed outstandingly in the AV-face condition, they
were able to make better use of the stimulus. If one cannot make use of such visual cues,
they may become meaningless or even become a distraction for listeners. In addition, the
nature of the visual cues may have contributed to the difference between the higher and
lower proﬁciency group in their comprehension. Hand-arm gestures, which facilitate
semantic information of speech, appear to be most useful for the lower proﬁciency
learners because they require semantic information to help their comprehension whereas
the visual cues of a speaker’s face, which visually present phonological element of the .
message, were most beneﬁcial for the higher proﬁciency learners. This may be because
they already understood the main part of the message and phonological visual cues,

which may have functioned as a clariﬁcation of the message.

The Background Questionnaire

The questionnaire was divided into three sections: Participants’ demographic
background, perceived effectiveness of activities contributing to listening, speaking and
vocabulary skills, and comments on their attention to and use of visual cues (see
Appendix E). Discussion focuses on the second two sections. To address research
question 3, the questionnaire was analyzed in subsections and discussed in the order in

which they appeared on the response sheet.

28

Questionnaire items 6-9. Questionnaire items 6-9 were tabulated according to the
rankings participants assigned to general activities that contribute to the development of
listening, speaking proﬁciency and vocabulary building. Table 4 provides the frequency
of rankings for these activities reported by the two proﬁciency groups. Graphs are also
provided for Items 8 and 9 where the responses were different between the higher and

lower proﬁciency groups.

29

Table 4
Frequency of Rankings of General Activities Using English That Contribute to Language
Skill Development: Questionnaire Items 6-9

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Item Proﬁciency level
Q6 Higher Lower
Ranking 1 2 3 Total 1 2 3 Total
Homework 4 9 4 17 O 12 6 18
English use in class 9 5 l 15 12 3 1 16
TV 1 5 7 13 3 3 8 14
Talking to friends 4 2 l 7 4 2 0 6
Reading 1 l 4 6 O O l 1
E-rnail 2 O 3 5 l O l 2
Radio 0 0 O O 1 O 2 3
Q7 Higher Lower
Ranking 1 2 3 Total 1 2 3 Total
TV 6 8 5 19 5 8 6 19
Talking to Americans 8 7 l 16 14 4 1 l9
Attending class 3 0 6 9 0 2 4 6
Radio/CD 3 0 5 8 2 3 2 7
Talking to friends 1 3 2 6 0 0 4 4
Q8 Higher ‘Lower
Ranking 1 2 3 Total 1 2 3 Total .
Talking to Americans 18 l 0 19 15 3 2 20
TV 3 3 8 l4 1 5 4 10
Talking to friends 0 8 0 8 2 9 3 14
Attending class 0 2 4 6 O 1 5 6
Radio/CD 0 O 2 2 1 l l 3
Q9 Higher Lower
Ranking 1 2 3 Total 1 2 3 Total
Reading 13 4 l 18 8 9 0 17
Homework 5 3 3 ll 6 5 3 l4
Attending class 1 5 4 10 l 3 5 9
TV 0 0 6 6 0 0 6 6
Talking to ﬁiends l 4 0 5 3 0 3 6
Talking to Americans 1 1 2 4 l 0 1 2
Radio/CD 0 0 2 2 0 1 0 1
E-mail 0 O 0 0 l 0 1 2
Note. The ﬁgure for each activity represents the frequency with which it was ranked, ﬁrst, second or third

by respondents. The total possible response was 21 for each group.

In Table 4, the far left column presents each questionnaire item number (6-9)

followed by the name of the activity that contributes to the skill development. Activities

30'

are ordered from most to least frequently preferred. The ﬁrst column under “1” is the
number of participants who ranked the activity ﬁrst, in the second column it is the
number who ranked it second, and in the third column it is the number who ranked it
third.

Questionnaire item 6 indicates the rankings of participants’ activities using English.
The question did not refer to a speciﬁc skill (listening, speaking, reading or writing)
because investigating the most common skills used in these activities was one of the
purposes of the question. Responses indicated that regardless of proﬁciency, learners are
exposed to English engaging in similar activities, which shows homogeneity in their
English use. The most common activity using English was “Homework” (N=35)
followed by “English use in class” (N=31), which suggested the participants used a
special type of English related to the course they were attending and “Watching TV”
(N=27). The responses were different with regard to proﬁciency for the other activities
such as “Talking to friends”, “Reading” and “E-mail”; these were preferred more by the
higher proﬁciency group (N=7, N=6 and N=5) than the lower proﬁciency group (N=6,
N=l, N=l), whereas “radio” as an input source was chosen only by the lower proﬁciency
group (N=3).

Questionnaire item 7 referred to their proﬁciency of activities contributing to listening
skills. Figure 2 indicates the rankings by the higher proﬁciency group and Figure 3
indicates those for the lower proﬁciency group. Each bar represents the number of
respondents who marked the activity as their ﬁrst, second or third preference in the
development of their listening Skills. “Rank 1” indicates ranking as the ﬁrst choice,

“Rank 2” as second and “Rank 3” as third. In general, both proﬁciency groups preferred

31

activities involving visual input to develop their listening skills. As shown, “Watching
TV” was the most preferred activity by both proﬁciency groups (N=19). The same
number of respondents in the lower proﬁciency group marked “Talking to American
friends” and “Watching TV” (N=19) but this number was a little less in the higher
proﬁciency group (N=16). “Attending class” was preferred more by the higher
proﬁciency group (N=9) than the lower proﬁciency group (N=6) as an activity

contributing to listening development.

32

Figure 2: Rankings of Activities Contributing to Listening Comprehension Skills
by the Higher Proﬁciency Group: Questionnaire Item 7

ther proflclency

 

8

0

c l
. o : ~W~ll
i g lClRankal

‘6 ‘IRankZl

s lmml

g 1 El“

2

 

 

 

- l
l
l

TV Radio Taking to Tala‘ng to Attending
‘ friends Arrerican class
i friends ‘
. Aetlvlty typos i

Figure 3: Rankings of Activities Contributing to Listening Comprehension Skills
by the Lower Proﬁciency Group: Questionnaire Item 7

 

Lower proficie ney l

 

Number of responses

 

 

 

‘ TV Radio Talking to Talking to Attending

friends American class i
friends ‘
Activity types 1

33

The results of questionnaire item 8 indicate participants’ preferences for activities
contributing to the improvement of their Speaking skills. As shown in Figures 4 and 5,
both proﬁciency groups perceived “Talking to American ﬁiends” as the most effective
activity to improve speaking skills (N=19 for the higher, N=20 for the lower). As for the
second most popular activity, the preferences between proﬁciency groups varied;
“Watching TV” was preferred more by the higher proﬁciency group (N=14 by the higher
proﬁciency group, N=11 by the lower proﬁciency group) whereas “Talking to friends”
(N=14 by the lower proﬁciency group, N=8 by the higher proﬁciency group) was
preferred more by the lower proﬁciency group. Lower proﬁciency learners may not be
ready for or comfortable with the input. Commonly, they need to ask questions to clarify
meaning. Participants favored activities that provide potential interaction with the
interlocutor such as “Talking to American friends” and “Talking to friends in English”.
In terms of activities that offer English input, participants preferred input with visual cues
better than auditory alone. For example, “Watching TV” was evaluated as more effective

than “Radio” which was rated the least favorite of all activities by both proﬁciency

groups.

34

Figure 4: Rankings of Activities Contributing to Speaking Skills
by the Higher Proﬁciency Group: Questionnaire Item 8

Higher proﬁciency

    
   

 

8
In
C
8 12 i
t ‘l
1 £10 ‘lRankZ.
° l
i - l .
i E9 3 :ialeHli
l E 6 ~. ,._
4 l
l s
l 2
i 0‘ ‘~--
‘ TV Ratio Taking to Taking to Attending class I
l friends American j
l
Aetivitytypes l
I

Figure 5: Rankings of Activities Contributing to Speaking Skills
by the Lower Proﬁciency Group: Questionnaire Item 8

 

Lower proficiency i

 

 

 

18 «
16
. 8 14 . i
l 2 i
1 O . ‘__
i g 12 l n Rank 3 j
2
l ‘6 10 i I Rank 2 l
* 8 ‘ l
l 3 | Rank 1
E 5 ‘
3
2
l .
j 2
0 J . .v
l TV Radio Talking to Taking to Attending
| friends American class i
1 friends I
l Activity types 1
1 V A 2, ,i 2 _ 2_._ V ,__ __,_-_J

Questionnaire item 9 deals with the preference for activities that contribute to
vocabulary building. No difference was found in the choice of activity between the
proﬁciency groups; “Reading” was the most preferred activity (N=35 in total) followed
by “Doing homework” (N=25 in total) and “Attending class” (N=l9 in total) by both
groups. “Watching TV”, which gives visual information, was more popular than
“listening to the radio/CD”.

As suggested in the literature, visual cues have a positive effect on the development of
ESL learners’ language skills. The participants of this study, both higher and lower
proﬁciency groups, were exposed to English that was related to the English course they
were enrolled in. The results from questionnaire items 6-9 suggest that there is no
difference in activity preferences. Across the proﬁciency levels, activities using visual
cues were rated higher than those that involve auditory input only. This preference
corroborates the ﬁndings of the listening comprehension task; visual cues facilitate
listening comprehension and are preferred by ESL learners.

Participants were in favor of the activities involving visual input in improving
listening and speaking skills, and vocabulary building. The difference in preference
ranking between the two proﬁciency learners was found for activities related to
developing listening and speaking skills; in both cases the higher proﬁciency learners had
a stronger preference for TV as input.

This positive attitude towards visual cues was hypothesized, and is supported by
previous studies (Ducroquet, 1977; Perry, 2001; Swaffer & Valentten, 1997; Wood,
1999). This suggests that the ESL learners were aware of the positive outcome of visual

information in listening comprehension and they preferred “natural” input as deﬁned in

36

the literature (Cabrera & Marinez, 2001; English, 1982; Mueller, 1980; Saitz, 1966) with
visual cues from a speaker. Using radio or CD3 as input was the least favorite type of
activity because of this difﬁculty caused by the absence of visual cues. Questionnaire
items did not address speciﬁc kinds of radio or TV programs. TV tends to offer a wider
variety of programming than radio, allowing L2 learners to select whatever they feel
comfortable watching. Visual media such as TV or video can function as an advance
organizer as well, helping the viewer to build schema, which facilitates comprehension of
subsequent information (Hanley, Herron, & Cole, 1995; Mueller, 1980). Not only does
TV attract L2 learners, it also facilitates the development of vocabulary and listening
skills (Herron, York, Cole, & Linden, 1998). Another reason that L2 learners may not
have preferred radio as an input source is because radio programs usually contain songs
and advertisements, which are not necessarily meaningful input for them. In addition,
radio an typically speak faster than actors or actresses on TV. Needless to say, rate of
speech and lack of visual information create a very difﬁcult condition for L2
comprehension.

“Talking to American friends” was the most popular activity in developing listening
and speaking in both proﬁciency groups. Especially in developing speaking skills, it was
preferred much more than any other choice. This response is supported by the SLA
literature on interaction: Interaction between a NS and a NNS (nonnative speaker), or
NNSs results in attention paid to L2 learners’ own output, which 5 noticing the
malformed utterance and them a chance to correct their output (e.g., Gass & Varonis,
1994; Mackey, 1999). There was an interesting difference in the responses between the

higher and lower proﬁciency groups; the lower proﬁciency group preferred “Talking to

37

friends in English”, which may include friends who are NNS of English whereas the
higher proﬁciency group chose “Watching TV” as the second most frequent response.
This suggested that advanced L2 learners favor authentic input. The lower proﬁciency
learners preferred “Talking to friends” to TV input because the former preference may
offer more comprehensible input for them because of NNSS’ slower rate of Speech than
that of NSs appear on TV program. TV preference occurred in the responses of listening
skills as well whereas the lower proﬁciency group chose “Talking to friends”.

The participants’ positive attitude towards “Reading” as an effective activity in
building vocabulary is compatible with Grandman and Hanania’s (1991) ﬁndings; not
only did they ﬁnd a positive effect of reading on vocabulary building, they also found
extracurricular reading contributed to better performance on the TOEFL test than the
other activities. In the present study, there was no difference in the ranking of the
responses between proﬁciency groups except for vocabulary building with “E-mail”
which was chosen only by the lower proﬁciency group (N=2).

Questionnaire items 10-23. The third section of the questionnaire involved a 5-point
Likert scale, and the responses were then analyzed to Show the tendency of the behavior
of participants. A t-test was used to analyze differences between the lower and higher
proﬁciency groups. The items were divided into subcategories according to their focus:
Items 10-12 refer to respondents’ preference for attending to visual cues in general
listening comprehension, items 13-14 refer to perceived difference in gesture use between
L1 and L2, items 15-16 refer to perceived contribution of gestures in face-to-face
communication, and 17-18 refer to attention paid to speaker’s lip movements and

gestures in face-to-face communication. Questionnaire items 19-23 were given to each

38

experimental group in order to ask for feedback on the stimulus: Item 19 was given to the
A-only group, items 20-21 to the AV-face group, and items 22-23 to the AV-gesture
group. Analysis of items 19-23 follows the analysis of items 10-18.

Table 5 Shows the summary of responses to questionnaire items 10-28. The ﬁrst
column indicates the category of each item, and the second shows the item numbers
related to the category. “Overall Mean” is the total mean score for the 5-point Likert
scale: 5—Strongly agree, 4—Agree, 3—Neutral, 2—Disagree and l—Strongly disagree
followed by the standard deviation (SD). The separate mean score by proﬁciency group
and t-value are also shown on the table.

Table 5

Summary of Responses to Questionnaire Items 10-18 and t-test Statistics Comparing
Higher and Lower Proﬁciency Groups

 

 

Category Question Overall SD Mean Mean t-value
Items Mean Higher Lower
Prof. Prof.
Group Group
Preference for visual cues in 10,11,12 4.16 .86 4.30 4.03 1.79
listening comprehension
Perceived difference in l3, 14 3.83 .97 3.88 3.79 .45
gesture use between L1 and
L2
Perceived contribution of 15, 16 3.44 1.00 3.43 3.45 .11

gestures to comprehension of
speaker in L1 and L2

Attention paid to visual cues 17, 18 3.30 1.01 3.43 3.17 1.10
in face-to-face
communication

 

Note: Critical t-value to meet signiﬁcance at p<.05 was 1.99 except for items 10-12 where critical value
was 1.98.

39

As can be seen in Table 5, there was no signiﬁcant difference in participants’
perceptions of visual cues between the proﬁciency groups. Overall, the higher
proﬁciency group had a more positive attitude towards visual cue use than the lower
proﬁciency group but the gap was very small. The strongest preference was found in the
perception of visual cues in listening comprehension: Participants reported that they
understood better with visual cues in listening tasks as found in items 10-12 (M =4.3O for
the higher, M =4.03 for the lower proﬁciency group). Since both groups showed Similar
responses, there was no signiﬁcant difference between the proﬁciency groups (t=1.79,
df=124)

The responses of questionnaire items 13 and 14 indicated that participants were
conscious of gesture use in American culture. Participants reported that Americans use
gestures more frequently than people in their own countries and they also reported that
they tended to use gestures more when speaking English than their native language (Total
M=3.83). In this study, there was no difference between the proﬁciency groups (r=.45,
df=82); both proﬁciency groups show very similar responses.

The analysis of items 15-16 indicated that the mean score showed a moderate
preference for perceived gesture contribution to comprehension in L1 and L2 (Total
M=3.44, SD=1.00) regardless of the proﬁciency levels (F.11, df=82). Both proﬁciency
groups perceived that the interlocutors would understand them better using gesture when
communicating both in the L1 and in English. Items 17-18 also indicated a moderate
tendency for attention to visual cues in face-to-face communication (Total M=3.30,

SD=1.01), and there was no difference between the proﬁciency levels (t=l.10, df=82).

40

In these last two categories, items 15-16 and items 17-18, participants marked a wide
range of responses ranging from 5 (strongly agree) to 1 (strongly disagree) on the Likert
scale. Especially for item 17, the responses divided into two opposite views: 21 of the 42
participants responded that they pay attention to the speaker’s lip movements and 21
responded that they did not. However, as for item 18, which was observation of gestures,
there was little variation: Only two out of 42 respondents reported that they did not pay
attention to gestures in general face-to-face communication.

There was a strong association between participants’ perception of gesture efﬁcacy
and their gesture observation; 31 out of 36 participants who responded that gestures
helped their comprehension of a speaker also reported that they pay attention to the
interlocutor’s gestures in face-to-face communication (86%). However, their use of
gestures had less connection with the perception of gesture efﬁcacy; 24 out of 36 reported
they actually used gestures in their English speech (67%).

Participants’ LOR was also examined for each questionnaire item from 10-18. 20
participants had LOR of less than 2 months, 14 participants had LOR of between 4 and 6
months, and 9 participants had LOR of 9 months or more. Each of these groups
according to LOR included participants whose proﬁciency level was lower and higher,
and who had been randomly assigned to all stimulus conditions. There was no
relationship between LOR and the responses except for item 14, in which I noted a trend

in their responses that the longer the LOR, the greater the reported gesture use in the L2.

41

Table 6

Summary of Responses to Questionnaire Items 19-23 According to Stimulus Condition
(A-only, AV-face and AV-gesture) and t-test Statistics Comparing Higher and Lower
Proﬁciency Group Scores

 

Category Question Overall SD Mean Mean t-
(Stimulus Condition) Items Mean Higher Lower value
Prof. Prof.

m... -_ _ . L ._ ._ Group Groua. _

Perceived efﬁcacy of visual 19 3.43 1.01 3.86 3.00 1.69

stimulus if provided

(A-only)

Attitude towards visual of 20 3.93 1.14 4.57 3.29 249*

face in the stimulus

(AV-face)

Perceived efﬁcacy of gesture 21 3.93 .18 4.47 3.71 3. l 3**

stimulus if provided

(AV-face)

Attitude towards gesture in 22 4.50 .52 4.43 4.57 .05

the stimulus (AV-gesture)

Attitude towards visual of 23 4.00 .78 3.86 4.14 .66
face in the stimulus

(AV-gesture)

Note. *p<.05, **p<.01. Critical value to meet signiﬁcance at p<.05 was 2.17.

The questionnaire items] 9-23 involved participants’ feedback on the stimuli used in
this experiment; therefore each stimulus group was assigned different questions. Table 6
indicates the summary of the analysis of the responses. The table is organized in the
same manner as Table 5: Mean, SD, Means of the higher and lower proﬁciency groups
and t-value. A greater difference between the proﬁciency groups was found in these
items. For in questionnaire item 19, half the A-only group responded that they believed
they would have comprehended the content of the lecture better if they had seen the

visual cues of the lecturer (M=3.43, SD=1.01). The responses seemed to divide into two

positions: Agree or disagree. Even though the higher proﬁciency group (M=3.86) tended

42

to have a more positive response to this question than the lower proﬁciency group
(M=3.00), there was no signiﬁcant difference (i=1 .69, df=12).

Questionnaire items 20 and 21 were given to the AV-face group. There was a
signiﬁcant difference between the proﬁciency group’s perceptions of the stimulus. The
higher proﬁciency group (M =4.57) had a signiﬁcantly stronger preference for the
presence of visual cues to facilitate comprehension of a lecture than the lower proﬁciency
group (M=3.29), (t=2.49, df=12, p<.05). In addition, there was a signiﬁcant difference
between the higher proﬁciency (M=4.47) and lower proﬁciency (M=3.7l) groups in
terms of preference for viewing gestures in the stimulus; the higher proﬁciency group
thought they could have performed better if hand gestures were present (t=3.l3, dﬁlZ,
p<.01). This preference of visual cues was also compatible with the result of the listening
comprehension task that the higher proﬁciency group performed signiﬁcantly better than
the lower proﬁciency group in AV-face condition.

The AV- gesture group was assigned to answer items 22 and 23. Item 22 indicates that
both proﬁciency groups thought that the presence of gesture in the stimulus helped their
comprehension: 14 out of 14 responded either “Strongly agree” or “Agree” (M=4.50,
SD=.52). In addition, in item 23, both proﬁciency groups felt that the presence of facial
cues and lip movements was also helpful (M=4.00, SD=.78). There was no difference
between the proﬁciency groups for either item (t=.50, df=12; F67, df=l2).

Analysis of questionnaire items 10-23 suggested that participants had a positive
attitude towards the use of visual cues in general either in perception or in production.
The result was consistent with the ﬁndings of the listening comprehension task that visual

cues facilitated participants’ listening comprehension, and it also supports the ﬁndings of

43

questionnaire items 6-9 of a positive attitude towards visual cues. Moreover, this L2
learners’ preference for visual cues is supported by the L2 acquisition literature
mentioned above. Overall, participants in this study showed a positive attitude towards
visual cues including hand gestures and lip movements. As a result, except for the
responses by the AV-face group for their feedback of the stimulus, there was no
signiﬁcant difference between the proﬁciency groups, which was not as expected. It
suggests that English proﬁciency level per se did not affect their perception of visual cues
in listening comprehension. One might conclude that L2 learners prefer the presence of
visual cues in listening comprehension tasks regardless of their proﬁciency.

Participants perceived that English speakers use more gestures than the L1 speakers
from their country, which in this study were mainly Korean and Japanese speakers (38
participants out of 42). In Asian cultures, the role of gestures, facial expressions and
other body language differ from that of American culture (Kagawa, 2001; Matsumoto
and Kudoh, 1993; Yum, 1987). What is interesting in this ﬁnding is that even without
explicit attention to gestures in the target culture, participants perceived this cultural
difference, and they reported that Americans use more gestures than speakers who share
the same respondents’ L1. The perception of cultural difference in gesture use was
consistent with the functional differences suggested by the literature (Kagawa, 2001;
Matsumoto & Kudoh, 1993; Yum, 1987). In addition, participants reported that they use
more gestures when communicating in English than in their L1. This tendency seemed
greater especially for those who have been in the L2 culture longer. A previous study
showed that children used more gestures that are closely related to the speech (Iconics

and Beats) as their speaking ability developed (Nicoladis, 2000). However, in the study,

participants’ LOR was an indication of frequent use of gesture because nonverbal
communication elements of language can be learned through informal L2 exposure
(Edward, 1980). Therefore, participants with a longer LOR might have greater ability to
use gestures as one of their communication strategies.

There was individual variation in the perception of the contribution of gestures. The
difference was found within proﬁciency groups rather than between them; in other words,
there was no difference according to participants’ L2 proﬁciency level. A similar
tendency was found in the responses of the participants’ with regard to attention to
interlocutor’s lip movements and gestures; the difference in the responses was not due to
proﬁciency but individual variation. There was no observable trend in term of
participants’ LOR and perceived contribution of gestures or attention paid to visual cues
of the interlocutor. Hattori (1987) noted that L2 learners with longer than 2 years of LOR
reported that they were able to take advantage of facial visual cue of interlocutors
although such a tendency was not found in this study. Majority of those who reported
that gestures and lip movements contributed in their comprehension also reported that
they pay attention to such visual cues. Therefore, one of the factors of drawing attention
to an interlocutor’s visual cues depends on perception in visual cue efﬁcacy but not LOR
or proﬁciency level. In this particular study, the participants’ English exposure was
mostly in a formal setting: “Doing homework” and “English use in class” were reported
as the most common uses of English (see questionnaire item 6). Therefore, the
participants may lack more informal English exposure where nonverbal communication

is more likely to be provided.

45

In response to the A-only stimulus, the higher proﬁciency group tended towards the
opinion that they would have understood better if the visual cues of the speaker had been
present. The lower proﬁciency group’s opinion was divided: Half agreed that visual cues
of the lecture would have helped and the other half did not, showing individual difference.

The only signiﬁcant difference in the responses to the stimuli based on proﬁciency
was found for the AV-face condition where the higher proﬁciency group regarded visual
cues from the speaker’s face as informative and helpful in comprehension of the lecture.
It seems that higher proﬁciency L2 learners are more aware of nonverbal cues especially
lip movements, which represent visible comprehension of L2 speech sounds, and tend to
notice and make use of them as an extra resource. The lower proﬁciency L2 learners
may not be capable of doing this based on more limited L2 interaction experience. This
ﬁnding was also consistent with the results of the listening comprehension task; the mean
difference between the higher and lower proﬁciency groups was the greatest in the AV-
face condition. In addition, if the visual cues in the AV-face condition were not helpful
for the viewer, they could be a distraction. In fact, some students in the lower proﬁciency
group showed their frustration in the comment and feedback section of the background
questionnaire: “It’s so difﬁcult and I didn’t understand the speaker’s face at all”. This
clearly indicated that visual cues of the speaker’s face were not as useful as they were for
the higher proﬁciency participants. This particular ﬁnding was very interesting because
there was no difference in responses between higher and lower proﬁciency groups in
attitude towards visual cues of lip movements and gestures in general face-to-face
communication (questionnaire items 10-12 and 17-18). The difference in the responses

between the proﬁciency groups appeared when the questionnaire inquired about the

46

reaction to the AV-face stimulus; that is to say, lower proﬁciency learners responded that
visual facial cues facilitated their comprehension but when they actually viewed the AV-
face stimulus, they did not feel it was helpful.

The feedback for the AV-gesture group showed no signiﬁcant difference between the
proﬁciency groups as I mentioned above. The reaction to gestures in the stimulus was
more positive than the reaction to lip movements. This response may be due to the
association of gesture with semantics versus phonology and hand gestures tended to be
more visually salient than the speaker’s lip movements, with longer durations per gesture.
Therefore, those in the AV-gesture groups responded that they felt gesture was more

helpful than visual cues on the face.

47

Chapter Four
Conclusion

This study revealed the contribution of visual cues such as gestures and facial visual
cues including lip movements in ESL learners’ listening comprehension. The results of a
two-factor ANOVA revealed that the AV-face and AV- gesture groups performed better
than the A-only groups, and the mean scores of the higher proﬁciency group were greater
across conditions than the lower proﬁciency group. However, proﬁciency level
determined which stimulus condition with visual cues was more informative. The higher
proﬁciency group received the highest mean score in the AV-face condition whereas the
lower proﬁciency group received the highest in the AV-gesture. This was also consistent
with the questionnaire responses to the stimulus in the AV-face condition showing
signiﬁcant difference between the proﬁciency levels; the higher proﬁciency group had a
better reaction to the stimulus than the lower proﬁciency group. The results of the
background questionnaire also conﬁrmed that L2 learners of English prefer to have the
visual cues of a speaker, both hand and facial gestures, in L2 listening comprehension;
however the greater the proﬁciency level, the more informative the lip movements are to
the learner.

The small sample size may limit the generalizability of the results. This study limited
its lecture topic to ceramics in order to avoid participants’ previous knowledge; however,
it is also important to investigate the effect of a speaker’s visual cues employing a wider
variety of lecture topics. Examining participants’ listening proﬁciency and performance
on multiple-choice question tasks before an experiment could also help interpret the

results.

48

The present study proposes the need for further investigations in different directions.
It is important to peruse individual variation in the contribution of visual cues in
comprehension and production. Linguistic experience of the participants as represented
by LOR, as well as language proﬁciency are factors inﬂuencing the value of gestural
information, whether hand or articulatory, to an L2 learner.

Another variable inﬂuencing one’s attention to visual cues is cultural variation. As
seen in previous studies, there is a semantic and functional difference across cultures in
gesture use. Some cultures make use of more salient gestures than others. The role of
gestural presence in the L1 culture may affect their comprehension in the L2.

In addition, investigation of L2 instruction on gestures is encouraged. For example,
training studies using academic listening settings to develop L2 learners’ listening
strategies focusing on nonverbal cues could provide a broadened teachability of the
nonverbal aspect of communication. Also, introducing formal gesture instruction raises
questions such as when and how to integrate nonverbal communication instruction. If the
training is successful, one has to consider the possibility of long-term effects on L2
language development. Furthermore, it is also necessary to determine the most useful
and effective activities or exercises in order to introduce nonverbal aspects of

communication in the target language.

49

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53

Appendix A
Outline of the lecture

Definition of Ceramic

0 General Tenn—Used to describe the shaping, ﬁnishing and ﬁring of clay.

0 Origin of the Word-- The word "ceramics" comes from the Greek word
"Keramos" meaning "Pottery," "Potter's Clay," or "a Potter." This Greek word is
related to an old Sanskrit root meaning "to burn" but was primarily used to mean
"burnt stuff."

0 Technical deﬁnition-- The technical deﬁnition of ceramics encompasses a much
greater variety of products than is normally realized. To most people, the word
ceramics means dinnerware, ﬁgurines, vases, and other objects of ceramic art.

 

 

 

Ceramic Products

0 Most ceramic products not generally recognized as utilitarian rather than aesthetic.
Examples are bathtubs, washbowls, sinks, electrical insulating devices, water and
sewerage pipes, bricks, hollow tile, glazed building tile, ﬂoor and wall tile,
earthenware, porcelain enamel and glass.

0 Have a number of outstanding properties which determine their usefulness. One of
the most unusual of these is their great durability.

Durability can be divided into three types: chemical, mechanical and thermal.
History

Mesopotamia (the region between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers),
0 Round shaped ceramics were already being made by 5000-4000 BC. These were
decorated with geometric drawings incised into clay.
0 Then humans and animal ﬁgures were created (between 4500-4000 BC)
0 Firing technique was developed.
0 Wheel for making pottery was invented (during 4000-3000 BC.)
Main features
0 Used to construct buildings and cities
(baked clay bricks)
o Persian (between the Caspian Sea and the Persian Gulfpottery) was a similar one
to that of Mesopotamia.
0 Walls of palace were decorated with colored glazed tiles.

. Emu
(approximately same period as Mesopotamia between 5000-4000 B.C.,)

0 They produced pottery using clay from River Nile.
- The ceramic forms became more cylindrical (between 3230-2700 BC.)

54

0 They started to use the wheel (About 2700-2100 BC.)
Main features

0 Egyptian Paste (a kind of glaze)
Turquoise color—if copper was used.
Violet—if the glaze contained the mineral manganese.

0 Great artistic and technical development. The Greek ceramists created perfectly
formed pots, painting them with decorative themes of outstanding beauty.
0 The wheel began to be used and improved upon in order to produce more
sophisticated pots (At the ﬁrst millennium of BC.)
0 2 distinctive characteristics: its shape and its style of decoration. Each pot had a
particular function, and its name was related to that function.
Examples;
0 Amphora—medium sized rim and two handles was used for holding liquids.
0 Oenochoe—having trefoil-shaped mouth, used for carrying and pouring water.
0 Rhynton—a drinking cup in the shape of an animal’s head.
'>.< The pictorial subjects that decorated the pots told stories of the deeds
of the gods, of heroes, battles and so on.
Americas
0 In early history, 2 characteristics in common: All were produced using either the
coiling method or by molding (rather than being made by the wheel).
Features;
- Thin-walled pitchers, jugs pots and goblets were modeled from grayish clay.
0 Geometric designs or stylized animal forms decorated these objects.

Tools
0 Cla — an earthy material that is plastic when moist but hard when ﬁred, that is
composed mainly of ﬁne particles of hydrous aluminum silicates and other
minerals, and that is used for brick, tile, and pottery;

o Canvas—used for slabs and strips of clay.

0 Looged tools—used for hollowing out solid pieces of pottery removing excess
clay and making the surface smooth and even.

0 Spgtulas agd modeling tools—these are generally made of wood but also of iron
or plastic. Used for joining pots, smoothing, clearing up and so on.

0 Ribs—used to reﬁne the surface when throwing pots on the wheel.

55

Cutting wire—used to cut clay and remove pieces from the wheel. It consists of
a steel or nylon wire, with a little wooden stick or ring at each end to make it easy
to handle without injuring.

Basic Technique

 

Hollowing out-hollowing out inner clay body leaving frame to make a container.

Pinch pots: making a bowl—creating a clay ball to dig a whole with your thumb.
Eventually pinching and drawing the clay to the edges upward and outward to
form a bawl.

Coiling: making a cylindrical pot—start with balls of clay and'roll in order to
make them longer. Coil on the top of the circular clay base to build up until it
gets to the desirable height. Smooth over the surface.

Slab-building: making a cube-shape box— Clay is rolled out into a ﬂat sheet and
making box with connecting the ﬂat square clay in order to make cubic.

 

On the wheel
Kneading—getting rid of air from the clay

Cut off a lump of clay

Press hard with both hands as if kneading a loaf of bread
Roll the clay

Tear into 2 pieces and join them together

Knead until they are completely together.

On the wheel

8.09.5995)?"

Place on the wheel head

Wet clay and hands.

Push downward with right hand/ pressure to the center with left hand.
Create a taller cone by drawing the mass of clay

Open up the pot with thumb pointing downward

Open up more with placing thumb at an angle

Place thumb of left hand and support with ﬁnger from outside and pull
downward.

Make the wall thinner

56

Appendix B
Script of the stimulus

Clip 1

Erm. . .today, we are gonna be talking about the basics of ceramics. Erm. . .you
probably are wondering where the word “ceramic” comes from since it doesn’t sound
like anything like pot or clay which is generally what ceramics is used for, it comes from
the Greek word Kormanos, which means what we were just talking about, clay,
or. . .erm. . .potter. Ok, so clay maker, potter, it’s. . .it’s from Greek origin. Alright so,
now we have some sort of basics of where the word “ceramic” comes from, because it
does sound a little odd considering it has nothing to do with clay or pottery in the name.

Anyways, so the history of po. .. ceramics goes back all the way to the Mesopotamia
era. The Mesopotamians used pottery and ceramics generally for function, that is to say
they used it on their walls, for decoration, they used it to build things. It was something
that was really used for a function rather than form.

In ancient Egypt. . .erm. .. ceramics was used more for form, for decoration. Erm. . .the
colors were varied, different from the Mesopotamia era. Mesopotamia era was more
earth tones, more sand tones, things of that nature, natural. Okay? Egypt, the tones that
they had, the colors and shapes of their ceramics was a lot more colorful. Especially a
blue and violet, it would become violet when they ki. . .put it in the kiln and heat it up, it
would turn into a lighter hue of blue. Ok, so you can deﬁnitely tell the differences
between these eras.

Another era, that ...erm. .. ceramics was used largely in was Greece. Greece used

their ceramics mostly in natural tones but it was very decorative. Usually on urns, okay,

57

so if you can picture an urn, you know like something they, sometimes put dead bodies in
ancient Egypt and in ancient Greece. . .erm. . ., urn Shaped, a lot of decoration on the sides.
Okay, they had things that were two-handled, so the urn would stand by itself sort of like
a vase, but in other things like an amphora, they would have handles on the side. Okay,
so there’s a lot of different shapes and ﬁgures to the Greek era ceramics. Other than
Mesopotamia which used them strictly for function and Egypt which used theirs more for
...erm. .. decoration. The urns had both, okay, in Greece, they were used for form and
function. They could used to carry things but they are also very beautiful, and very
decorative on the outside. Not as colorful as the Egyptian ceramics but ...erm. . .they had

more ability to do more things.

Clip 2

When we’re making ceramics, there’s a lot of different mediums we can use and
there’s a lot of different tools we have to use. Of course we have to have clay. Okay, the
clay starts out in a very soft form, in a ball usually. Okay and you need to mold that clay
out of that ball, or that slab which you’ve been given. Okay, there’s going to be a lot of
tools you’ll need to use that. Erm. . .some tools you use in molding the clay are canvas,
this is used when hollowing out some sort of . . .of ceramic object that you’re trying to
make. Say you’re trying to make a cone. You would roll up a piece of canvas and put
the clay around that cone. Okay, and then you would draw the canvas out as the clay
dries. So, you would have the shape of what that canvas looked like as it was rolled.

Another tool that can be used to shape the clay is. . .erm. .. a spatula or a wiring, okay.

A spatula can be used also to hollow out ...erm. .. a piece of clay, a piece of ceramic.

58

And the looped tools as well can be used. Loop tools look kind of like picks. They’re
shaped with triangles or circles on the top that are hollowed out by wires, okay, then they
have a long narrow ...erm. .. shaft followed by another shape, either triangle, circle, or
slightly oblong shape. That helps that you can drag down the clay, to make certain
shapes and ﬁgures. So, of course, a circle shape would correspond to making a circular
line all the way down the ceramic. Okay, a triangular shape would have that same sort of
triangular shape down the ceramic. Okay so. . .erm. . .some other tools you can use in
shaping the ceramic is wire, if you would like to ...erm. .. hollow it out in such a way but
you would like to have indentations around the ceramic, you can use wire to ...erm. ..
shape around, to kind of tie around, it will indent the clay and then you can remove the
wire, and as you remove the wire, that indent around the clay molding around the ceramic
that you’re trying to make will be left in tact. So, that is used when you’ve already
hollowed out a piece of clay and you’re looking to make a hollow ceramic, but yet you

want to do more decoration other than just lines used with the loop tools.

Clip 3

So, now that we’ve talked about some of the basic tools used to shape clay into a
ceramic, we need to talk about how we can make forms outside of the basic shape.
We’ve already talked a little bit about decoration. There’s also larger tools you can use
or larger objects that can be molded with clay and added to the base of the ceramic. So
say you have a bowl, and you’ve done some decorations on the bowl with some wiring
and with some loop tools, so you have a little bit of decoration. But you’d like to add

balls, tiny balls around the top of the ceramic bowl. To do that, you could use a method

59

called coiling or rolling. Coiling just means to coil around the bowl so you could have
ridges on the bowl. Or if you wanted those decorative balls on top of the bowl, you could
do what is called rolling, which is basically just rolling the clay into a hardened ball,
smashing it softly onto the top of the bowl and that would cause another decorative form
to be created.

Erm. . .another very functional way of using clay is slab building, because obviously,
just like the Mesopotamians, we use clay in many ways for function, to use to make
things that we use in everyday life, buildings, roofs, houses, things that make up basic
tools of everyday. So, slabbing is used by many constru. .. construction companies, slab
building where you make one square slab which was used a lot in the Mesopotamian era
as they put it on the wall. But today it’s used mostly, it’s sometimes used for wall
decoration, but mostly used for function, and that for pavers,. . .erm. . .decks, or going into
people’s houses, or decoration on. . .erm. . .on the sides of houses, things like that used
very much in Mexican architecture, and in southern California you will see these clay
slabs which are usually red or orange in color on top of roofs, slabbed together to form a

clay roof.

Clip 4
Erm. . .now, we’re gonna learn how to use the wheel to form your clay into a piece of

pottery or ceramic. Okay, so the ﬁrst thing you have to remember is clay does not come

in the Shape you see it in in all the stores as it’s already formed. It comes in a big ball of

mush, which is basically clay, and clay is just a natural substance that comes from the

60

earth. Okay, and as we talked about before, that’s been used over time for many different
forms and functions. Today we’re gonna be talking more about how to make clay for
something that is more for forms, something that’s aesthetically pleasing

that’s. . .erm. . .nice to look at okay, pots, bowls, coffee mugs, things very simple, start
Simple, okay.

So ﬁrst you have to begin by kneading the clay. Okay, the best way to knead clay is
to use your hands, get in there and get dirty. This is not something you use tools for,
okay. First, you need to wet your hands, to get them in some sort of lukewarm water,
okay, and then you’ll proceed to kneading the clay, just like you would knead. . .erm. . .a
piece of dough, just like you would roll out a piece of bread, or try to roll out dough to
make bread or cupcakes or whatever it is that you make when you’re home in the kitchen.
Okay, so the reason for doing this is because it gets all the air out of the clay. And if
there is air in the clay. . .erm. . .it can be trapped, it’ll be trapped in the clay when you get
it into the form you want and when baking it, it can form cracks and can actually explode.
So, you need to make sure you’re very diligent about kneading out all the air bubbles that
are in the clay. Okay so, the clay has to be cool, your hands have to be wet, okay, it helps
with the maneuvering of the clay, it’ll make the clay a little more malleable, a little more
squishy.

Alright so, begin by. . .erm. . .taking the ball and smashing it down onto the counter on
which you’re working okay, slowly begin to knead it out, use your ﬁngers, use your
hands, the heel of your hand can be used as a great tool, it’s the most powerful part of
your hand, that can be used to roll it out, just like a rolling pin, okay. The reason why we

don’t use tools in this is because ceramics has historically been thought of as something

61

that is hand made, okay, not something used with tools to actually do the shaping, the
decorating is where the tools come in like I said earlier but for the actual shaping, it’s best
to use your hands. So, knead through, and depending on how big of a piece you’re
working with you can divide that long ﬂat piece or that round ﬂat piece that you’ve
kneaded out into. . .erm. .. into different pieces, okay, to make smaller or bigger pieces.

Today, we’re gonna be working with the whole piece.

Clip 5
Now that you’ve kneaded it out and gotten all the. . .all of the bubbles out of the clay, you
can now move to the wheel where we’ll actually “throw the clay”. Okay, that doesn’t
mean you’re throwing the clay at each other, it means you’re putting it on a spinning
wheel and it will take the Shape and form of what you want by using your hands as the
tools to guide them. Okay, so you’ll place the clay onto the spinning. . .erm. . .clay pot or
the thrower and turn it on, and as it turns on, it’s gonna spin around and it’s all controlled
by your foot so however fast you want the clay to spin, it’s all controlled by a foot pedal.
The faster, the more pressure you’ll put on the pedal, the slower the less pressure, okay.
So, today, we should probably start off slow. Place the clay onto the machine, start off
slowly, and you’ll notice that your hands will start to get dry after a little while. So,
frequently re-dip your hands in the warm water to keep the clay malleable. Okay,
depending on what shape you want, move your hands in all different directions just to
kinda get a feel and see how the shape of where your hands move makes the clay take
form, okay. You have to play around with the clay ﬁrst to really get the feel

for. . .erm. . .how. . .how quickly you can move your hand and something can go very

62

wrong - the clay will fall, the shape will completely disintegrate right before your eyes
just from one false movement. So, take some time and get a feel for the clay. Alright,
after. . .erm. . .you shape the clay, you. . .erm. . .have the shape that you want, okay, you’ve
done any sort of decorating on it that you want, you’re going to have to remove it very
carefully from the thrower, alright. This is a very important. . .erm. . .taSk to do because at
any time your clay, like. . .erm. . .some sort of quiche, can just fall ﬂat. So, make sure
you’re very careful when removing, when stopping your. . .erm. . .machine, okay, do it
very slowly, very gradually and make sure that your hands are right where you want the
very outer part of your ceramic to end. Okay, so you don’t want it to tilt any sudden
movements, but you don’t wanna be ﬁrm with the. . .erm. . .clay because then it will take a
different shape than what you want it. So, you allow yourself to kind of gently remove
the machine from the clay and Slide the clay over to a. . .erm. . .piece of wax paper,
whatever we’re using, to put it into the. . .erm. . .oven before we actually insert it into the
oven. Okay. . .okay, and while in the oven, you’ll notice that your clay will harden, okay,
and for different sizes of course it will be different ways. . .erm. . .different lengths of time
that it will remain in the oven. Okay, once the clay is ﬁnished baking, you can take it out
of the oven, and you’ll notice that it’s very hard now so there’s no way you can

really. . .erm. . .do any sort of functional actual. . .erm. . .indentations or anything else onto
the clay. But this is the point in time where after it cools, you can be allowed to paint the
clay any color you want, okay, to use, to make any sort of artistic decoration, alright, that
was used a lot by the Egyptians, so you can do that sort of thing, that is only can be done

after the clay cools, after the ceramic pot or bowl or mug or whatever you made has

63

cooled. Because if it’s too warm, the paint will simply melt and fall off. Ok, that

concludes our class for today, thank you for coming, and have fun making ceramics.

64

Appendix C

AV-face Video Stimulus

 

AV-gesture Video Stimulus

 

Frame shows the lecturer producing the rounded vowel in the word ball in the sentence;

“Okay, the clay starts out in a very soft form, in a ball usually.” (Clip 1, see Appendix B)

65

Appendix D

Response Sheet

1. Listening Comprehension Questions
2. Background Questionnaire

Instructions

DO NOT turn the front page until you are told to do so.

You will listen/view a lecture for 2-4 nrinutes. When each clip ends the
investigator will tell you to turn the page and answer the questions. The
listening questions are multiple-choice question; circle the choice you think
most appropriate for each question. There are 5 clips total and each clip
contains 4 questions. If you ﬁnish, just wait, DO NOT turn to the next page
until you are told to do so. When you ﬁnish answering questions for all 5
clips, you may answer the background questionnaire. When you ﬁnish it,
you may turn in the responses and leave the classroom.

If you want to know the result of your listening test, you may contact the investigator by
e-mail at suevoshi@msu.edu. Please keep your reference number to do so.

Thanks again for participating in this study.

Ayano Sueyoshi

MA TESOL program
Sueyoshi@msu.edu

66

Appendix D

Listening Comprehension Questions
Clip 1

Circle the correct answer from a~d.

1. What is the topic of the lecture?
a. Geography
b. Ancient Literature
c. History of the Mesopotamian Bra
(1. Introduction to Ceramics

2. The word “Ceramic” came from the Greek word Kormanos, ........
which is the name of a Greek artist.

meaning “clay” in Greek.

which is the name of a Mesopotamian city.

meaning “decoration”.

999‘!”

3. Which of the following is true?
a. Grecian ceramics were colorful and decorative.
b. Egyptian ceramics were more colorful than those of Mesopotamian
c. Mesopotamians limited their use of ceramics for decoration.
(1. Egyptian ceramics had wider usage than those of Greece.

4. Which of the following is the characteristics of the Grecian urns that the

lecturer did NOT mention?

a. They had many different usages such as transporting goods, decoration and so
on.

b. They were less useful than Egyptian urns because they were only used for
decoration.

c. The urn named, “Amphora” had handles.

(1. They usually had beautiful decorations on the side.

67

Clip 2

5. The tool, canvas, is used for making which shape according to the lecturer?
a. ball
b. cylindrical cone
0. long stick
d. ﬂat circle

6. Which is the correct process for making pottery using the “molding method”?
Select the correct sequence from a~d.

A. wait until the clay dries B. roll the canvas into cone shape.
C. draw the canvas out D. put the clay over the canvas.

a. D— B- C— A

b. A— 13— D— C

c. C- A— D— B

d. B— D— A— C

7. According to the lecturer, loop tool is used for what purpose?
a. putting the clay over a canvas.
b. shaping and decorating the clay.
c. adding color to the clay.
(I. helping the clay dry.

8. What action involves in “hollowing out” process?

a cutting the clay in half

b. tying the clay to make indentations

c taking the center clay out

(1 adding a piece of clay onto another piece of clay with a spatula

68

Clip 3

9. Which of the following processes about the coiling and rolling technique did the
lecturer mention?

a.
b.
c.
d.

Coiling is used to put balls and a bowl together.

Rolling is used to make a basic bowl.

Rolling is used to make small balls.

Coiling and rolling methods are not usually used to decorate a bowl.

10. According to the lecturer, who uses the ‘slab building’ method in modern society?

999‘?”

farmers

construction companies
interior designers

china companies

11. In what aspect of ceramic use do we resemble the Mesopotamians?

a.
b.
c.

d.

We use it to make artistic objects using decorative patterns.

We use it to express our emotions and feelings.

We use it for religious purposes, for example, putting dead bodies for
ceremonies such as a funeral.

We use it for functions in daily life.

12. What is unique about the roofs in southern California and Mexico?

a.
b.
c.
(I.

They use the same material as Mesopotamians to make their roofs.
They have the same color as Mesopotamian ceramic houses.

They put ceramic slabs together to make a roof.

They sometimes put pottery on the roof.

69

Clip 4

13. Which of the following is true about clay?
a. You can only get the clay from the store nowadays.
b. You have to store the clay before shaping it.
c. The clay can be formed in stores.
(1. The clay looks like a soft ball.

14. Which one of the following is true about kneading clay?
a. The best way to knead clay is to use tools such as a bread rolling pin.
b. Your hands should be dry to control the clay.
c. The purpose of kneading clay is to get rid of air from the clay.
(I. If you do not knead clay quickly, your hands will get dirty.

15. According to the lecturer, which part of the hand is most powerful?

a. thumbs
b. ﬁngers
c. the back of your hand
(1. the palm of your hand

16. Which statement is NOT true?
a. Clay is used for a long period of time for the purpose of function and form.
b. You have to knead the clay on the spinning wheel.
c. If you do not knead clay thoroughly, the ceramic piece might break.
(1. Clay can be found in the ground.

70

Clip 5

17. Which of the following is NOT true?
a. “Throwing the clay” means shaping the clay using the spinning wheel.
b. The speed of the spinning wheel is controlled by the foot pedal.
c. You have to wet your hands frequently to keep the clay controllable.
d. It is a good idea to move your hand quickly when working on the wheel.

18. What did the lecturer suggest during the shaping of the clay?
a. You should move your hands in different directions so that you can observe
how the clay forms.
b. You should take time to learn how to control the speed of the spinning wheel.
c. You should always use tools to form the shape you want.
(1. You should start the spinning wheel at a fast speed.

19. Which is the correct process for completing a ceramic piece? Select the correct
sequence from a~d.

A. the clay will be ﬁrm

B. gradually remove the clay from the spinning wheel.
C. color the clay.

put the clay In the oven.

D.
——B
--—D
—D—
——C

goers»
51wa
U>O(:')
>O>Zi>

20. Which of the following did the lecturer mention?

You can only color the clay when it is still warm.

You have a last chance to make indentations before putting it into the oven.
If the shape is simple, the clay will harden sooner in the oven.

We should paint the clay the same color as the Egyptians did this time.

999‘!”

71

Appendix E

Background Information Questionnaire
Listening Comprehension Using Visual Cues
Investigator: Ayano Sueyoshi
suevoshﬁlmsuedu

Circle the one that describes you.

1. Gender
a. Male b. Female

2. What is your native language?
a. Korean b. Chinese c. Japanese d. Spanish e. French
f. Other ( )

3. How long have you been in an English-speaking country?
( ) year(s) and/or( ) month(s)

4. Are you taking other academic course(s) this semester?
a. Yes b. No
If yes, what course(s) are you taking?

 

5. Have you taken any classes related to ceramics or pottery?

a. Yes b. No
6. When do you use English most often? Please rank 1, 2 and 3.
_ watching TV/movie _ in classes
__ listening to the radio _ talking to friends
_ e-mailing __ reading magazines/newspapers/books
__ doing homework _ others

7. Which studying styles do you think helps improve your listening skills most

effectively?
Please rank 1, 2 and 3.
__ watching TV/movie __ listening to the radio/CD
__ talking to Americans _ attending lectures

talking to ﬁiends in English

8. Which studying styles do you think helps improve your speaking skills most
effectively?

__ watching TV/movie __ listening to the radio/CD

__ talking to Americans _ attending lectures

__ talking to friends in English

72

9. Which studying styles do you think helps build your vocabulag most effectively?
Please rank 1, 2 and 3.

watching TV/movie listening to the radio/CD
talking to Americans attending lectures
e-mailing doing homework

talking to friends in English.
reading magazines/newspapers/books

Please circle the number that expresses your opinion.
10. It is easier to understand English when I can see the speaker’s face.

Strongly agree Strongly disagree
5 4 3 2 l
l 1. It is easier to understand English when I can see the speaker’s gesture.
Strongly agree Strongly disagree
5 4 3 2 1
12. It is easier to understand English conversations on TV than on the radio.
Strongly agree Strongly disagree
5 . 4 3 2 1
13. I use gesture more frequently when I talk in English than when I talk in native
language.
Strongly agree Strongly disagree
5 4 3 2 1
14. I think Americans use more gestures than people from my country.
Strongly agree Strongly disagree
5 4 3 2 1

15. I think my American friends or teachers understand my speech better when I use

gesture.
Strongly agree Strongly disagree
5 4 3 2 1
16. I think my friends understand my speech better in native language when I use gesture.
Strongly agree Strongly disagree
5 4 3 2 1
17. In face-to-face communication, I pay attention to speaker’s lip movements.
Strongly agree Strongly disagree
5 4 3 2 1

73

18. In face-to-face communication, I pay attention to speaker’s gesture.
Strongly agree Strongly disagree
5 q 4 3 2 1
Only for group A (Audio only)
19. I believe I would have understood the lecture better if I had seen the speaker.
Strongly agree Strongly disagree
5 4 3 2 1

Only for group B (Visual of a face)
20. I believe seeing the speaker’s face helped my understanding of the lecture.

Strongly agree Strongly disagree
5 4 3 2 l
21. I believe I would have understood better if I had seen the speaker’s gesture.
Strongly agree Strongly disagree
5 4 3 2 1

Only for group C (Visual of gestures)
22. I believe watching the speaker’s gesture helped my understanding.

Strongly agree Strongly disagree
5 4 3 2 l
23. I believe watching the speaker’s face helped my understanding.
Strongly agree Strongly disagree
5 4 3 2 1

74

For everyone
22. Please write anything you felt about this research. What part is the most difﬁcult for

you? Did you think visual helped your listening comprehension? If you didn’t see the
video, which part was most difﬁcult to understand? And so on. . .. (Optional).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

If you want to know your test score, please e-mail the investigator your reference number,
which is on the ﬁrst page of the response sheet.

Thank you for your participation.

Ayano Sueyoshi
suevoshi@msu.edu

75

 

 

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