needed for the task represented by both teachers’and students’questionnaire data);
the“competence domain”is represented by cognitive processes (see Fig.4.1).
This volume attempts to answer the following research questions:
- What are the task demands of listening to an academic mini-lecture and com-
pleting a listen-to-summarize cloze task thereafter? - What are the main cognitive processes test-takers undergo while completing the
listen-to-summarize cloze task after listening to an academic mini-lecture?
2 :1 How does the listen-to-summarize cloze task interact with test-takers’
test-taking cognitive processes?
2 :2 To what extent do test-takers of various language competence levels differ
in terms of their cognitive processes involved in completing the
listen-to-summarize cloze task and the online retelling?
In this volume, Chap. 2 explains to a certain depth the nature of academic lecture
comprehension. In Chap. 3 , by reviewing literature in thefields of linguistics,
psychology and education, the researcher has categorized approaches to assessment
of lecture comprehension and investigated the construct of lecture comprehension
tasks from different perspectives. Chapter 4 discusses in thorough detail the task
characteristics of TEM 8 listen-to-summarize tasks, which is the main research
instrument in the current empirical study.
Chapters 5 to 8 offer the results and discussion of the empirical research. Chapter
5 presents the investigation on task demands of TEM 8 mini-lecture task. In this
chapter, questionnaire survey results from both teachers and students will be
demonstrated, including descriptive statistics and exploratory factor analysis.
Chapter 6 presents test-takers’TAP data and analyzes the cognitive processes
involved in the test-taking phase and the interaction between the
listen-to-summarize task and the test-taking cognitive processes. Chapter 7 centers
upon the retelling data that help map out listeners’mental presentation of the two
mini-lectures. Chapter 8 isfixated upon the three key notions addressed by research
questions: task demands, cognitive processes and language competence.
Triangulation of quantitative data analysis of task demands and qualitative data
analysis of cognitive processes will be established. Finally, in Chap. 9 the reser-
acher manages to generate arguments on the task validity and individual differences
across cognitive processes of completing the summary cloze tasks and retelling of
the mini-lectures, upon which recommendations for lecture comprehension
assessment and instruction are hence provided.
The research reported in this volume is a preliminary investigation into the
construct and assessment of lecture comprehension. Hopefully, the results of
the volume can inspire interest in designing a test format that aims to improve the
practice of assessing lecture comprehension ability and thus shed some light on the
research of the designing of listen-to-summarize tasks in the future.
6 1 Introduction