The Effect of Using Authentic Audio Materials on EFL Students‟ Listening Self-efficacy, Motivation and Comprehension: First Year Social Sciences Students at Jimma University in Focus

Abstract

The main objective of this study was to investigate the effect of using authentic audio materials on EFL students’ listening self-efficacy, motivation and comprehension. The study employed a quasi-experimental research design. Furthermore, both quantitative and qualitative approaches were used in the study. The participants of the study were 1st - year undergraduate students of Jimma University who were assigned to the Social Sciences’ Stream in 2022.Two intact groups were randomly selected among the total of 20 groups and assigned randomly to treatment and control groups for the research. The treatment group contained 51 students and similarly, the control group contained 51 students. To collect the quantitative data, listening comprehension tests and questionnaires were used whereas to collect the qualitative data, reflective journal was used. The quantitative data were analyzed using SPSS version 23 by employing inferential statistics specifically, Independent samples t-test. The qualitative data were analyzed using a qualitative software analysis tool called Atlas.ti version 7. The quantitative results of the findings showed a statistically significant difference in favour of the treatment group regarding the effect of using authentic audio materials on students’ listening self-efficacy (t(100) = 3.896, p=0.001), students’ listening motivation (t(100) =3.320, p=0.001) and students’ listening comprehension (t(100) = 3.184, p=0.002). These findings showed that using authentic audio materials in EFL classrooms helps students to improve their listening self-efficacy, motivation and comprehension. Moreover, the results of the qualitative findings also showed that most of the participants found authentic audio materials motivating and empowering in their listening self-efficacy and listening comprehension improvement. Based on these findings, the researcher recommends that carefully selected authentic audio materials with graded tasks should be used in EFL listening classrooms.