Metacognitive Awareness in Academic Listening: A Case Study of Jordanian Postgraduate Students

Abstract

Research has indicated that listening is the least investigated skill in the world literature, and in the Jordanian literature it is not an exception.  This can be attributed to the nature of listening as having an unclear product and output from listeners.  Consequently, Metacognitive Awareness Listening Questionnaire (MALQ) developed by Vandergrift et al (2006) that assesses listeners’ level of metacognitive awareness was employed to evaluate listeners’ level of comprehension in academic listening activities.  This questionnaire consists of 21 items that embody five underlying aspects.  Specifically, this study targeted 22 first year postgraduate students of Linguistics at Yarmouk University, Jordan.  The quantitative results indicated that the respondents are moderate users of metacognitive strategies.  Therefore, the findings have highlighted Jordanian higher education providers of the need of extensive research to improve the comprehension level of academic listening activities involving postgraduate students.