IAFOR Journal of Education: Language Learning in Education

Volume 9 – Issue 3 – 2021

The Impact of Accent among Non-Native English-speaking Biology
Lecturers on Student Comprehension and Attitudes
Alexandra Kolesnikova
Lomonosov Moscow State University
RussiaAlina Liubimova
Lomonosov Moscow State University
RussiaElena Muromtseva
Lomonosov Moscow State University
RussiaAnton Muromtsev
Lomonosov Moscow State University
Russia25

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Abstract
This study examined the attitudes of postgraduate biology students of three top-ranked Russian
universities towards the foreign accents of non-native English-speaking lecturers. Fifty
participants responded to a questionnaire, the main purpose of which was to explore the listeners’
perceptions of professors’ accents and their influence on students’ ability to concentrate on andcomprehend the lecture material. The research included a quantitative analysis of gathered
descriptive data. The results of the study show Russian students’ tolerant attitudes to foreign
accents of non-native lecturers and demonstrate their readiness to comprehend non-standard
English-medium speech of non-native representatives of the international natural sciences
academic community.
Keywords: accent perception, foreign accent, non-linguistic professional discourse, Russianspeaking students, sociolinguistics, students’ attitudes

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The current global sociolinguistic paradigm welcoming non-standard varieties of English andinculcating tolerant attitudes to their spoken realisations has defined the shift from so-called“nativeness” and foreign accent reduction to achieving intelligibility and comprehensibility ofan utterance in international non-linguistic professional discourse (Chien, 2014; Gill, 1994). The
phenomenon of foreign accent softening, rather than total accent reduction, is said to beintertwined with maintaining a person’s national identity while removing phonological barriers
constraining effective intercultural communication (Gill, 1994; Johnson & Frederick,
1994; Nelson, 2011). In the context of English being a means of international communication
among speakers with different L1 backgrounds and various professional pursuits, the analysis
of non-native interlocutors’ oral speech perception in natural sciences academic discourse
presents a challenge for modern sociolinguistic research.
The objective of this study is to determine the evaluative judgements of Russian postgraduates
towards non-native English-speaking biology lecturers in order to assess their level of tolerance
to accented speech in an academic context. Accent bias has been linked to career possibilities,
including those in academia, as non-native lecturers are commonly judged against native speakerpronunciation standards and ranked lower on dimensions relevant to teaching, such ascompetence and teaching quality (Hendriks et al., 2018). Native English accents have been
historically highly regarded in Russian higher education, being associated with good educationand prestige, making the probability of the presence of accent bias quite high. Maslova (2017)
tapped into the perception of non-native speakers’ (NNS) foreign accent within the linguistic
community of other NNSs. This study, however, seeks to explore Russian students’ attitudes
toward non-native lecturers’ accents and assess their readiness to comprehend non-standard
English-medium speech in the academic context. The most essential question in this study iswhether the presence of a negative attitude towards a foreign accent stops the listener frommaking the effort to concentrate on the content of a lecture.
Literature Review
The concept of English as a Lingua Franca (ELF) has irreversibly changed the role ofpronunciation, both its acquisition and instruction, in English as a second language (ESL) class.
Much of the current research suggests that there is less emphasis on ESL students struggling tosound native-like (Chien, 2014; Derwing, 2010; Nelson, 2011) as the focus in language
acquisition has shifted to intelligibility and comprehensibility as the most important features of
ESL learners’ speech of any L1 backgrounds, as according to Nelson (2011),
Far from being an issue only across ‘native’ and ‘non-native’ varieties, intelligibility is aconcern across any varieties, whether broadly or narrowly construed (p.33).
Still, much evidence coming from empirical studies shows that there is a huge gap between therequirements for those who use English as a professional tool and those who use it as a meansof communication in non-linguistic professional environments. Regardless of the ELF status andenormous worldwide influence of English, in Wach’s study (2011), which involved 234 subjects,
the majority of respondents (98% in Group A (n=132) and 83% in Group B (n=102)) agreed that
it was preferable for teachers of English to have native-like pronunciation. The study by Coskun(2011) discovered that 38 out of 47 respondents, senior students of the English Language
Teaching department, found having native-like pronunciation very important for a teacher ofEnglish. In the study by Maslova (2017), a questionnaire was administered to 23 teachers and
41 undergraduate students at Lomonosov Moscow State University (MSU). The results revealed
that Russian teachers and ELT majors believed that “it was necessary to follow a particular27

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pronunciation norm while teaching English to those for whom this language is a professionaltool” (p.10). At the same time, appealing back to ELF advocates (Modiano, 2009; Dimova, 2018)
in non-native speaker (NNS) to NNS oral interaction in ELF, it becomes clear thatthe traditional prescriptivism of English language teaching (ELT) in the Expanding
Circle, which emphasizes the benefits of imitating the educated native speaker of SE[Standard English], has become unacceptable (Dimova, 2018, p.51).
Thus, due to the study’s focus on the role of pronunciation in communication between nonnative speakers who use English as a lingua franca, those who belong to the professional
linguistic environment have been excluded. The aim was to study accent perception in nonlinguistic academic communication, namely, in the natural sciences academic community, inorder to find out whether postgraduate students of biology of three top-ranked Russian
universities give much attention to foreign accents of non-native speaking lecturers and to what
extent a foreign accent might be an obstacle in processing accented speech.
Research in foreign accent perception or rating often involves native speakers as listeners andexperts assessing the level of intelligibility of the accented speech of NNS (Gill, 1994; Johnson& Frederick, 1994; Lazaraton, 2005; Lowenberg, 2002; Seidelhofer, 2001) Moreover, experts
and scholars themselves, being frequently zealous advocates of ELF, in their research compare
NNS accents to native pronunciation. For example, Kennedy and Trofimovich (2008) assessed“how closely the pronunciation of an utterance approaches that of a native speaker” (p.461),
while Julkowska and Cebrian (2015) looked at how similar the pronunciation of an L2 speakeris to the pronunciation of a native speaker of a particular language, which seems to contradict
the idea of ELF in terms of sociolinguistic diversity and equality. Therefore, this study wasplanned as the one establishing a purely non-native English-speaking environment with both
listeners and speakers of non-native L1 backgrounds, who use English as a lingua franca forresearch in the field of natural sciences.
Research Questions
In this study, the participants’ attitudes were collected in order to answer the following researchquestions:
RQ1: When students listen to a lecture on biology in English delivered by a non-native speaker,
is it important for them that the lecturer does not have a foreign accent? If so, how important?
RQ2: Does the presence of the lecturer’s foreign accent prevent the students from concentratingon the content of the lecture? If so, to what extent?
RQ3: To what extent can students agree with the statement that non-native lecturers in theirprofessional field should strive to reduce their foreign accents?
Apart from that, Russian-speaking students assessed foreign accents of the representatives of theinternational academic community that came from countries of the expanding circle of English
whose contribution to the further development of every branch of biological sciences wasequally significant and most prominent. The analysis of the classification of academic andresearch-related institutions outlined in the SCImago Institutions ranking of 2018 revealed thatthe three top countries in this regard were China, Germany, and France. Hence, specified pairsof questions (2 per country) were designed:

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RQ4 – RQ6: How easy was it for the students to understand the content of a fragment of alecture delivered in English by a professor from China (RQ4), Germany (RQ5) and France(RQ6)?
RQ7 – RQ9: When students listened to a fragment of a lecture delivered by a lecturer from
China (RQ7), Germany (RQ8) or France (RQ9), did the lecturer’s foreign accent prevent thestudents from concentrating on the content of the lecture?
Finally, some additional statistical tests were performed in order to look for possible meaningfulcorrelations. It was hypothesized that the more the student was concerned about the presence ofa national accent in a foreign lecturer’s speech, the more it would impede their concentration on
the lecture content.
Methodology
The participants in this study were 50 postgraduate biological sciences majors who belong to thenatural sciences academic community of Lomonosov Moscow State University (MSU), SaintPetersburg State University and Information Technology, Mechanics and Optical design (ITMO)
University. The participants were chosen by the means of convenience sampling from these topranked Russian universities as they had established academic links with Lomonosov MSU where
the study was based. Out of these 50 participants, 41 majored in Biology and 9 in Bioengineeringand Bioinformatics. All the participants had attended or were still attending compulsory classes
of English as a Foreign Language for biologists at the Upper-Intermediate level of language
proficiency (marked B2 in Common European Framework of References) or higher (CEFR,2018).
Prior to conducting the research, the study was piloted on a trial group of 10 participants –students of Lomonosov Moscow State University. Taking into consideration respondents’
feedback and comments, several changes were introduced into the questionnaire.
In the first part of the study, all the participants were administered an anonymous online
questionnaire, which was specifically designed for this study (Appendix 1, Part 1). The items in
the questionnaire matched the research questions of the study. The main aim of the questionnaire
was to explore the participants’ attitudes towards the presence of a foreign accent in the speechof a non-native English-speaking lecturer from their professional field, and reveal the effects ofaccented speech on students’ ability to concentrate on the material without being distracted.
The questionnaire consisted of eleven 7-point Likert items, given that 7-point rating scales canbe referred to as “balanced” (Friedman & Amoot, 1999, p. 119), which tends to increase thedegree of “precision” of participants’ answers (Cohen et al., 2017, p. 327). Each scale point waslabelled by the researchers to minimise inaccuracies stemming from individual interpretation of
numbers.
Anonymity of the questionnaire responses was ensured due to ethical considerations; no personal
data was collected. Out of sustainability reasons the researchers opted for an online
questionnaire; the study was conducted via Google Forms. The participants were provided withdetailed written instructions for each part of the survey. By submitting the questionnaire, theparticipants consented for their responses to be used for research purposes. Each participant
could access the questionnaire link only once to prevent answer falsification.

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In the second part of the study, the students were asked to listen to a fragment of a lecturedelivered by non-native English-speaking lecturers from China, Germany, and France(Appendix 1, Part 2). The respondents were instructed to fill in their answers after listening to
the recording once. To prevent the participants from making unnecessary appearance-based
judgements, the researchers removed the visuals and solely played an audio version of thefragment of each video. The main criteria for the choice of the video fragments were as follows:
●
●
●
●
●
●

the lecture had to address a biology-related topic;
the speaker had to come from a country which belongs to the Expanding Circle;
the speaker’s mother tongue was not English;
the speaker was proficient in English;
the speaker specialised in one of the branches of biology;
the speaker belonged to the international academic community.

To ensure that the students’ answers to both parts of the questionnaire were adequate, a separate
fill-in-the-blank activity (Appendix 2) was designed, based on the script of each lecture
fragment, and was aimed at checking their real understanding of its key topic points.
Results
Part 1 Descriptive Statistics (RQ1-RQ3)
To analyse the data, the participants’ questionnaire responses were entered into JASP software1.
Responses for Questions 1 to 3 were treated as scale variables with possible integer values (1 to7) corresponding to the questionnaire scale points. The descriptive statistics of the data gatheredin the first part of the survey (N = 50) can be seen below in Table 1:
Table 1
Descriptive Statistics of the Gathered Data (Questions 1-5)

1

RQ1

RQ2

RQ3

RQ1

RQ2

RQ3

Valid

50

50

50

Skewness

0.068-0.055-0.057

Missing000Std. Error

0.337

0.337

0.337

Mean

3.56

4.88

4.66

Kurtosis-0.586-0.501-1.279Median3

5

4.5

Std. Error

0.662

0.662

0.662

Mode

3

5

6

Min

1

3

2

Std.
Dev.

1.215

1.081

1.319

Max

6

7

7

https://jasp-stats.org/

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RQ1: When students listen to a lecture on biology in English delivered by a non-native
speaker, is it important for them that the lecturer does not have a foreign accent? If so,
how important?
For Question 1, the seven-point Likert scale ranging from “does not matter at all” to“fundamentally important” received the following responses. Most students stated that theyfound the foreign accent of a non-native English-speaking lecturer “somewhat unimportant”(n=20), followed by “somewhat important” (n=12), “neutral” (n=8), “not important” (n=6),“does not matter at all” (n=2), “really important” (n=2) and “fundamentally important” (n=0).
Based on this descriptive data, approximately 56% of the participants in this study regard thepresence of the foreign accent in the speech of a non-native lecturer in their professional field
tolerantly. It can be hypothesized that the students are paying more attention to what the speakeris saying rather than how much in common their speech has with the pronunciation patterns ofa native speaker of the English language.
RQ2: Does the presence of the lecturer’s foreign accent prevent the students fromconcentrating on the content of the lecture? If so, to what extent?
For Question 2, most participants stated that a foreign accent of a non-native lecturer “mostly
does not interfere” (n=19) with their ability to concentrate on the lecture content, this answer
was followed by “somewhat interferes” (n=11), “hardly interferes” (n=11), “moderatelyinterferes” (n=6), and “does not interfere at all” (n=3). Generally, it can be concluded thatapproximately 66% of the participants in this study could concentrate on the lecture even if the
speech of a non-native lecturer was characterized by the presence of a foreign accent. Suchstudent experience does not seem surprising: nowadays, when English is being widely used as a
lingua franca, it is hard to imagine a university lecturer who would be unintelligible to the pointthat it would seriously impede students’ concentration. Moreover, considering the extensive
amount of non-native English input that students presumably receive in and out of the university
due to open social media and other Internet resources, an even higher percentage of students
reporting unaffected concentration would be anticipated.
RQ3: To what extent can students agree with the statement that non-native lecturers intheir professional field should strive to reduce their foreign accent?
In the final question of the first part of the survey most students stated that they agreed with thegiven statement for the most part: although 17 participants “totally agreed” with it, these students
did not consider it “crucial” for a lecturer to achieve native-like proficiency when it came to theirpronunciation. Other students shared that they either “rather agreed, than disagreed” (n=13), or“rather disagreed, than agreed” (n=11); some respondents “partially agreed” (n=6) with thestatement or considered it crucial and “absolutely agreed” (n=2). Only one respondent“disagreed” (n=1). Overall, 76% of the participants in this study were in favour of non-native
speaking lecturers involved in English-medium instruction at the university level reducing theirforeign accents. These results appear slightly contradictory to students’ responses in RQ1 and
RQ2 and can be interpreted as a reflection of native speaker bias, as regardless of the reported
satisfactory lecturers’ speech comprehensibility and intelligibility, the students expect theirprofessors to match the native-speaker standard. This situation has been previously reported inhigher education in other national contexts (e.g., the Netherlands) (Hendriks et al., 2018).

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Part 2 Descriptive Statistics (RQ4-RQ9)
Responses for Questions 4 to 9 also were treated as scale variables with possible integer values(1 to 7) corresponding to the questionnaire scale points. The descriptive statistics of the data
gathered in the second part if the survey (N = 50) can be seen below in table 2.
Table 2
Descriptive Statistics of the Gathered Data (Questions 4-9)
Descriptive statistics (3)
RQ4

RQ5

RQ6

RQ7

RQ8

RQ9

Valid

50

50

50

50

50

50

Mean

5.820

5.680

4.980

5.160

3.980

3.940

Median

6

6

5

5

4

4

Mode

6

6

5

5

4

4

Std. Dev

0.873

1.077

1.270

1.251

1.332

1.376

Descriptive statistics (4)
RQ4

RQ5

RQ6

RQ7

RQ8

RQ9

Skewness-0.400-0.642-0.709-0.445

0.415

0.161

Std. Error ofSkewness

0.337

0.337

0.337

0.337

0.337

0.337

Kurtosis-0.392-0.0741.081-0.290-0.334-0.340Std. Error of
Kurtosis

0.662

0.662

0.662

0.662

0.662

0.662

Minimum

4

3

1

2

2

1

Maximum

7

7

7

7

7

7

RQ4 – RQ6: How easy was it for the students to understand the content of a fragment of alecture delivered in English by a professor from China (RQ4), Germany (RQ5) and France(RQ6)?
In Question 4, most students stated that they found understanding the content of the lecture
fragment delivered by the Chinese lecturer “easy” (n=23), this answer was followed by “mostly
easy” (n=12), and “very easy” (n=11). There were no instances of a student who would find thecontent of the lecture fragment somewhat difficult to comprehend.

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Answering RQ5, 90% of the participants stated they were quite comfortable when listening to alecture delivered by a German professor regardless of their foreign accent. However, the French
speaker (RQ6) in English seemed to be more challenging to understand for the participants inthis study, because more than a third (36%) of them reported difficulty in understanding.
Another set of questions tapped into the students’ ability to concentrate on the content of thelecture regardless of the lecturer’s non-native accent (RQ7 – RQ9). The results are demonstrated
in table 3.
For Question 7, most participants stated that the foreign accent of the Chinese lecturer “hardly
interferes” (n=19) with concentrating on and comprehending the content of the lecture fragment,
followed by “mostly does not interfere” (n=12), “does not interfere at all” (n=12), “somewhat
interferes” (n=5), and “moderately interferes” (n=2). Generally, it can be concluded that the vast
majority of the participants in this study (86%) had no trouble understanding the lecturedelivered by a Chinese professor from their professional field.
As for the German lecturer, most participants stated that his foreign accent “mostly does notinterfere” (n=16) with concentrating on the lecture content. Other students shared that theGerman accent in English “hardly interferes” (n=14) with it, this point was followed by “doesnot interfere at all” (n=7), “somewhat interferes” (n=7), “moderately interferes” (n=5) and“interferes very much” (n=1).
As for the French professor, most participants stated that his foreign accent “somewhat
interferes” with their ability to concentrate on the lecture content. Other students shared that the
French accent in English “mostly does not interfere” (n=11), “moderately interferes” (n=11),“very much interferes” (n=7), “hardly interferes” (n=4), “does not interfere at all” (n=2), and“completely impedes concentration” (n=1). See table 3. Generally, it can be concluded that only
34% of the participants in this study did not experience much difficulty concentrating on thecontent of the lecture delivered by the French professor.
Table 3Students’ Responses to Questions 7-9

RQ

Completely Interferes
MostlyDoes notModerately Somewhat
Hardlyimpedesvery
does notinterfere
interferes interferesinterferesconcentrationmuchinterfere
at allRQ7(Chinese)

0

0

2

5

12

19

12

RQ8
(German)

0

1

5

7

16

14

7

RQ9
(French)

1

7

11

14

11

4

2

Part 3 Additional Tests
Another goal was to reveal if there was any correlation between students’ attitudes to theimportance of the absence of accent in their non-native lecturer’s speech and its link to students’
self-reported concentration and comprehension abilities. Spearman’s correlation coefficient
statistics indicated the following (see table 4):

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Table 4Spearman Correlation Coefficient
Variables
RQ1

RQ2

Spearman’s rhop-0.341

0.016

Lower 95% CI Upper 95% CI-0.565-0.069The results indicate that there is a statistically significant moderate negative correlation between
variables, that is, the more important the absence of accent, the more the foreign accent of the
non-native lecturer speaking English impedes concentration on and understanding of the lecture
content, as reported by the students. These findings might suggest that if a participant sees thelecturer’s foreign accent as an issue, it prevents that individual from making a special effort tobecome accustomed to the phonological peculiarities of the lecturer’s speech in an effort to makesense of the lecture content, which explains the self-reported absence of understanding.
Discussion, Limitations and Recommendations for Further Research
In Part 1 of this study, most participants reported that they wanted the non-native biology
lecturers to strive to reduce their foreign accents (RQ3). Combined with the results of RQ1 and
RQ2, this finding seems slightly contradictory. Most students report their tolerance in RQ1 bystating that having or not having an accent is generally not crucially important for a biology
lecturer, as well as admitting that it does not typically impede concentration on the lecture
content (RQ2). However, most respondents still believe that non-native lecturers should try to
reduce their accent, which probably reflects the native-speaker bias persistent in their minds, as
has been previously reported by other researchers in the field (e.g., Kelch & SantanaWilliamson, 2002).
In Part 2, the students’ reported ease of comprehension of accented speech varied according to
the lecturers’ L1 accent, and the Chinese lecturer was judged as the most comprehensible. The
French lecturer was reported as the least comprehensible, with his accent affecting the students’ability to concentrate on and understand the content of lecture. However, generally, most
students still stated that the effect that the non-native accent had on their concentration in thelecture was minimal, except for the French lecturer. The significance of the research also lies in
the finding that the more important the absence of accent was to a particular student, the moredifficult it was for that student to comprehend the content of the lecture and to concentrate on it.
From previous research it is known that speech can be accented but still perfectly
comprehensible (Kang et al., 2010). Therefore, the current findings might suggest that if aparticipant views the lecturer’s foreign accent as an issue, it prevents them from making a special
effort to become accustomed to the phonological peculiarities of the lecturer’s speech in orderto make sense of the lecture content. This would explain the self-reported absence ofunderstanding. The ability to concentrate and comprehend therefore seems to be subjective.
Clearly, self-reported measures are not fully reliable when it comes to comprehension as they
only portray the students’ individual viewpoints. More studies are warranted to compare thestudents’ reported comprehension of non-native lecturers’ accented speech with their actual
quantitative comprehension scores on the same task. It seems that, considering the data gathered
in Part 1, it could be expected that the students’ actual comprehension will be better than what
they report due to the presence of the native-speaker bias.

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However, some limitations should be noted, namely, there is no indication of whether any of theparticipants in this study (1) are simultaneous bilinguals, (2) have extensive experience in third
language acquisition of Chinese, German, or French, or (3) have completed their bachelor’s
degree in the same professional field as their master’s. Future research could exclude from thesample those respondents who come from other professional backgrounds, primarily focusing
on the students who have successfully completed their bachelor’s studies with the major innatural (biological in particular) sciences and have been attending a compulsory English forSpecial Purposes class for at least 3 academic years while not being simultaneous bilinguals.
Conclusion
Overall, this study demonstrated that a majority of study participants regard the presence of theforeign accent in speech of a non-native lecturer in their professional field tolerantly. This neutral
attitude points to the students’ probable readiness to comprehend non-standard English as a medium
of instruction from non-native representatives of the international natural sciences academic
community. However, the presence of native-speaker bias even in non-linguistic academic
environments was also noted. It is hoped that with the continuous future spread of English as a
lingua franca the native-speaker ideology will give way to an enhanced acceptance of academic
professionals from a variety of L1 backgrounds in the eyes of university students so that greater
learning may be the result.
This study and similar studies in other national contexts might prompt other universities dealing
with the same issue to start actively promoting intelligibility-based pronunciation instruction insteadof following a native-speaker model. If intelligibility were to actually become the main criteria forassessing spoken language of a non-native speaker in an academic environment, NNS lecturers andstudents would be more likely to participate in conferences and other international events inacademia without the fear of being misjudged for failing to sound like a native speaker.

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World Englishes, 28(2), 208–223. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-971X.2009.01584.x
Nelson, C. L. (2011). Intelligibility in world Englishes. London: Blackwell Publishing Ltd.
https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-971X.2009.01584.x
Seidelhofer, B. (2001) Closing the conceptual gap: The case for a description of English as a
lingua franca. International Journal of Applied Linguistic, 11, 133–158.
https://doi.org/10.1111/1473-4192.00011
Wach, A. (2011). Native-speaker and English as a lingua franca pronunciation norms: English
majors’ views. Studies in Second Language Learning and Teaching, 1(2), 247–266.
https://doi.org/10.14746/ssllt.2011.1.2.5
Watkins, J. (2016). An introduction to the science of statistics: From theory to implementation.
Preliminary Edition. Retrieved fromhttps://www.math.arizona.edu/~jwatkins/statbook.pdf
Corresponding author: Alexandra Kolesnikova
Email: alex_wd@mail.ru

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Appendix 1 Part 1
1. When you listen to a lecture on biology in English delivered by a non-native speaker, is
it important for you that the lecturer does not have a foreign accent? If so, howimportant?
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
Does notNot
Somewhat
NeutralSomewhat
ReallyFundamentally
matter at important unimportant
importantimportantimportantall
2. Does the presence of the lecturer’s foreign accent prevent you from concentrating on
the content of the lecture? If so, to what extent?
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
CompletelyInterferes Moderately Somewhat
Mostly does
HardlyDoes notimpedesvery much interferesinterferes
not interfereinterferes interfere atconcentrationall
3. To what extent can you agree with the statement that non-native lecturers in theirprofessional field should strive to reduce their foreign accent?
1Strongly
disagree2
Disagree

3
Ratherdisagreethat agree

4
Ratheragree
thandisagree5Partiallyagree

6
Totally agree,
but it is not
crucial7
Absolutely
agree, it is
crucialAppendix 1 Part 2
4. How easy was it for you to understand the content of a fragment of a lecture deliveredin English by a professor from China?
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
Extremely Very Somewhat
Somewhat Mostly easy
Easy
Very easy
hard
hard
hard
easy
5. How easy was it for you to understand the content of a fragment of a lecture deliveredin English by a professor from Germany?
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
Extremely Very Somewhat
Somewhat Mostly easy
Easy
Very easy
hard
hard
hard
easy
6. How easy was it for you to understand the content of a fragment of a lecture deliveredin English by a professor from France?
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
Extremely Very Somewhat
Somewhat Mostly easy
Easy
Very easy
hard
hard
hard
easy

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IAFOR Journal of Education: Language Learning in Education

Volume 9 – Issue 3 – 2021

7. When you listened to a fragment of a lecture delivered by a lecturer from China, did
the lecturer’s foreign accent prevent you from concentrating on the content of thelecture?
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
CompletelyInterferes Moderately Somewhat
Mostly does
HardlyDoes notimpedesvery much interferesinterferes
not interfereinterferes interfere atconcentration
all
8. When you listened to a fragment of a lecture delivered by a lecturer from Germany,
did the lecturer’s foreign accent prevent you from concentrating on the content of thelecture?
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
CompletelyInterferes Moderately Somewhat
Mostly does
HardlyDoes notimpedesvery much interferesinterferes
not interfereinterferes interfere atconcentrationall
9. When you listened to a fragment of a lecture delivered by a lecturer from France, did
the lecturer’s foreign accent prevent you from concentrating on the content of thelecture?
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
CompletelyInterferes Moderately Somewhat
Mostly does
HardlyDoes notimpedesvery much interferesinterferes
not interfereinterferes interfere atconcentration
all
Appendix 2
Audio segment from video 1. Chinese lecturer. Central nervous system and blood brain barrier
Listen to the speaker and fill in the gaps in the text with the words given below. There are someextra words which you do not need to use.
•drain them •spinal cord •diencephalon •lymph drain bearer •brain stem •die encephalon•telencephalon •blood-brain barrier •cerebellum •gore-tex •vellum •spiral core •cortex
There’re four parts, four big parts of our brain. One is telencephalon here, the biggest part of ourbrain including cortex. Diencephalon here, the middle part, the inside part of our brain.
Cerebellum, this part here and brain stem. Brain stem connects our brain with the spinal cord.
Before we get into the four major parts of our brain, let’s look at the blood-brain barrier.
There’re four parts, four big parts of our brain. One is _____________ here, the biggest part ofour brain including _______________. __________________ here, the middle part, the inside
part of our brain. ____________, this part here and brain stem. _______________ connects ourbrain with the ____________. Before we get into the four major parts of our brain, let’s look at
the ______________.
https://www.coursera.org/learn/advanced-neurobiology1/lecture/jLUk8/1-1-2-central-nervoussystem-and-blood-brain-barrier
Audio segment from video 2. German lecturer. Folic Acid: Preparing for Pregnancy
Listen to the speaker and fill in the gaps in the text with the words given below. There are someextra words which you do not need to use.

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IAFOR Journal of Education: Language Learning in Education

Volume 9 – Issue 3 – 2021

•fall eight •methylate DNA •petal wealth •folate supply •contraception •bear out•B vitamins •maternal •be vitamins •penetrate RNA •vitamin B9 •nocturnal•phosphate supply •vital benign •fetal health •folates •preconception period
There are specific nutritional aspects in the preconception period which are of importance forboth maternal and fetal health. In particular, folate supply is essential to support healthy fetal
development. Folates comprise a group of substances that belong to the B vitamins. Folate isalso known as vitamin B9. It is essential fornumerous body functions. The human body, forexample needs folate to synthesise, repair and methylate DNA.
There are specific nutritional aspects in the ________________ which are of importance forboth ___________ and ________________. In particular, _________________ is essential tosupport healthy fetal development. _______________ comprise a group of substances thatbelong to the ______________. Folate is also known as ______________. It is essential fornumerous body functions. The human body, for example needs folate to synthesise, repair and_________________.
https://www.coursera.org/learn/nutrition-pregnancy/lecture/CJs4d/folic-acid-preparing-forpregnancy
Audio segment from video 3. French lecturer. Treating oxidative stress as a way of dealing with
the African AIDS epidemic
Listen to the speaker and fill in the gaps in the text with the words given below. There are someextra words which you do not need to use.
•c’est la vie •nutrition •hatred of the prius •ox sedative press•chronically infected •equilibrated •HIV •trance mission •tonically inspected•oxidative stress •maltuition •transmission •get rid of the virus
The scientist is answering to the question: “Is treating oxidative stress one of the best ways todeal with the African AIDS epidemics?”
I think this is one way to approach, to decrease the rate of transmission, because, I believe, HIV,
we can be exposed to HIV many times without being chronically infected, our immune system
will get rid of the virus within the few weeks if you have a good immune system, and this is also
the problem of African people. Their nutrition is not very equilibrated, they are in oxidative
stress, even if they are not infected with HIV, so their immune system doesn’t work well already.
I think this is one way to approach, to decrease the rate of __________ , because, I believe,_______ , we can be exposed to HIV many times without being ________________, ourimmune system will _______________ within the few weeks if you have a good immune
system, and this is also the problem of African people. Their ______________ is not very______________ , they are in ______________ , even if they are not infected with HIV, so theirimmune system doesn’t work well already.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JrzV_xnhlGY40