Schmidt-Rinehart (1994) also carried out a study with the main purpose of discovering the effects of topic familiarity on
L2 listening comprehension. University students of Spanish at three different course levels listened to two familiar
passages, one about a familiar topic and another about a novel topic. The passages represented authentic language in
that the recordings were from spontaneous speech of a native speaker. The results indicated that the subjects scored
considerably higher on the familiar topic than on the new one (see also Caplan-Carbin, 1997).
Sadighi and Zare (2002), in their study, explored the effect of background knowledge on listening comprehension. Two
TOEFL preparation classes allocated to EFL students took part in the study. The experimental group received some
treatment in the form of topic familiarity, and their background knowledge was activated. Then a 50-item TOEFL test of
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listening comprehension was administered to both experimental and control groups. A statistical analysis of the results
provides some evidence in support of the effect of background knowledge on listening comprehension.
Later, Othman and Vanathas (2004) also conducted an experiment that focused on topic familiarity and its influence on
listening comprehension. Data were elicited from thirty four intermediate level students who were majoring in Business
Studies at a private tertiary institution. A comparison between the pretest and posttest scores showed that the subjects
achieved significantly higher marks after the treatment lessons. The findings of this study indicated that topic familiarity
has an influence on listening comprehension.