the predictive power of ambiguity tolerance, l2 auditory discrimination ability, and critical thinking of intermediate efl learners’ listening ability

The purpose of the present study was to investigate the potential connection among the degree of iranian efl learners ambiguity tolerance, critical thinking, auditory discrimination ability, and their listening comprehension. a total of 40 persian-speaking efl learners, who had enrolled at a private language institute, were non-randomly selected through the convenience sampling method. having selected the participants of the study, first, the researcher administered a listening comprehension test and phonological awareness tests as placement. at the second stage, the test of ambiguity tolerance developed and validated by ely was administered to assess to what extent the participants were ambiguity tolerant. next, the critical thinking of language learners was evaluated through the distribution of the persian version of honey’s critical thinking questionnaire translated and validated by naeini. it should be mentioned that each participant was asked to answer the questionnaires in two different phases. this can be explained in the light of the fact that the administration of all questionnaires in one session would have bored the participants. therefore, the questionnaires were given to the participants in two separate sessions. the thorough analysis of data using regression analysis revealed that iranian efl learners ambiguity tolerance, critical thinking, and auditory discrimination ability were positively correlated with their listening comprehension. moreover, efl learners’ l2 auditory discrimination, critical thinking, ambiguity tolerance, and listening comprehension serve as significant predictors of their listening comprehension ability. finally, some implications for efl teachers and material developers were presented.