Language proficiency drives listening-related fatigue in those who communicate in English as their second language

Abstract

Abstract Individuals who listen to speech in their second language (‘L2 listeners’) are disproportionately impacted by adverse acoustic conditions; a phenomenon coined the ‘non-native speech-in-noise disadvantage’. Evidence also suggests that L2 listening taxes cognitive resources to a greater extent than in L1 listeners. Very little, however, is known about the longer-term consequences of this sustained cognitive engagement. Listening-related fatigue refers to the daily life subjective experience of extreme tiredness from effortful listening. The current study recruited a large sample of L2-English listeners ( N = 256) to explore factors that predict listening-related fatigue. Approximately half of this sample ( n = 126) reported an Indo-European (IE) language (e.g., Italian) as their first language, whereas the other half ( n = 130) reported a non-Indo-European (non-IE) language (e.g., Vietnamese) as their first language. Non-IE L2 listeners reported higher overall listening-related fatigue than both IE L2 listeners and a group of monolingual English-speakers (L1-English). Self-rated proficiency and objective vocabulary scores were significant predictors of L2 listening-related fatigue and they moderated the effect of L2 use on listening-related fatigue; individuals who reported increased L2 use were more likely to experience increased fatigue, but only if their self-rated proficiency was low or moderate or their vocabulary score was low. Exploratory mediation analysis suggested that the effect of the L2 listener group (IE vs. non-IE) on listening-related fatigue was attributable to lower self-rated proficiency and objective vocabulary in the non-IE L2 group. To conclude, language proficiency appears to be a strong determinant of listening-related fatigue in L2-English listeners. When L2-English proficiency is low, increased L2-English usage is associated with heightened listening-related fatigue.

The authors' abstract, as published at the source. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 2026 · DOI ↗