Processing of Advertisements by EFL Arab College Students

The study investigated ESL students’ ability to comprehend and analyze advertisements, to identify the stylistic features of advertisements, to find out the features that are easy to identify, and those that are difficult to identify. Results of a test with 66 ESL college students showed ad features that were easy to identify and those that were difficult to identify. Responses also reflect the difficulty level of the different stylistic features of the advertisement. Correcting faulty punctuation marks was more difficult than correcting faulty capitalization. Analysis of the subjects’ faulty responses showed areas with which they had comprehension difficulties. Causes of advertisement comprehension problems and recommendations for advertisement comprehension instruction will be given.

Prof. Reima Al-jarf
King Saud University
Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
http://faculty.ksu.edu.sa/aljarf