The Rashomon effect: which features of a speaker’s talk do listeners notice?

The same L2 speaking performance may be analysed and evaluated in very different ways by teachers or raters. We present a new, technology-assisted research design which opens up to investigation the trajectories of convergence divergence between tracked recorded what raters noticed when, whilst grading speaker’s videoed talk IELTS Speaking Test. devised graphs ‘noticing trajectories’ compare relative degrees all at any point. possible reasons for convergence/divergence were elicited using stimulated recall interviews. found that raters’ noticing rating tended converge relation easily identifiable features such as idioms. However, some stretches speaker talk, there was clear terms rated raters; real tests, background score-monitoring system deals with divergence. enables delicate depiction how process rater unfolds over time. Applications are suggested examiner training, well classroom discourse CA data workshops.