scholarly journals The Effects of Explicit/Implicit Instructions on the Development of Advanced EFL Learners’ Pragmatic Knowledge of English: Apology Speech Act

2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 76
Author(s):  
Pasand Shark

The current study explored the effects of explicit and implicit instructions on the development of advanced EFL learners’ pragmatic knowledge in terms of apology speech act. A total of 10 English native speakers and 40 advanced EFL students participated in this study. The Iraqi Kurdish EFL learners were selected from grade 12 in British International School in Erbil/ Iraq and their level was determined by Oxford Quick Placement Test (OQPT) proficiency test. These 40 participants were divided randomly into two; explicit group (EG) and implicit group (IG) Later, they were provided a Multiple-choice Discourse Completion Test (MDCT) as a pre-test, which consisted of 10 different situations of apology and were based on the participants’ real-life situation, each situation included 3 options and only one answer could be selected which considered to be the most appropriate answer to them. The aim was to show if there were any significant differences between EG and IG. The English native speakers were given the same (MDCT) and were asked to choose the most appropriate answers. After the treatment, (EG) and (IG) were provided the same MDCT as a post-test. The findings revealed that the results of EG and IG were significant and they showed improvements after the treatment, and the EG outperformed the IG in post-test and delayed-test.

2018 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 105-119
Author(s):  
Maryam Sharif ◽  
Lotfollah Yarmohammadi ◽  
Firooz Sadighi ◽  
Mortaza Yamini ◽  
Mohammad Sadegh Bagheri

This study was an attempt to compare and contrast the realization patterns of condolence speech act in English and Persian and to examine Iranian EFL learners’ realization of this speech act in English. The study was further interested in investigating whether Iranian EFL learners’ realization of condolence speech act is associated with their level of L2 proficiency. To this end, a Discourse Completion Test (DCT) was administered to 82 undergraduate Iranian EFL students in English. The participants were divided into three levels of language proficiency (elementary level, intermediate level, and advanced level) based on their scores on the Oxford Quick Placement Test (OQPT). For baseline comparisons, the EFL learners also received the translated version of the same DCT in Persian, and the English DCT was administered to 20 native speakers (NSs) of American English. The data were analyzed based on Elwood’s (2004) coding scheme. The results revealed that English and Persian NSs and Iranian EFL learners had access to the same condolence strategies, yet they differed in the semantic formulas, content, or forms they adopted to formulize their condolence expressions. In addition, level of L2 proficiency was found to be associated with Iranian EFL learners’ realization of condolence speech act. 


2016 ◽  
Vol 7 (3) ◽  
pp. 579 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fatemeh Zarepour ◽  
Masoumeh Imani Saidloo

Electronic mail is one of the widely used medium for institutional communication particularly in academic institutions. The main focus of this study was determining requesting strategies and mitigating elements used by the Iranians’ EFL learners in English written requestive e-mails to their professors. This study also determined opening and closing strategies and supportive moves. To this aim, 61 e-mail were collected using DCT and analyzed by means of CCSARP (Cross-Cultural Speech Act Realization Pattern) coding scheme. The results showed that Iranian students, under the effect of L1 norms, used more direct strategies and to soften the force of requests they tended to use mitigating elements and pre-request supportive moves. It had been concluded that Iranian EFL students have lack of pragmatic knowledge; therefore, it is necessary to make them aware of norms of requestive e-mails written by English native speakers.


2019 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 67
Author(s):  
Nenden Sri Rahayu

The research investigates the speech act recognition of refusing as made by Indonesian learners of English as a foreign language, native Indonesian, and native English. It involves three groups: 13 Indonesian EFL Learners (IELs), 13 Indonesian Native Speakers (INSs), and 13 American Native Speakers (NSs) of English. They were asked to respond to ten different situations, in which they carry out the speech act of refusal. Their strategies in refusing were compared one another in order to find out whether the refusal performed by Indonesian EFL Learner (IELs) correspond more closely with those of the Indonesian Native Speakers (INSs) or with speakers of the target language, the American Native Speakers (NSs). The data, collected from a Discourse Completion Test (DCT) which was developed by Blum-Kulka, were analyzed and categorized based on Azis�s categories (2000). Results indicated that although a similar range of refusal strategies were available to the two language groups, cross-cultural variation still exists. The data involved some contextual variables, which include the status of interlocutors (higher, equal, or lower status) and eliciting acts, i.e., requests, invitations, offers, and suggestions.Keywords: Indonesian EFL Learners; interlanguage pragmatics; refusal strategy; speech�act.


SAGE Open ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 215824402110503
Author(s):  
Abudalslam Alfghe ◽  
Behbood Mohammadzadeh

This study investigates the three speech act strategies of request, suggestion and apology in Libyan Arab EFL undergraduate students (AREFLUS) and Amazigh EFL undergraduate students (AMEFLUS). It also examines their linguistic and pragmatic competence in these strategies. Two Libyan universities (Sebha and Zwara) are selected for the study, which includes 50 AREFLUS and 37 AMEFLUS participants. To investigate the students’ socio-pragmatic and pragma linguistic competence, two instruments are used: a questionnaire in the form of a Discourse Completion Test (DCT) and a rating scale. The results reveal numerous similarities between the Libyan Arab and Amazigh participants in performing all the speech act strategies of request, suggest and apology. However, some significant differences regarding gender are found among Libyan EFL students. Overall, both groups appear to be more competent in functioning than in structuring the three mentioned speech act strategies.


2016 ◽  
Vol 6 (11) ◽  
pp. 2175
Author(s):  
Sahar Moradi ◽  
Maryam Danaye Tous ◽  
Abdorreza Tahriri

This study aimed to investigate the extent of Iranian EFL students’ pragmatic knowledge, and if there were any significant differences among EFL learners at different years of study (the freshmen, the sophomores, and the seniors) on this knowledge. To this end, 78 EFL students of University of Guilan (Rasht-Iran) were tested using a Multiple-choice Discourse Completion Test (MDCT), (Birjandi & Rezaei, 2010). The results showed that, their extent of pragmatic knowledge wasnot at satisfying level. Also, the results showed that there were significant differences between the freshmen and seniors in this regard.


2020 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 148-155
Author(s):  
Abdelfattah Laabidi ◽  
Adiba Bousfiha

Complaining as a speech act can occur in every conversation even unintentionally. The use of this speech act is culture specific. The expressions and strategies used to issue a complaint vary according to context, interlocutors and to other socio-cultural variables. The present study investigates the complaint strategies of Moroccan higher education institutions’ EFL students. Data for the current study are collected from 37 second and third year students learning English as a Foreign Language (EFL) representing a population in Moroccan Higher Education embodied in Moulay Ismail University, Meknes and who have managed to answer a discourse completion test composed of five situational prompts. A quantitative design is used for the collection, the analysis and the interpretation of data. The data gathered are described and analyzed using descriptive statistics. The findings indicate that Moroccan EFL students use specific linguistic forms to make complaints regarding different social variables such as social distance, ranking and social power. They also imply that Moroccan EFL learners tend to use more indirect strategies in issuing their complaints along with some intimacy expressions that mark the specificity of the Moroccan culture as a positive politeness culture, par excellence.


2016 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 24
Author(s):  
Mohammad Davoudi ◽  
Mojtaba Rezaei

<p>The present study aims at investigating the influence of podcasts (POD) on language comprehension of Iranian pre-intermediate EFL learners. An Oxford Placement Test (OPT) was administered to 60 male and female university students. The participants were considered as pre-intermediate learners and were divided into two groups (one experimental group and one control group). During the fifteen sessions of the treatment, thirty podcasts were presented to the two groups. The experimental group received just the audio file of the POD, and the control group received a different treatment which was the transcript file of the same audio podcast file of the experimental group. The results of the t-tests revealed that there was no significant difference in language comprehension scores across the posttest between two groups. Based on the interview results after the post-test, all of the participants (100%) agreed that both audio and the transcripts (written texts) were useful for them and claimed that it is a good method of improving language comprehension.</p>


2016 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Novia Hayati

 Abstrak Analisis Kontrastif Kotowari Hyougen  antara Pembelajar Bahasa Jepang dan Penutur Asli. Di antara beberapa aktifitas berbahasa, tindakan menolak sering dianggap sebagai tindakan yang cukup sulit karena memberikan perasaan tidak menyenangkan terhadap lawan tutur. Tindak tutur menolak tidak terlepas dari latar belakang tindak tutur berbahasa oleh pengguna bahasa tersebut. Pembelajar yang berbahasa ibu bahasa Sunda memiliki kemiripan dengan penutur asli dalam membuat tindak tutur penolakan dikarenakan adanya kedekatan aturan undak usuk bahasa sunda dengan tainguu hyougen dalam bahasa Jepang. Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk mengetahui ungkapan penolakan yang digunakan oleh pembelajar bahasa Jepang kemudian melalui perbandingan dengan penutur asli diketahui persamaan dan perbedaanya serta permasalahan dalam ungkapan penolakan oleh pembelajar. Instrumen yang digunakan dalam penelitian ini adalah Discourse Completion Test (DCT). Hasil analisis data menunjukan terdapat persamaan diantara pembelajar dan penutur asli dalam pengguna {wabi} terhadap dosen akrab (penggunanya lebih rendah). Sebagai permasalahan dalam ungkapan penolakan yakni pembelajar menggunakan {fuka} dalam bentuk futsuu no hiteikei, dan {koshou} dalam frekuensi yang cukup tinggi. Sebaliknya, penutur asli menggunakan fukanoukei, dikarenakan apabila menggunakan futsuu no hiteikei akan diterima sebagai arti penolakan yang kuat/keras.Kata kunci: Kotowari hyougen, DCT, Taiguu hyougen, penutur asli, konstraktif  Abstract Contrastive Analysis of Kotowari Hyougen between Learners of Japanese Language and Japanese Native Speakers. Among several speaking activities, action of refusal is often considered a difficult act as it gives an unpleasant feeling againts interlocutors. Refusal speech act cannot be separated from the background of the speech act by the user of the language. Learners whose mother tongue is Sundanese language has similarities with Japanese native speakers in making the speech act of refusal due to the proximity of the undak usuk in Sundanese with tainguu hyougen in Japanese. This study aims to determine the expressions of refusal used by Japanese learners then, through comparison with native speakers, to determine the similarities, differences and problems in the expression of rejection by the learners. The instrument used in this study is Discourse Completion Test (DCT). Form the analysis of the data it was found that there were similarities between learners and native speakers that {riyuu/iiwake}, {wabi}, {fuka} were used as the main semantic formula. There are similarities between learners whose mother tongue is Sundanese and native speakers in using language {wabi} to professors considered familiar (lower usage). The problem of expressions of refusal used by learners {fuka} in the form Futsuu fuka no hiteikei and {koshou} was in a fairly high frequency. In contrast, native speakers use fukanoukei, because using Futsuu no hiteikei will be considered as a strong/hard sense of refusal.Keywords: Kotowari hyougen, DCT, Tainguu hyougen


2000 ◽  
Vol 129-130 ◽  
pp. 225-274
Author(s):  
Ali Işik

The present study investigates the combined effects of different amounts of comprehension-based and form-focused instruction on skill-based proficiency and knowledge of grammatical structures of beginner-level efl students. Specifically, the study addresses the following research questions : 1) Does a basically comprehension-based program of instruction supported by form-focused instruction help beginner-level efl learners improve/develop their listening, reading and writing abilities more than a basically form- focused program of instruction? 2) Does a basically form-focused program of instruction help beginner-level efl learners improve their knowledge of grammatical structures more than a basically comprehension-based program of instruction? One experimental and one control group, each containing 20 lycee prep level Turkish efl students, participated in the study. The subjects in the experimental and control groups were randomly selected from among lycee prep classes in two different schools. The experimental group enrolled in a program of comprehension-based instruction supported by form- focused instruction; whereas, the control group enrolled in a basically form-focused program of instruction. Both the experimental and control groups had 29 hours of efl instruction per week for 36 weeks. Different instruments were used to see the effects of these two different types of instruction on their reading, listening, writing skills and knowledge of grammatical structures. At the end of the fourth month, both groups were given the listening, reading and writing components of the Key English Test (ket) and the grammar component of the Oxford Placement Test. At the end of the eighth month, they were given the Preliminary English Test (pet) and another version of the grammar component of the Oxford Placement Test. The results indicated that the program of comprehension-based efl instruction supported by form-focused instruction was more effective than a basically form-focused program of instruction in helping beginner-level students develop their listening, reading, and writing skills as well as their knowledge of grammatical structures.


2016 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 167
Author(s):  
Jalal H. Albaqshi

<p>This research explores the sequence of content in ESP curricula to our learners’ linguistic development and to authentic situations. This study has been conducted in Alahsa College of Technology, Saudi Arabia. Methodology used was an analysis of an ESP textbook in corpus-based approach and matching the units of the textbook to students' needs analysis of observed real life situation in a car workshop. Results show that the content of the textbook, to some extent, meet the course objectives and students' needs in technical terms with some shortage in expanding the activities to be a functional simulation of an authentic environment regarding conversational and written skills. <strong></strong></p>


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