Verbal irony, a form of figurative language, uses the discrepancy between a speaker’s intended meaning and the literal word meanings to achieve social goals. Yet, little research exists on individual differences that may disrupt irony understanding. Verbal irony may challenge shy children, who tend to interpret ambiguous stimuli as being threatening, and who have difficulties with mentalizing in social contexts. This study assessed whether shy children interpret ironic statements differently than do non-shy children. Children (8- to11-year-olds) listened to stories wherein one character made a statement to another character that was a literal or ironic criticism or a literal or ironic compliment. Children appraised the speaker’s belief and communicative intention. Shyness was assessed using self report measures of social anxiety symptoms and shy negative affect. Shy children did not differ from non-shy peers in comprehending speakers’ beliefs. However, shy children rated speakers who made ironic criticisms as being more mean than did children low in shyness. Thus, while understanding that speakers intended to communicate their true beliefs, shy children construed the social meaning of irony differently, indicating difficulties with pragmatics. Such subtle differences in pragmatic understanding may underlie some of the social difficulties facing shy children.

Verbal irony, a form of figurative language, uses the discrepancy between a speaker’s intended meaning and the literal word meanings to achieve social goals. Yet, little research exists on individual differences that may disrupt irony understanding. Verbal irony may challenge shy children, who tend to interpret ambiguous stimuli as being threatening, and who have difficulties with mentalizing in social contexts. This study assessed whether shy children interpret ironic statements differently than do non-shy children. Children (8- to11-year-olds) listened to stories wherein one character made a statement to another character that was a literal or ironic criticism or a literal or ironic compliment. Children appraised the speaker’s belief and communicative intention. Shyness was assessed using self report measures of social anxiety symptoms and shy negative affect. Shy children did not differ from non-shy peers in comprehending speakers’ beliefs. However, shy children rated speakers who made ironic criticisms as being more mean than did children low in shyness. Thus, while understanding that speakers intended to communicate their true beliefs, shy children construed the social meaning of irony differently, indicating difficulties with pragmatics. Such subtle differences in pragmatic understanding may underlie some of the social difficulties facing shy children.

Despite advances in medical technologies, interpersonal communication remains the primary tool physicians use to exchange information, make diagnoses, and treat patients (Cameron & Williams, 1997; Groopman, 2007; Ong, de Haes, Hoos, & Lammes, 1995). In the medical encounter effective communication between physician and patient is essential so that beneficial health and wellbeing outcomes are achieved for patients. Taking a discourse analytic approach, this study examined interactions occurring between international medical graduate (IMG) residents, attending physicians, and patients during the treatment advice phase of the supervised medical encounter. The aim of the study was to examine the co-constructed nature of the delivery and receipt of treatment advice and the ways in which physicians and patients managed interpersonal relations through the negotiated activity. The theoretical framework of pragmatic competence was utilized to underpin the study. Physician-patient interactions served as the primary data source. Medical encounter interactions between five different IMG residents and 31 patients were observed and audio-recorded. Observations and a post-medical encounter survey completed by patients served as secondary data sources. The analysis of the data revealed that this medical speech activity embedded within the medical encounter was realized through the use of a variety of discourse strategies and contributions from multiple participants as they attended to the interpersonal and transactional goals associated with the delivery and receipt of treatment advice. Findings provided insights into how multi-party discourse worked to jointly construct and negotiate treatment recommendations. Findings indicated that IMG residents utilized indirect advice giving strategies. Additionally, both IMG residents and patients utilized interrogatives in various ways to engage actively in the treatment decision-making process. Finally, the data revealed how the participants attended to each other's face needs as they worked to enhance, maintain, or challenge face through the dynamic process of negotiating relationships.

This study investigated how the speech act of refusal is realized in Egyptian Arabic by intermediate and advanced American learners of Arabic as a foreign language. It also compared the performance of the learners to that of native speakers of Egyptian Arabic and native speakers of American English. The study aimed to investigate the relationship between the learners' language proficiency and their pragmatic competence. In addition, it examined the extent of pragmatic transfer from L1 and whether there was a relationship between the degree of pragmatic transfer and the level of L2 proficiency. The study also examined how refusals are structured and organized at the discourse level. Four groups participated in the study: 10 native speakers of Egyptian Arabic, 10 native speakers of American English, 10 American learners of Arabic at the intermediate level, and 10 at the advanced level. Data were collected using enhanced open-ended role plays which consisted of 6 scenarios eliciting refusals of offers and requests in equal and unequal status situations. Both quantitative and qualitative data analytic methods were used for analyzing the interactions. Results show that there were important differences between the two learner groups and the native speakers of Egyptian Arabic with regard to the frequency of direct and indirect strategies and individual strategy use. For example, the learners used a higher percentage of direct strategies and a lower percentage of indirect strategies than the native speakers of Egyptian Arabic, especially in higher status situations. The learners also used a higher percentage of the Statement of Regret and Request for Information/Clarification strategies and a lower percentage of the Postponement and Hedging strategies than the Egyptians. With regard to differences between the two learner groups, the advanced students were able to engage in more negotiation and use an overall lower percentage of direct strategies and a higher percentage of indirect strategies than their intermediate counterparts. Evidence of positive and negative pragmatic transfer was observed in the two learner groups; however a higher degree of transfer was observed in the advanced students. Individual differences among the learners were found to play a major role in how refusals were realized.

The present study investigates pragmatic transfer by Chinese learners of English as a foreign language (EFL) at low and high proficiency levels in email requests. Data was elicited using an email production questionnaire consisting of four email situations, which vary along two social dimensions: relative power, either equal or higher, and size of imposition, either big or small. Four groups of participants, who were all university students, took part in the study. Thirty-seven Chinese native speakers of Mandarin and 35 Australian native speakers of English provided the baseline data. Thirty-five Chinese EFL learners at low proficiency level and 38 Chinese EFL learners at high proficiency level provided the target data. Altogether 580 emails were collected. Data was classified according to an adapted version of the coding scheme developed by Blum-Kulka et al. (1989). Email requests were analyzed at both the utterance and discourse levels. At the utterance level, directness level, strategy types and internal modifiers were examined. At the discourse level, external modifiers, including all the supportive moves in the opening, body, and closing of an email request were analyzed. Following Beebe et al. (1990), data was looked at in terms of the frequency, content and average number of pragmatic features. Both qualitative and quantitative analysis methods were adopted. To determine evidence of pragmatic transfer, first, the Chinese baseline data and the English baseline data were compared. The EFL data was then compared with that of the two baseline groups. Pragmatic transfer was confirmed if the EFL data resembled the Chinese baseline data but differed from the English baseline data. In addition, the instances of pragmatic transfer displayed by the EFL groups at low and high proficiency levels were compared to examine the correlation between pragmatic transfer and language proficiency, that is, whether pragmatic transfer increases or decreases as learners’ language proficiency increases. Pragmatic transfer was investigated on both pragmalinguistic and sociopragmatic levels. Findings of the present study show that pragmalinguistic and sociopragmatic transfer occurred at the utterance and the discourse levels in all three areas: the frequency, content and average number of pragmatic features, by both the low and high proficiency EFL learners. Moreover, a comparison of the performance of requests by the two learner groups indicates that the high proficiency learners had a greater amount of pragmatic transfer than the low proficiency learners. The findings of this study lend strong support to the positive correlation hypothesis proposed by T. Takahashi and Beebe (1987). The findings of the present study highlight the importance of the inclusion of pragmatic components in foreign language teaching. Pedagogical implications of the findings are discussed. Possible suggestions regarding how to improve the EFL learners’ pragmatic competence are provided.

The present study investigates pragmatic transfer by Chinese learners of English as a foreign language (EFL) at low and high proficiency levels in email requests. Data was elicited using an email production questionnaire consisting of four email situations, which vary along two social dimensions: relative power, either equal or higher, and size of imposition, either big or small. Four groups of participants, who were all university students, took part in the study. Thirty-seven Chinese native speakers of Mandarin and 35 Australian native speakers of English provided the baseline data. Thirty-five Chinese EFL learners at low proficiency level and 38 Chinese EFL learners at high proficiency level provided the target data. Altogether 580 emails were collected. Data was classified according to an adapted version of the coding scheme developed by Blum-Kulka et al. (1989). Email requests were analyzed at both the utterance and discourse levels. At the utterance level, directness level, strategy types and internal modifiers were examined. At the discourse level, external modifiers, including all the supportive moves in the opening, body, and closing of an email request were analyzed. Following Beebe et al. (1990), data was looked at in terms of the frequency, content and average number of pragmatic features. Both qualitative and quantitative analysis methods were adopted. To determine evidence of pragmatic transfer, first, the Chinese baseline data and the English baseline data were compared. The EFL data was then compared with that of the two baseline groups. Pragmatic transfer was confirmed if the EFL data resembled the Chinese baseline data but differed from the English baseline data. In addition, the instances of pragmatic transfer displayed by the EFL groups at low and high proficiency levels were compared to examine the correlation between pragmatic transfer and language proficiency, that is, whether pragmatic transfer increases or decreases as learners’ language proficiency increases. Pragmatic transfer was investigated on both pragmalinguistic and sociopragmatic levels. Findings of the present study show that pragmalinguistic and sociopragmatic transfer occurred at the utterance and the discourse levels in all three areas: the frequency, content and average number of pragmatic features, by both the low and high proficiency EFL learners. Moreover, a comparison of the performance of requests by the two learner groups indicates that the high proficiency learners had a greater amount of pragmatic transfer than the low proficiency learners. The findings of this study lend strong support to the positive correlation hypothesis proposed by T. Takahashi and Beebe (1987). The findings of the present study highlight the importance of the inclusion of pragmatic components in foreign language teaching. Pedagogical implications of the findings are discussed. Possible suggestions regarding how to improve the EFL learners’ pragmatic competence are provided.

The present study investigates pragmatic transfer by Chinese learners of English as a foreign language (EFL) at low and high proficiency levels in email requests. Data was elicited using an email production questionnaire consisting of four email situations, which vary along two social dimensions: relative power, either equal or higher, and size of imposition, either big or small. Four groups of participants, who were all university students, took part in the study. Thirty-seven Chinese native speakers of Mandarin and 35 Australian native speakers of English provided the baseline data. Thirty-five Chinese EFL learners at low proficiency level and 38 Chinese EFL learners at high proficiency level provided the target data. Altogether 580 emails were collected. Data was classified according to an adapted version of the coding scheme developed by Blum-Kulka et al. (1989). Email requests were analyzed at both the utterance and discourse levels. At the utterance level, directness level, strategy types and internal modifiers were examined. At the discourse level, external modifiers, including all the supportive moves in the opening, body, and closing of an email request were analyzed. Following Beebe et al. (1990), data was looked at in terms of the frequency, content and average number of pragmatic features. Both qualitative and quantitative analysis methods were adopted. To determine evidence of pragmatic transfer, first, the Chinese baseline data and the English baseline data were compared. The EFL data was then compared with that of the two baseline groups. Pragmatic transfer was confirmed if the EFL data resembled the Chinese baseline data but differed from the English baseline data. In addition, the instances of pragmatic transfer displayed by the EFL groups at low and high proficiency levels were compared to examine the correlation between pragmatic transfer and language proficiency, that is, whether pragmatic transfer increases or decreases as learners’ language proficiency increases. Pragmatic transfer was investigated on both pragmalinguistic and sociopragmatic levels. Findings of the present study show that pragmalinguistic and sociopragmatic transfer occurred at the utterance and the discourse levels in all three areas: the frequency, content and average number of pragmatic features, by both the low and high proficiency EFL learners. Moreover, a comparison of the performance of requests by the two learner groups indicates that the high proficiency learners had a greater amount of pragmatic transfer than the low proficiency learners. The findings of this study lend strong support to the positive correlation hypothesis proposed by T. Takahashi and Beebe (1987). The findings of the present study highlight the importance of the inclusion of pragmatic components in foreign language teaching. Pedagogical implications of the findings are discussed. Possible suggestions regarding how to improve the EFL learners’ pragmatic competence are provided.

The present study investigates pragmatic transfer by Chinese learners of English as a foreign language (EFL) at low and high proficiency levels in email requests. Data was elicited using an email production questionnaire consisting of four email situations, which vary along two social dimensions: relative power, either equal or higher, and size of imposition, either big or small. Four groups of participants, who were all university students, took part in the study. Thirty-seven Chinese native speakers of Mandarin and 35 Australian native speakers of English provided the baseline data. Thirty-five Chinese EFL learners at low proficiency level and 38 Chinese EFL learners at high proficiency level provided the target data. Altogether 580 emails were collected. Data was classified according to an adapted version of the coding scheme developed by Blum-Kulka et al. (1989). Email requests were analyzed at both the utterance and discourse levels. At the utterance level, directness level, strategy types and internal modifiers were examined. At the discourse level, external modifiers, including all the supportive moves in the opening, body, and closing of an email request were analyzed. Following Beebe et al. (1990), data was looked at in terms of the frequency, content and average number of pragmatic features. Both qualitative and quantitative analysis methods were adopted. To determine evidence of pragmatic transfer, first, the Chinese baseline data and the English baseline data were compared. The EFL data was then compared with that of the two baseline groups. Pragmatic transfer was confirmed if the EFL data resembled the Chinese baseline data but differed from the English baseline data. In addition, the instances of pragmatic transfer displayed by the EFL groups at low and high proficiency levels were compared to examine the correlation between pragmatic transfer and language proficiency, that is, whether pragmatic transfer increases or decreases as learners’ language proficiency increases. Pragmatic transfer was investigated on both pragmalinguistic and sociopragmatic levels. Findings of the present study show that pragmalinguistic and sociopragmatic transfer occurred at the utterance and the discourse levels in all three areas: the frequency, content and average number of pragmatic features, by both the low and high proficiency EFL learners. Moreover, a comparison of the performance of requests by the two learner groups indicates that the high proficiency learners had a greater amount of pragmatic transfer than the low proficiency learners. The findings of this study lend strong support to the positive correlation hypothesis proposed by T. Takahashi and Beebe (1987). The findings of the present study highlight the importance of the inclusion of pragmatic components in foreign language teaching. Pedagogical implications of the findings are discussed. Possible suggestions regarding how to improve the EFL learners’ pragmatic competence are provided.

L'un des objectifs de l'enseignement d'une langue est de rendre les apprenants conscients de la façon d'utiliser cette langue en fonction de leurs objectifs communicationnels. Cette compétence relève du champ de la pragmatique. Cette recherche porte sur l'enseignement de la pragmatique dans un contexte d’Anglais de Spécialité (ASP), à savoir la Faculté de médecine à l'Université de Taiz. Elle étudie le niveau de compétence pragmatique chez les étudiants en médecine dans le but de l’intégrer dans la salle de classe. L'étude fait appel à une enquête par questionnaire composé de “Discourse Completion Tasks” afin d'examiner la capacité des étudiants à produire des actes de langage, et d’un test de conscience visant à mesurer leur capacité à identifier les énoncés appropriés et inappropriés. L'interview est un autre outil que nous avons conçu pour explorer les perceptions des étudiants diplômés envers la compétence pragmatique. Une approche qualitative et quantitative est adoptée pour l’analyse des données. Les résultats de l'étude montrent que les étudiants ont un niveau de compétence pragmatique faible en ce qui concerne la production et aussi la conscience pragmatique. De plus, les étudiants ont fait preuve d'une réceptivité accrue quant à l'importance de la compétence pragmatique. Par conséquent, un modèle provisoire est proposé pour favoriser l’intégration de cette compétence en ayant recours à une série télévisée qui pourrait les motiver à apprendre l'anglais. / One of the goals of teaching a language is to make learners aware of how to use it to serve a communicative purpose. This lies within the scope of pragmatic competence. This research deals with teaching pragmatics in a context of English for Specific Purposes (ESP), namely the faculty of medicine at Taiz University. It investigates medical students’ level of pragmatic competence with the ultimate aim of integrating it in the classroom. The study makes use of a questionnaire composed of a Discourse Completion Task to examine students’ ability to produce speech acts and an awareness test to measure their ability to identify appropriate and inappropriate utterances. The other tool is an interview conducted to explore graduate students’ perceptions towards pragmatic competence. The data are analysed qualitatively and quantitatively. The study findings reveal a low level of pragmatic competence among students in the production and awareness levels. Besides, a positive tendency is shown towards the importance of pragmatic competence. Accordingly, a tentative model is proposed to incorporate pragmatic competence with the help of a medical TV show which will keep them motivated in learning English.

International teaching assistants (ITAs) are considered advanced English users with relatively high standardized language proficiency test scores. However, they may experience difficulties during their interactions with undergraduate students. Some of these difficulties may arise from affective factors such as ambiguity, stress, and adjustment and can impact language use. From an individual differences perspective, a second language user with high communication anxiety may have difficulty comprehending or producing appropriate pragmalinguistic forms. Using a mixed-methods approach, this study examined the underlying factors in ITAs communication anxiety and willingness to communicate in the US classroom and how these factors explained their pragmatic competence, which refers to the ability to use language in socially appropriate ways. A total of 289 ITAs participated in the study. To measure their judgement of appropriateness, a pragmatic appropriateness test was designed. The speech act production was elicited through a discourse completion test. Two survey instruments were designed to measure ITAs’ classroom communication anxiety and willingness to communicate. The major underlying factors from the exploratory factor analysis performed on the survey responses were ‘ease of communication,’ classroom management anxiety,’ ‘fear of warning,’ and ‘willingness to interact with students’. A six-predictor multiple regression analysis revealed that linguistic competence was the most important factor contributing to pragmatic competence. Other factors such as ease of communication and willingness to communicate positively correlated with pragmatic competence. In addition to quantitative data, qualitative data were collected in the form of classroom observations, field notes, and interviews from a group of ITAs (N = 4) who had also participated in the quantitative part of the study. The analysis of the qualitative data revealed that the situational context of instruction determined the particular communication patterns in different disciplines, specifically the impact of threat posed to the negative and positive face of the discourse participants. Additionally, in conjunction with the quantitative findings, while the ITAs seemed to be generally willing to interact with students, teacher-fronted talk in the form of delivering lectures and self-talk especially in large classes was found to be anxiety-inducing for some of them. Length of residence and opportunities for communication seemed to influence the process of adjustment and acquisition of the classroom pragmatic norms. Finally, ITAs’ perceptions and beliefs about appropriateness seemed to affect their pragmatic performance in the classroom. More specifically, ITAs’ perspectives on education and communication such as moderating the power variable in class and building rapport and interpersonal relationships with students through casual talk seemed to guide their choices of pragmalinguistic forms and politeness strategies. The study offered a number of implications for ITA research and training.