The significance of producing socially appropriate utterances, not just linguistically correct ones, has given rise to a plethora of studies on speech acts. In this regard, the performance of second and foreign language learners against the norms of the target language and the factors affecting them have yet to be thoroughly investigated. To…

Prosody communicates pragmatic meaning far beyond that which is evident at the surface level of an utterance and can pose challenges to learners' pragmatic comprehension. The current study investigated how second language (L2) English learners made decisions about speaker intent when communicated through prosody. Seventeen English L2 learners took…

Recently, the field of instructed pragmatics has seen a shift of paradigm from the prevailing cognitive approaches to socially-oriented ones, revolving around the notions like collaborative dialogue and sociocultural theory. Drawing on the notion of collaborative dialogue, this study investigates the extent to which teacher's scaffolding and…

This study explores the construct validity of speaking tasks included in the TOEFL iBT (e.g., integrated and independent speaking tasks). Specifically, advanced natural language processing (NLP) tools, MANOVA difference statistics, and discriminant function analyses (DFA) are used to assess the degree to which and in what ways responses to these…

This study investigates the effect of instruction on the acquisition of pragmatic routines used in academic discussion, specifically expressions of agreement, disagreement, and clarification. Thirty-seven learners, including an experimental group of 26 students and a control group of 11 students, participated in the study. Five intact classes…

Swain's Output Hypothesis proposes a facilitative effect for output on the acquisition of second language morphosyntax. In the context of classroom instruction, a number of studies and reviews suggest that explicit instruction in pragmatic elements promotes development. Other studies have offered less conclusive evidence of the effectiveness of…

In this study, the performance of apologies among 20 non-native speakers (NNSs) of English and 20 native speakers (NSs) of English was examined. Two questions were addressed: How did NNSs' apologies compare with NSs' in identical situations? What relationship existed between the performance of apologies by NNSs and Test of English as a Foreign…