Pragmatic Transfer in Prognosis Communication to Patients with Cancer by Chinese and Thai Oncologists

Abstract

To identify Chinese and Thai oncologists’ pragmatic transfer from L1s (Chinese and Thai) to English when delivering prognostic information to patients at different stages of cancer, this study adopts written discourse completion tasks (DCTs) and semi-structured interviews for analysis. The findings indicate that English proficiency does not directly lead to pragmatic transfer from L1s (Chinese and Thai) to English in this study. But the factor of culture, including the perceptions of death and Thai people’s religious belief, influences Chinese and Thai oncologists’ language uses and results in positive pragmatic transfer from L1s to English. Furthermore, the factor of the residence in English language community, the language input from American TV series, and the current environment of medical care in China and Thailand are also associated with oncologists’ pragmatic development.