The effect of instruction on learners’ use and negotiation of refusals

Abstract

Research into Interlanguage Pragmatics has often focused on the effect of instruction on speech act production. However, features related to the interactive nature of conversation are rarely used in most of the pedagogical proposals for teaching the speech acts. Considering research outcomes on the benefits of pragmatic instruction, the need to conduct pragmatic intervention at the discourse level (Felix-Brasdefer, 2006b; Kasper, 2006) and the value of audiovisual input as a source of pragmatic input (Alcon, 2007; Fernandez-Guerra, 2008; Martinez-Flor, 2008), the present study focuses on the effect of instruction on learners' use of refusal strategies and concern for pragmatics. Alcon's (forthcoming) pedagogical proposal for teaching the speech act of refusals at the discourse level is used during the instructional treatment. In addition, pragmatic input is provided for the present study by means of scenes from the series Stargate, which were controlled for speech act type (refusals to requests) and social distance (+ power and + social distance). Findings from the study support Schmidt's (1993, 1995, 2001) noticing hypothesis, thus providing further evidence that high levels of attention-drawing activities are helpful for pragmatic learning. In addition to the differences as regards learners' use of refusal strategies, learners' attempts to accommodate the non-compliant nature of the speech act of refusals seem to have also been influenced by the teaching of refusals at the discourse level.1 IntroductionResearch into Interlanguage Pragmatics (ILP) has often focused on speech act production. Speech acts such as requests, apologies, complaints and refusals have received a great deal of attention over the years, but most of these studies ignore the interactive nature of conversation in their analyses of speech acts. Similarly, features related to the interactive nature of conversation are rarely used in most of the pedagogical proposals for teaching the speech acts or in most studies on speech act instruction (Martinez-Flor and Alcon, 2007, on suggestions; Olshtain and Cohen, 1990, on apologies; Rose and Ng Kwai-Fun, 2001, on compliments and compliment responses; Alcon, 2005, 2008; Martinez-Flor, 2007; Safont, 2005, 2007; Salazar, 2007; Takahashi, 2001; Uso-Juan, 2007, on requests; Kondo, 2008, on refusals). In addition, although results of these studies support Schmidt's (1993, 1995, 2001) noticing hypothesis and provide evidence of the positive effect of instruction (see also Alcon and MartinezFlor, 2005, 2008; Codina, 2008; Jeon and Kaya, 2006; Rose and Kasper, 2001; Takahashi, 2010), they ignore the interactive nature of conversation and the potential of teaching pragmatics at the discourse level.In the case of refusals, and as reported by Gass and Houck (1999: 2), the complexity of the speech act requires face-saving manoeuvres to accommodate the non-compliant nature of the act. Most of the research on refusals has applied or adapted Beebe et a/.'s (1990) taxonomy, thereby focusing on semantic formulas, especially when dealing with learners or when contrasting NS and NNS use (see Al-Eryani, 2007; Al-Issa, 2003; AlKahtani, 2005; Felix-Brasdefer, 2003, 2006a; Geyang, 2007; Keshawarz, Eslami and Ghahraman, 2006; King and Silver, 1993; Kondo, 2001, 2008; Kwon, 2004; Salazar et al., 2009, among others). However, Felix-Brasdefer (2009) shows clearly that refusals function as a response to an initiating act and they are co-constructed by two or more interlocutors over multiple turns. In a similar line and in the area of language pedagogy, Felix-Brasdefer (2006b) and Alcon (forthcoming) present pedagogical models for teaching refusals at the discourse level. Felix-Brasdefer (2006b) presents three pedagogical sessions for teaching the negotiation of refusals across multiple turns in Spanish. The first one, communicative actions and cross-cultural awareness, focuses on cross-cultural awareness of refusing in English and Spanish, as well as providing pragmalinguistic input on refusals. …