The Impact of Instruction on the Pragmatic Comprehension of Speech Acts of Apology, Request, and Refusal Among Iranian Intermediate EFL Learners

Abstract

Theoretical and pedagogical attention in pragmatic competence and instruction for second- and foreign language learners has culminated in the growing body of literature on teaching pragmatics. Based on cognitively oriented second-language acquisition (SLA) theories, most studies on pragmatic intervention have primarily focused on dichotomous teaching approaches including explicit vs. implicit as well as inductive vs. deductive interventions. However, very few studies have capitalized on more dynamic teaching approaches taking advantage of authentic video-driven vignettes. Therefore, the present study sought to find out the impact of video-enhanced input on the comprehension of three speech acts of apology, request, and refusal on 69 (27 males and 42 females) Iranian intermediate EFL learners who were randomly divided into four homogenous groups (i.e., metapragmatic, form-search, interactive translation, and control) based on the results of the Oxford Quick Placement Test (OQPT). The four groups were accordingly exposed to 60 video vignettes (20 for each speech act) extracted from different episodes of Friends and Seinfeld sitcoms as well as Annie Hall movie for eight 60-min sessions of instruction twice a week. Results of the multiple-choice discourse completion test (MDCT) (Birjandi and Derakhshan Applied Research on English Language, 3(1), 67-85, 2014) revealed that metapragmatic consciousness-raising, form-search, and interactive translation groups led to the development of pragmatic comprehension from pretest to posttest. Furthermore, the results of the post hoc test of Tukey (HSD) demonstrated that while the form-search group had a better performance than interactive translation and control groups, the metapragmatic group outperformed the other treatment groups. In the light of the gained results, the findings might provide pedagogical implications for pragmatic practitioners and theoreticians as well as materials developers, teachers, and learners. Finally, it concludes with some avenues for further research.