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20© Chen, Shu-hui Eileen, and Shu-Chu Chen 2007
Research article
This open access article is distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0).
English proficiency and topic effect in compliment response behaviors by Chinese EFL learners: transfer effect revisited
Shu-hui Eileen Chen1, Shu-Chu Chen2
1 National Taipei University of Education, Taiwan.
E-mail: shuchen@ms7.hinet.net
2 National Yunlin University of Science and Technology, National Cheng-Chi University, Taiwan.
E-mail: chensc@yuntech.edu.tw
This study investigated the effects of English proficiency and topic on compliment response by Taiwanese EFL learners in Taiwan, and to explore potential transfer patterns by using DCT (Discourse Completion Test) questionnaire. Subjects consisted of four groups: 20 Chinese native speakers, 20 English native speakers, 20 Chinese EFL learners with higher English proficiency, and 20 Chinese EFL learners with lower English proficiency. The results showed that: (1) there was significant difference in English Compliment strategies between Chinese EFL learners with higher proficiency and native English speakers, as well as between native English speakers and native Chinese speakers in Taiwan, but no significant difference was found between Chinese EFL learners with lower proficiency and native English speakers; (2) English proficiency influences Compliment strategy; (3) topic affects English compliment response strategies to a great extent. Chinese EFL learners and native English speakers adjusted their compliment response strategies in different situations. The perceptions of the social variables bear similarities and differences between Chinese EFL learners and native English speakers; (4) different transfer patterns other than position and negative transfer were found in the selection of English compliment response. There were interlanguage variations in English compliment response strategies in Chinese EFL learners.
Received: 10 February 2007
Reviewing editor: Andrey G. Kirillov Accepted: 1 March 2007
Published online: 15 March 2007
Abstract
Keywords
compliment response; proficiency; transfer
For citation
Chen, Shu-Hui Eileen, and Shu-Chu Chen. 2007. "English proficiency and topic effect in compliment response behaviors by Chinese EFL learners: transfer effect revisited." Language. Text. Society 1 (1): e27-e42. https://ltsj.online/2007-01-l-chen-chen-02. (Journal title at the time of publication: SamaraAltLinguo E-Journal.)
1. INTRODUCTION
Since Hymes (1972) introduced the notion of communicative competence including speakers' knowledge of the linguistic rules as well as the sociocultural norms for appropriate use, there has been a growing interest in empirical research in speech act studies. As international interaction becomes increasingly intense in this modern global village, language use in speech act performance in cross-cultural communication deserves greater emphasis. It has been noted that failure to use language appropriately in performing speech acts cross-culturally, which constitute one of the most essential communicative components in our daily life, may lead to communication breakdown. As language learners develop their language, they need to learn how to perform speech act appropriately in the target community. For the speech act of compliment response to be carried out satisfactorily, L2 language learners need to learn not only new means for its realization to avoid pragmalinguistic errors (Thomas 1983), but also to acquire the mapping of form (linguistic realization) and reflected socio-cultural values and function in the target language to avoid sociopragmatic errors (Thomas 1983; Kasper, 1989). Studies on the development of pragmatic competence in this aspect, however, were not adequately addressed in the framework of modern linguistic studies in language learners' grammar system in the past. As pragmatic competence constitutes essential elements in language competence, to increase the explanatory power of language use phenomenon, there is need to extend the scope of modern linguistic studies by incorporating pragmatics studies into the description of learner's grammar. Hence, more empirical studies on the development of language learners' grammar system by focusing on their pragmatic development becomes valuable.
During these recent years, following cross-linguistic studies on speech act realization patterns by Blum-Kulka et al. (1984), there have been a wide range of cross-cultural studies on speech act realizations in various languages such as request (Cohen and Olshtain 1993; Fukushima 1990; Blum-Kulka and House 1989; Faerch and Kasper 1989; Blum-Kulka 1982, 1983, 1987), compliments (Herbert 1989; Holmes 1986, 1988, 1989; Manes 1983; Wolfson 1983; Herbert and Straight 1989; Ye 1995; Knapp, Hopper and Bell 1984), compliment response (Chen 1993; Yu 2003; Ye 1995), apologies (Olshtain 1983; Kasper 1989; Cohen and Olshtain 1981; Edmondson 1992; Frescura 1993; Trosborg 1987; Holmes 1989; Zuskin 1993), refusals (Beebe and Cummings 1985; Takahashi and Beebe 1987; Tickle 1991). These cross-cultural speech act studies have shown that there is cross-linguistic and cross-cultural differences in the realization and selection patterns in speech act performance despite some claim for cross-cultural universality (Austin 1962; Searle 1969, 1975; Brown and Levinson 1978, 1987). For example, studies on compliment response, among others, indicated that there were cross-linguistic and
cross-cultural differences between Chinese and English in the selection of compliment response strategies and the function compliment response fulfills in different cultures (Chen 1993; Ye 1995; Herbert 1989; Holmes 1988, Yu 2003).
Generally, due to differences in the concept of politeness, English-speakers produced more acceptance strategies and fewer rejection forms to anoint to the complimenter's positive face whereas Chinese speakers use more no-acceptance strategies and fewer acceptance forms to show modesty (Brown and Levinson 1987; Leech 1983; Pomerantz 1978; Yu 2003; Chen 1993; Herbert 1989, 1990; Holmes 1988, Gu 1990; Mao 1994). The differences in the selection and function of compliment response between English-speaking and Chinese-speaking people may cause cross-cultural misunderstanding.
In studies of compliment and compliment response, the effect of contextual factors of social variables have been shown to affect the patterning of speech act behaviors, and may interact with each other (Manes 1983; Holmes 1986; Wolfson 1983; Beebe, Takahashi and Uliss-Weltz 1990; Takahashi and Beebe 1987; Daikuhara 1986; Lee 1990; Herbert 1990, 1991; Ye 1995). For example, the way how compliment is interpreted depends, to a great extent, on what the topic is, and how the compliment topic is valued. Given specific compliment topic situation when compliments were perceived as an expression of solidarity among status-equals, compliments tend to be accepted. Whereas in other topic situations when compliments were perceived as face-threatening act, mitigating or rejecting might be employed. Manes (1983) and Holmes (1986) found that the most frequently occurring topics in American English were compliments on personal appearance and accomplishments. Compliments on food or possessions were, on the other hand, found common in speakers of Hawaii Creole English speakers and Polish speakers (Lee 1990; Herbert 1991). Hence, compliments on acquisition of this kind were directed to the social ability rather than the personal judgment on the complimentee. In Chinese society, however, compliments on performance/ability is more common than on appearance/possession (Ye 1995). In Chinese society, more emphasis is placed on the virtues of people and qualities of individuals rather than on good looks (Yang 1987). As Chinese society is a culture, which upholds morality, moderation, and modesty, people may use more rejection to show modesty when complimented on performance/ability, particularly with the complimenter with higher status (Chen 2003). At any rate, the way how people respond to compliments is constrained by the weight of interacting social variables, and the functions that were imposed in specific social situations. The value and weightiness of compliment topics vary cross-culturally. Hence, for the speech act of L2 compliment response to be carried out satisfactorily, L2 learners need to learn the mapping of form (linguistic realization) and reflected socio-cultural values and function in the target language.
During these recent years, transfer phenomenon, i.e., the influence of non-native language users' L1 pragmatic knowledge on linguistic action in L2, has been a focal concern in studies on interlanguage pragmatics (Kasper 1992, for review). Sociopragmatic transfer has been found to operate in learners' perceptions of contextual factors, such as status (Beebe, Takahashi and Uliss-Weltz 1990; Takahashi and Beebe 1993; Blum-Kulka 1982; Thomas 1983; Eisenstein and Bodman 1986; Faerch and Kasper 1989; Shih 1986); assessment whether carrying out a particular linguistic action is socially appropriate, and the overall politeness style adapted in an encounter in specific social situation. While it is a virtually uncontested assumption that nonnative speakers'
linguistic action may be influenced by their L1 sociopragmatic knowledge, however, it remains unclear how the both transfer (Odlin 1989; Wolfson 1989a; Beebe, Takahashi and Uliss-Weltz 1990; Selinker 1983), and the conditions of pragmatic transfer (transferability) interacting with nonstructural context-dependent factors, such as topic and learning context, etc. (Tannen 1985; Scollon and Scollon 1983; Daikuhara 1986; Herbert 1990, Holmes 1988; Wolfson 1983, 1989a; Take 1994; Yu 1999) can involve complex interplay with learner factors, such as proficiency (Takahashi and Beebe 1987; Olshtain and Cohen 1989; Blum-Kulka 1991; Maeshiba, Yoshinaga, Kasper and Ross 1996; Robinson 1992; Wildner-Bassett 1994).
Some previous studies on interlanguage pragmatics has offered some account for the positive role proficiency plays in pragmatic transfer. Blum-Kulka (1982) reported that their Canadian learners of Hebrew did not transfer indirect request strategies to Hebrew as much as might have been expected due to lack of sufficient L2 knowledge necessary to implement indirectness. Maeshiba et al. (1996) reported that advanced Japanese learners of English showed more pragmatic transfer in their election of apologizing strategies than intermediate learners. A study done by Takahashi (1992) on request strategies by Japanese ESL learners suggested the distinct difference perceived between low and high proficiency learners in the transferability of conventional indirectness. However, Trosborg (1987) examined proficiency effect on learners' performance of apology, and found that only the use of modality markers increased with higher proficiency, but not in the use of apology strategy. Eisenstein and Bodman (1986) reported, from their study on gratitude, that lack of culturally relevant schemata irrespective of linguistic proficiency might encourage or inhibit pragmatic transfer. In other words, there is interaction between proficiency and other factors as well. The interaction effect remains to be further examined.
So far, although there is a growing research in interlanguage pragmatics on the speech acts of requests, refusal, apologies, compliments to address the issues of pragmatic transfer, there was, nevertheless, limited number of studies specifically targeted for L2 learners' compliment response, an understudied speech act (Yu 1999; Baba 1999). To better understand transfer effect in L2 speech act performance, there is need to conduct more studies on compliment response. In addition, despite valuable findings reported in previous limited literature on compliment response, there were some inadequacies. First, none of the L2 studies investigated the effect of compliment topic of appearance/possession vs. performance/ability, one of the most influential social variable influencing the selection of compliment response strategies between English-speaking and Chinese-speaking societies (Manes 1983; Holmes 1986, 1988; Ye 1995; Yu 1999; Wolfson 1989a). Without taking the effect of topic into effect, how transfer and transferability interacts with nonstructural factors in L2 compliment responses can not be fully understood. Secondly, as shown in previous cross-linguistic studies, there were intra-lingual inconsistencies within the varieties of English-speaking and Chinese-speaking speech communities respectively (Kasper 1992; Herbert 1989; Holmes 1988; Knapp, Hopper and Bell 1984). The inconsistency lies in the distribution of preferred acceptance forms vs. amendment forms in English-speaking speech community, as revealed from studies by Herbert (1989), Holmes (1988), and Knapp et al. (1984), and predominant use of rejection vs. amendment forms in Chinese-speaking speech community, as suggested by Chen (1993), Ye (1995), and Yu (2003). There is a serious question raised about what should constitute a target variety as the target norm to serve as a baseline for
comparison. By including control data both from native Chinese speakers and native English speakers collected synchronously in the target speech community, how EFL learners' performance is related to L1 or L2 can be more informative, and revealing. Thirdly, different types of transfer patterns, including differentiation, amalgamation, which have been reported as potential sources of interlanguage variation in language processing (Harrington 1987; Hernandez, Bates and Avila 1994; Liu, Bates and Li 1992; Su 2001) awaits to be examined in interlanguage speech act performance. The present study is intended to investigate L2 compliment response behaviors by Chinese EFL learners, with different English proficiency levels, to examine potential transfer pattern as it interacts with topic. The findings of the present study will help obtain a more clear picture of pragmatic transfer occurring as it interacts with nonstructural and learner-internal factors in L2 speech act performance. The research questions that will be addressed are as follows:
1. Are there cross-cultural differences in the selection of compliment response strategies used by native English speakers, Chinese EFL learners and native Chinese speakers in Taiwan?
2. How do Chinese EFL learners vary their L2 compliment response strategies as a function of English proficiency?
3. How does the social variable of topic affect the selection of L2 compliment response strategies by Chinese EFL learners?
4. What are potential transfer patterns occurring in L2 compliment response by Chinese EFL learners? What are the similarities and differences between Chinese L2 learner's perception of contextual factors of status, & topic and that of native English speakers in L2 compliment response?
2. METHODOLOGY
The study will mainly be carried out through the experimental methodology by using a written DCT (Discourse Completion Test) questionnaire, following the work of Blum-Kulka et al. (1984, 1989) and Chen (2003). Although DCT methods have been criticized for not being able to fully reflect the real speech behavior in authentic context by some researchers (Beebe and Cummings 1985; Wolfson, Marmor and Jones 1989), it is, nevertheless, the most commonly used way in the studies of interlanguage pragmatics in that it can help obtain a large amount of relevant data in a short time period and to achieve systematic variations along the designated social factors (Cohen and Olshtain 1994; Blum-Kulka and House 1989). The research design for this study is described as follows:
2.1. Subjects
Subjects will consist of four groups: 2 monolingual control groups (20 Chinese native speakers, and 20 English native speakers), and 2 bilingual groups (20 Chinese EFL college students with higher English proficiency, and 20 Chinese EFL college students with lower English proficiency). The monolingual Chinese native speakers know little English while 20 English native speakers who know little Chinese, and had been exposed to Chinese-speaking environment for no
more than half a year. The grouping of Chinese bilingual EFL college students into higher proficiency group and lower proficiency group will be based on the scores of English Proficiency Test.
Monolingual controls
Twenty Chinese adult native speakers and 20 English adult native speakers participated in the experiment in their native language only. The two monolingual groups represented the standard against which we compare performance by bilingual subjects on compliment response strategy in the English and Chinese version respectively. This helps further explore the potential transfer effect as a function of English proficiency.
Chinese EFL college bilinguals
Chinese EFL college subjects were selected from college freshmen, from National Taipei Teachers College. They do not have any learning difficulty, and are with similar middle-class socio-economic background. In the first phase, they were asked to take English Proficiency Test with reliability and validity to determine their English proficiency level.
2.2. Stimuli
In the questionnaire, 8 daily life events were described, 4 for the situation in which compliment topic is on appearance/possession between status equals (hereafter S=A), and 4 for the situations in which compliment topic is on performance/ability between status equals (hereafter S=P). The situations were about the events that easily take place in real life situations. The independent variables are proficiency, and topic in different social situations. Under the description of each situation, there was a blank space saved for writing down what our subjects would say in each situation. To avoid the potential effects of fixed response patterns, no situations with the same topic parameter were presented in sequence. The following Table 1 presents the design of the variables:
Table 1. Design of the variables
Situation Status of complimenter Compliment topic
S1 new watch Equal Appearance/Possession
S4 - 2 score Equal Performance/Ability
S5 - 3 room Equal Appearance/Possession
S7 - 4 dress Equal Appearance/Possession
S9 - 5 competition Equal Performance/Ability
S11 - 6 jigsaw puzzle Equal Performance/Ability
S14 - 7 appearance Equal Appearance/Possession
S16 - 8 test Equal Performance/Ability
Native English speakers and Chinese EFL learners will be asked to fill out the English version of the questionnaire whereas Chinese monolinguals were asked to fill out the Chinese version of the questionnaire.
2.3. Procedures
Subjects were asked to provide more than response, which they find socially appropriate.
2.4. Coding and data analysis
Based on previous research by Herbert (1989), Holmes (1988), and Yu (2003), and Chen (2003), subjects' responses in the present study will basically be coded by the following super strategies: Acceptance strategies (appreciation, agreement, gladness, association), Amendment strategies (return, downgrade, explaining, offer of object or assistance, joking, questioning, association), Rejecting & Denigrating (disagreement, qualification, diverge, association), Face-relationship related response, and no response. The overall frequency occurrences of super strategies and the percentage each accounted for among the total were calculated for further analysis and comparison.
After all the responses have been checked, the number of each type of strategy will be calculated, and summed. The data will then pooled for subsequent analyses. ANOVAs and Chi-square tests will be conducted to examine difference sources with Probabilities up to 0.05 considered as significant. Types of transfer pattern will be determined by the following criteria as adopted from Kasper (1992). Lack of statistically significant differences in the frequencies of a pragmatic feature in L1, L2 and IL can be operationally defined as positive transfer. Statistically significant differences in the frequencies of a pragmatic feature between IL-L2 and L1-L2 and lack of statistically significant differences between IL and L1 can be operationally defined as negative transfer. Statistical result that goes beyond the domain as identified by the criteria will be further explored to determine different potential types of transfer effect in interlanguage pragmatics.
Potential Transfer patterns were identified by comparing percentage of each superstrategy used in each of the four social conditions (S=A, S=P) by two groups of EFL learners respectively between each pair among L1, IL, and L2. Various types of transfer patterns that have been observed include: positive transfer, negative transfer, language differentiation, language amalgamation, and interlanguage variations.
3. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
The data of native English speakers and native Chinese speakers was first compared in terms of each superstrategy. The result of Chi-square tests showed that there are similarities and significant differences between the two groups. The synchronous data indicated that there are cross-linguistic similarities and differences between American English and Taiwanese Chinese speakers. To address research question 1, based on this premise, the data of native English speakers and two groups of Chinese EFL learners were then pooled for analyses through the use of ANOVAs with repeated measures on two factors (group, and strategy type) to evaluate the
main effects of group and strategy type as well as interactional factors. Probabilities up to 0.05 were considered as significant. The result of ANOVA with repeated measure showed that the main effect of group and strategy type as well as the interaction effect of group x strategy type were significant (p < 0.05). Further post hoc tests indicated that the difference in the selection of compliment response strategies between higher proficiency EFL learners (hereafter HEP) and native English speakers (hereafter NES) was significant. However, there was no significant difference between lower proficiency EFL learners (hereafter LEP) and native English speakers. To further identify the source of difference in each strategy type, one-way ANOVA with repeated measure was conducted for each type of 13 super strategies (coded from A to M). The results indicated that for strategy A (Accepting), there was difference in frequency distribution between LEP and HEP (p < 0.05), between NES and HEP (p < 0.001). The former in each pair used significantly more Accepting strategy than the latter. LEP used significantly more Accepting strategy than HEP (p < 0.05), and NES used significantly more Accepting strategy than HEP (p < 0.001). However, there was no significant difference between LEP and NES. It seemed that due to the lower English proficiency, LEP tended to use Accepting strategies by resorting to simple linguistic expressions of thanking, which accounts for higher percentage of Accepting strategy. This partly explained why LEP would employ higher percentage of Accepting strategy than HEP. Compared with Chinese EFL learners, NES used much more Accepting super strategy. Brown and Levinson's positive face concept helps account for the behaviors why Americans tended to accept compliments by anointing to the complimenter's desire to be approved.
For strategy B (Returning), there was no significant difference between each pair of groups. For strategy C (Mitigating), there was significant difference in the performance between HEP and LEP (p < 0.05), as well as between HEP and NES (p < 0.001). The former in each pair used significantly more Mitigating strategy than the latter. HEP used more Mitigating strategy than LEP (p < 0.05), and HEP used significantly more Mitigating strategy than NES (p < 0.001). However, there was no significant difference between LEP and NES though the former employed more Mitigating strategies than the latter. Compared with Americans, Chinese EFL learners adopted much more Mitigating super strategy. To downgrade the force of accepting compliments, Chinese EFL learners used Mitigating super strategy to get out of the dilemma of being considered as arrogant., which would be regarded as impolite in Chinese society, where the value of modesty is highly valued.
For strategy D (Rejecting and Denigrating), there was significant difference between HEP and NES (p < 0.001), and between NES and LEP (p < 0.05). Under the influence of western culture through English learning experience, Chinese EFL learners did not predominantly resort to Rejecting strategy as reported in Chen (1993).
The significant difference in the use of strategy J (Returning & Mitigating) was found between HEP and NES (p < 0.05). HEP used significantly more Returning & Mitigating than NES. However, in the use of other types of combined strategies, no significant difference was found between each pair of the 3 groups in the use of strategy E (Accepting & Mitigating), strategy F (Mitigating & Explaining), strategy G (Accepting & Rejecting), strategy H (Rejecting & Returning), strategy I (Accepting & Returning), strategy K (Accepting & Mitigating & Returning), strategy L (Rejecting & Mitigating & Returning). In sum, generally speaking, all the 3 groups tend to accept
rather than reject compliments when the superstrategies containing the element of acceptance were collapsed as the superstrategy of Accepting in general.
The following section presented the most frequently used super strategies among the three groups. The type of super strategies whose percentage of strategy use was above the average, i.e. 7.69 %, were considered as the most frequently used super strategies. For HEP, the most frequently used strategies, among the 13 types of super strategies, included, in the descending order of percentage, Mitigating (45.14%), Accepting (34.8%), Accepting & Mitigating (32.6%), and Returning (10%). For LEP, they included, in the descending order of percentage, Accepting (35.79%), Mitigating (24.73%), Accepting & Mitigating (16.9%), and Returning (7.68%). For NES, they included, in the descending order of percentage, Accepting (41.57%), Accepting & Mitigating (24.97%), Mitigating (13.28%) as well as Rejecting & Denigrating (13.28%).
Since the situations were embedded with different kinds of social variable of topic, which might become confounding factors for the selection of compliment strategies, further examination of the use of compliment response in each type of social situation was needed to identify the sources of similarities and differences as well as the effect of topic.
ANOVAs with repeated measure were further conducted to address the question on the effect of topic across superstrategies. To investigate the effect of topic, the tests were conducted between situations in which the status variable is held constant, while the topic variable varies (i.e. S+A vs. S+P and S=A vs. S=P). Between S+A vs. S+P as well as between S=A vs. S=P, overall the effect of topic and strategy as well as interaction effect was all significant.
One-way ANOVA was further carried out to determine whether there was difference in the use of each type of main superstrategy (whose frequency occurrence was above average) among the 3 groups as a function of the effect of topic respectively. By comparing the strategy use in S=A vs. S=P, the result suggested that in the use of Returning strategy, there was significant difference between HEP and LEP (p < 0.01). In the use of Mitigating, there was significant difference between NES and HEP (p < 0.001). In the use of Rejecting strategy, the frequency occurrences between each of the Chinese EFL learners and NES were significant (p < 0.001). In the use of Accepting & Mitigating, there was significant difference between NES and LEP (p < 0.001) as well as between LEP and HEP (p < 0.01). To summarize, the results indicated that the perception of social variable of topic by Chinese EFL learners deviated to a certain extent from native English speakers in the selection of certain compliment response strategies. Under S=A, NES used significantly more Returning than HEP while there were no significant difference between the two in other superstrategies. Nevertheless, no significant difference was found in the use of compliment response superstrategies between NES and LEP. Under S=P, HEP used significantly more Mitigating superstrategy than NES (p < 0.001) while NES used significantly more Rejecting than HEP (p < 0.001). The frequency occurrence of Rejecting and the combined superstrategy of Mitigating and Rejecting used by LEP was significantly lower than that used by NES (p < 0.05). The perception of the contextual factors of topic exhibits similarities and differences between Chinese EFL learners and NES.
When we compared comparing compliment response strategies across the situation S=A vs. S=P, the result of Chi-square test showed that LEP used significantly more Accepting in S=P (p < 0.05) while they used significantly more Returning in S=A (p < 0.001). Native English speakers
used significantly more Rejecting in S=P (p < 0.01) while they used significantly more combined strategy of Accepting & Mitigating in S=A (p < 0.01). The comparison of English compliment response between S+P vs. S=P indicated that native English speakers and HEP employed significantly more combined strategy of Accepting & Mitigating in S+P (p < 0.05). However, the comparison between S+A vs. S=A showed that LEP used significantly more Returning in S=A (p < 0.05). The result suggested that social variable of topic affects the adjustment of English compliment response strategies to a greater extent than that of status.
To account for different phenomenon observed in L2 learning, transfer has been found to operate in learners' perceptions of contextual factors, assessment whether carrying out a particular linguistic action is socially appropriate, and the overall politeness style adopted in an encounter in specific social situation. While it is a virtually uncontested assumption that nonnative speakers' linguistic action may be influenced by their L1 sociopragmatic knowledge, however, it remains unclear how the both transfer and the conditions of pragmatic transfer (transferability) interacting with nonstructural context-dependent factors can involve complex interplay with learner factors, such as proficiency. Based on Kasper's criteria, the comparison between each pair of L1, IL and L2 for HEP and LEP respectively showed that different transfer patterns have been observed. The transfer patterns varied as a function of English proficiency, status and topic. Positive transfer patterns have been found in HEP in S=A in the use of all the superstrategies; However, there were interlanguage variations for LEP in S=A. While positive transfer operates in the perceptions of contextual factors for the selection of the combined strategy of Accepting and Mitigating by Chinese EFL learners, there seemed to be amalgamation in the strategies employed. For example, in the use of Mitigating superstrategy, there was significant difference between Chinese compliment response by LEP and English compliment response by NES, but there was no significant difference between IL and L2. The findings suggested that transfer patterns interact with social variables and English proficiency, and led to interlanguage variations in L2 compliment response strategy use.
4. CONCLUSION
The findings of the study can be summarized as follows:
1. Overall, there was significant difference in the selection of English Compliment strategies between Chinese EFL learners with higher proficiency and native English speakers, as well as between native English speakers and Chinese speakers in Taiwan, but no significant difference was found between Chinese EFL learners with lower proficiency and native English speakers.
2. Topic affects the selection of English compliment response strategies to a Great extent. Chinese EFL learners and native English speakers adjusted their compliment response strategies in different social situations. The perceptions of the social variables bear similarities and differences between Chinese EFL learners and native English speakers.
3. Different transfer patterns other than position and negative transfer have been found to operate in the selection of English compliment response. There were interlanguage variations in English compliment response strategies as exhibited by Chinese EFL learners. The implications that we can draw from the findings of this study is that L2 proficiency plays a role in L2
compliment response strategy use, and interacts with nonstructural context-dependent factor of topic in the development of pragmatic competence. In addition to cross-cultural similarities and differences, transfer patterns across languages, which were often cited as one of the major sources of errors, can not be fully understood without taking nonstructural context-dependent factors into consideration. Moreover, language use by L2 learners in L2 speech act performance involves intricate interplay between use of target linguistic forms and perception of reflected socio-cultural values and function in the target language. This implies that the description of the linguistic (grammatical) system of language learners can not be detached from the description of pragmatic development. The interface between different levels of linguistic structure in language learners' grammar system deserves better attention as modern linguists explore similarities and diversities in language use phenomenon across cultures and different speech communities in linguistic inquiry.
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Declaration of conflicting interests
The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of
this article.
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Author information
Shu-hui Eileen Chen is an Associate Professor, Graduate Institute of Children English Education, National Taipei
University of Education, Taiwan.
Shu-Chu Chen is an Instructor, National Yunlin University of Science and Technology & Ph.D student, National Cheng-
Chi University, Taiwan.
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