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There has long been interest in the effect of stay abroad on pragmatic development in second language (L2) pragmatics research. However, few testing instruments exist to assess pragmatics learning in stay abroad and provide information about learners’ development to help institutions evaluate the success of stay abroad programs. In this study, we describe the adaptation and validation of Roever’s (2005) test of second language routine formulae to be used large-scale with Japanese stay-abroad learners. We follow Kane’s (2006) argument-based approach to validation, evaluating the first four inferences: Domain description, Evaluation, Generalization, and Explanation. We also investigate the test’s practicality within the institutional setting of intended use. We find evidence supporting the use of the test for providing information on pragmatics learning during stay abroad. The test can differentiate between low- and high-ability learners, shows adequate reliability, and reflects the roles of proficiency and exposure in pragmatics learning in stay abroad contexts. The test is also practical and requires few resources. Further steps, such as the investigation of the Extrapolation and Decision inference, are discussed.

Proficiency is a widely used concept in second language (L2) pragmatics where it is commonly viewed as lexico-grammatical knowledge, and can be measured by means of standardised or researcher-designed tests, or estimated on the basis of levels in a language program. It is a common grouping variable in research studies, allowing researchers to compare the pragmatic or interactional abilities of learners at different proficiency levels, and such studies have overwhelmingly found a strong contribution of proficiency to L2 pragmatics. However, this contribution varies depending on the area of pragmatics investigated, and the degree of overlap depends strongly on the measurement instruments for both proficiency and pragmatics. We illustrate this through a study on the effect of proficiency on implicit and explicit pragmatic knowledge.

The overarching aim of the study is to explore the extent to which test takers’ performances on monologic speaking tasks provide information about their interactional competence. This is an important concern from a test use perspective, as stakeholders tend to consider test scores as providing comprehensive information about all aspects of L2 competence. One hundred and fifty test takers completed a TOEFL iBT speaking section consisting of six monologic tasks, measuring speaking proficiency, followed by a test of interactional competence with three monologues and three dialogues, measuring pragmalinguistic skills, the ability to recipient design extended discourse, and interactional management skills. Quantitative analyses showed a medium to high correlation between TOEFL iBT speaking scores and interactional scores of r = .76, though with a much lower correlation of r = .57 for the subsample most similar to a typical TOEFL population. There was a large amount of variation in interactional scores for test takers at the same TOEFL iBT speaking score level, and qualitative analyses demonstrated that test takers’ ability to recipient design their talk and format social actions appropriate to social roles and relationships was not well captured by speaking scores. We suggest potential improvements.

The purpose of this study was to investigate Chinese University students' ability to recognize irony. To this end, we developed a test that included literal and ironic items and focused on the students' ability to identify which of the items were ironic. 112 first- and second-year Chinese university students completed the test, a C-test as a measure of language proficiency, and a language experience questionnaire. 24 native speakers completed the irony test and C-test to provide a baseline for comparison. Results showed that the learners' scores were markedly lower than the NS's on the ironic items but not on literal items. Both learners and NSs had difficulty with the positive irony items. The learners' response times were also markedly slower than the NSs. There were significant but relatively weak correlations between the learners' irony scores and their proficiency and the amount of time they had spent in an English-speaking country. Overall, the results of the study confirm the findings of previous studies, namely that irony is a late acquired aspect of L2 pragmatic competence. We concluded that unlike NSs, even those learners with advanced language proficiency rely on explicit processing strategies to detect irony and propose explicit instruction is needed to help learners acquire the ability to recognize irony.

Pragmatic ability is crucial for second language learners to communicate appropriately and effectively; however, pragmatics is underemphasized in language teaching and testing. This book remedies that situation by connecting theory, empirical research, and practical curricular suggestions on pragmatics for learners of different proficiency levels: It surveys the field comprehensively and, with useful tasks and activities, offers rich guidance for teaching and testing L2 pragmatics. Mainly referring to pragmatics of English and with relevant examples from multiple languages, it is an invaluable resource for practicing teachers, graduate students, and researchers in language pedagogy and assessment.

This study explores the opening phase of online task-based text-chat interactions between second language (L2) learners of English at three proficiency levels through a Conversation Analysis (CA) inspired, moment-by-moment analysis, and relates differences between groups to participants' differential levels of interactional competence. We focus on sequential environments where the first idea potentially leading to an accomplishment of a decision-making task is proffered, as well as any preliminaries (e.g., greeting) prior to the first-idea proffer. We found that participants oriented to a normative expectation of proffering ideas for task accomplishment early on, regardless of proficiency. Higher-level learners' first-idea proffers were more likely to occur in the form of a response to a soliciting move, whereas lower-level learners’ idea-proffers were less responsive. While preliminaries were overall not common, their production increased with proficiency level and only high-level learners produced extended preliminary sequences. As proficiency increased, linguistic formats for first idea-proffers also showed greater linguistic variety whereas lower-level learners exclusively relied on a narrow range of performative lexico-syntactic forms such as I want X constructions. The findings provide insight in how L2 learners deploy their interactional competence to open work on tasks in text chat.

Because English is widely used as a lingua franca, language testers have started to consider the introduction of non-native accents into English listening tests. This study investigates how accents...

Employing a CA-inspired methodological approach, this study investigates L2 learners' interactional competence for dyadic interaction via text chat. Fiftythree dyads of Japanese learners of English at three proficiency levels (high, mid, and low) participated in this study, where they worked on three discussion tasks in L2 English. The data were 97 participant-generated task closings, which were analyzed in terms of linguistic repertoire and sequence organizations of terminal exchanges between participants in a dyad, and summonsanswer sequences between participants and the researcher. The data showed that the participants recurrently implemented a sequence of soliciting and providing an agreement on the idea for task accomplishment to signal a forthcoming closing of task talk. The findings indicated that more proficient learners produced more extended sequences in conducting closing rituals. Some highproficiency learners explicitly mentioned, or interacted with, the researcher, a third party, to initiate task closing or reformulate crossed messages in closing the talk. These findings provide insights into online L2 interactional competence in text-based CMC media.

This article presents a review of research that has investigated ways of measuring implicit and explicit knowledge of a second language (L2), focusing on grammar. It begins by defining implicit and...

In the assessment of speaking, a psycholinguistically based speaking construct has predominated. In this paper, we argue for the integration of the construct of interactional competence (IC) in speaking assessments to broaden the range of defensible inferences from speaking tests. IC emphasizes the co-constructed nature of interaction and enables the rating of L2 users’ ability to deploy interactional tools that lead to shared understandings. Recent work on IC shows that levels of development can be distinguished, for example, in the sequential organization of social actions such as requests and refusals. This can in turn inform interactionally specific ratings. Furthermore, an IC perspective allows a fine-grained analysis of interactions between examiners and test takers to detect effects of examiner talk. Apparent misunderstandings or disfluencies by test takers can be examiner-induced with the test taker’s response actually demonstrating interactional ability rather than lack of proficiency. We argue that inclusion of IC as a construct in testing speaking opens new perspectives on oral proficiency and enhances the validity of speaking assessments.

This study investigates the development of second language (L2) learners' interactional competence, specifically how their dispreference marking in refusals changes as their general target language competence and interactional competence increase. 30 L2 speakers of English with L1 Arabic at three proficiency levels and 10 native English speakers conducted dyadic role plays involving requests and refusals. With increasing proficiency, learners' range of interactional methods for implementing refusals as dispreferred actions also increase. Low-proficiency learners showed little delay or mitigation of refusals, whereas intermediate proficiency learners employed “yes but” constructions and other refusal turn formats and showed incipient ability to delay the refusal by sequential means. Advanced learners exhibited more active recipiency, implemented sequential and lexical resources more precisely and conventionally, and had a larger range of methods at their disposal. English native speakers used additional methods, not found in the learner groups, most notably the prefatory particle “well”. We attribute learners' changes in interactional competence to their greater ability to formulate responses while still listening to the interlocutor, and their extensive practice with methods of conveying refusal without damaging social solidarity. We note remaining gaps in even advanced learners' competence, which may require focused instruction.

This study examined the development of requests made by second language (L2) learners of Modern Standard Arabic at four levels of L2 ability. The study used longitudinal and cross-sectional data collection to investigate how learners' performance of requests developed over a five-month period and differed as a function of ability level. The results indicated U-shaped development, with learners initially decreasing their use of direct requests and increasing their use of indirect requests as their overall language ability increased. However, at higher ability levels, learners approximated native speaker norms by reverting to direct requests. This developmental pattern demonstrated the constraining effect of learners' sociopragmatic competence on their pragmalinguistic performance. In addition, the findings highlighted the nonuniversality of developmental stages proposed by Kasper and Rose (2002), showing that developmental trajectories differ between languages with a preference for indirect requests (such as English and Greek) and those with a preference for direct requests (such as Arabic).

ESL learners can find it challenging to use English in a way that is pragmatically appropriate to the situation and interlocutor. In this article, we explore the impact of increased proficiency on learners’ pragmatic performance. ESL learners in Australia at four proficiency levels completed three role plays, and we analysed how the learners formulated their requests. We found that the expansion of learners’ linguistic repertoire with increased proficiency also led to a wider variety of request formats. Where beginner learners used imperatives and ‘want-statements’, lower-intermediate learners added the modal ‘can’, upper-intermediate learners introduced ‘could’, and advanced learners used more complex expressions. Despite their improvement, learners showed little sensitivity to the social situation. We suggest ways of facilitating learners’ pragmatic development through instruction.

Quantitative Methods for Second Language Research introduces approaches to and techniques for quantitative data analysis in second language research, with a primary focus on second language learning and assessment research. It takes a conceptual, problem-solving approach by emphasizing the understanding of statistical theory and its application to research problems while paying less attention to the mathematical side of statistical analysis. The text discusses a range of common statistical analysis techniques, presented and illustrated through applications of the IBM Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) program. These include tools for descriptive analysis (e.g., means and percentages) as well as inferential analysis (e.g., correlational analysis, t-tests, and analysis of variance [ANOVA]). The text provides conceptual explanations of quantitative methods through the use of examples, cases, and published studies in the field. In addition, a companion website to the book hosts slides, review exercises, and answer keys for each chapter as well as SPSS files. Practical and lucid, this book is the ideal resource for data analysis for graduate students and researchers in applied linguistics.

The ability to participate in extended interactions is an important aspect of second language proficiency but has not been much investigated. In this study, we focus on how a group of low-proficiency learners managed extended conversations in role plays involving requests. We compared them with intermediate- and advanced-level learners and found that low-proficiency learners are less likely to delay their request and less likely to use explanations or accounts preceding the request. However, the atypical structure of their requests seems to signal to the interlocutor a need to take a more collaborative role in the interaction and suggest possible explanations and accounts for the learner to confirm. This demonstration of the expected sequential organization of requests raises possibilities for classroom instruction, especially if coupled with metapragmatic awareness raising.