Study of Chinese Learners' Pedagogical Choices in Korean
In addition to learner-internal factors, CLKs' awareness of the need to be pragmatic and the relationship advantages they had access to were significant. RIs from TS and ZL for instance mentioned their local professor relationship as a major factor in their decision to stay clear of criticizing a strict professor (see examples 2).
This article reviews all local pragmatic research on Korean published up to 2020. It focuses on the practical core topics such as:
Discourse Construction Tests (DCTs)
The Discourse Completion Test (DCT) is widely used in the field of pragmatic research. It has numerous advantages however, it also has its drawbacks. The DCT, for example, does not take into account individual and cultural variations. The DCT can also be biased and lead to overgeneralizations. This is why it is important to analyze it carefully prior to using it for research or assessment purposes.
Despite its limitations, the DCT can be a useful tool to study the relationship between prosody and information structure in non-native speakers. The ability of the DCT in two or more stages to manipulate the social variables that are related to politeness is a plus. This feature can be used to study the impact of prosody in different cultural contexts.
In the field of linguistics, the DCT has become one of the most significant tools for analyzing learners' communication behaviors. It can be used to examine various issues that include politeness, turn-taking, and lexical choice. It can also be used to determine the phonological difficulty of learners speaking.
Recent research utilized a DCT as an instrument to test the ability to resist of EFL students. Participants were presented with a variety of scenarios to choose from and then asked to select the appropriate response. The authors found that the DCT was more effective than other refusal measures, including a questionnaire and video recordings. Researchers warned, however, that the DCT must be employed with caution. They also recommended using other data collection methods.
DCTs can be designed using specific linguistic criteria, such as form and content. These criteria are intuitive and are based on the assumptions of the test designers. They aren't always accurate and may misrepresent how ELF learners actually respond to requests in real-world interactions. This issue calls for more research into alternative methods of assessing refusal competence.
In a recent study DCT responses to student requests via email were compared with those from an oral DCT. The results showed that the DCT promoted more direct and traditionally form-based requests and a lower use of hints than email data did.
Metapragmatic Questionnaires (MQs)
This study examined Chinese learners' pragmatic choices when it comes to using Korean by using a range of tools that were tested, including Discourse Completion Tasks (DCTs) as well as metapragmatic questionnaires and Refusal Interviews (RIs). Participants were 46 CLKs with intermediate or higher ability who responded to MQs and DCTs. They were also required to provide reflections on their opinions and their refusals to participate in RIs. The results revealed that CLKs are more likely to reject native Korean pragmatism norms. Their choices were influenced by four factors such as their personality and multilingual identities, their current life histories, as well as their relational affordances. These findings have implications for pedagogy for L2 Korean assessment and teaching.
The MQ data was analyzed first to determine the participants' practical choices. The data was classified according to Ishihara (2010)'s definition of pragmatic resistance. Then, we compared their choices made by the participants with their linguistic performance using DCTs to determine if they were a sign of a pragmatic resistance. Interviewees also had to explain why they chose a pragmatic behavior in certain situations.
The results of the MQs, DCTs and z-tests were analyzed with descriptive statistics and z tests. It was found that the CLKs frequently resorted to euphemistic responses such as "sorry" and "thank you." 프라그마틱 공식홈페이지 is likely due to their lack of experience with the target language which led to an insufficient understanding of korea pragmatic norms. The results showed that CLKs' preference for converging to L1 or departing from both L1 as well as L2 pragmatic norms varies according to the DCT situations. In situations 3 and 12 CLKs preferred diverging from both L1- and L2-pragmatic norms, while in Situation 14, CLKs preferred convergence to L1 norms.
The RIs also revealed that the CLKs were aware their pragmatism in every DCT situation. The RIs were conducted one-to-one within two days of the participants completed the MQs. The RIs were recorded and transcribing, and then coded by two coders who were independent. The coding process was iterative, with the coders re-reading and discussing each transcript. The coding results are then evaluated against the original RI transcripts to determine if they captured the underlying pragmatic behavior.
Interviews with Refusal
One of the major questions in pragmatic research is why some learners are hesitant to adhere to the pragmatic norms of native speakers. Recent research has attempted to answer this question by using various experimental tools including DCTs MQs and RIs. Participants included 44 CLKs and 46 CNSs from five Korean Universities. They were asked to perform the DCTs in their native language and complete the MQs in either their L1 or L2. Then they were invited to a RI where they were asked think about their responses to the DCT situations.
The results showed that CLKs on average, did not adhere to the pragmatic norms of native speakers in more than 40% of their responses. They did so even though they could create native-like patterns. They were also aware of their pragmatism resistance. They attributed their actions to learner-internal aspects such as their personalities, multilingual identities, and ongoing lives. They also referred to external factors, like relational benefits. They also discussed, for instance how their relationships with their professors allowed them to perform better in terms of the linguistic and social standards of their university.
The interviewees expressed concern about the social pressures or penalties they could be subject to if their local social norms were not followed. They were concerned that their native interactants might perceive them as "foreigners" and believe they are incompetent. This is similar to the concerns expressed by Brown (2013) and Ishihara (2009).
These results suggest that native-speaker pragmatic norms are no longer the norm for Korean learners. They could still be useful for official Korean proficiency testing. Future researchers should reconsider the usefulness of these tests in different contexts and in particular situations. This will allow them to better understand the impact of different cultural environments on the pragmatic behavior and classroom interactions of L2 students. Furthermore it will assist educators to create more effective methods for teaching and testing the korea's pragmatics. Seukhoon Paul Choi is principal advisor at Stratways Group, a geopolitical risk consultancy based out of Seoul.
Case Studies
The case study method is an investigational strategy that employs participant-centered, in-depth investigations to explore a specific subject. This method utilizes numerous sources of information like interviews, observations, and documents to confirm its findings. This type of investigation is useful when analyzing complicated or unique subjects which are difficult to assess using other methods.
In a case study the first step is to clearly define both the subject and the purpose of the study. This will allow you to identify which aspects of the topic should be studied and which ones can be skipped. It is also beneficial to study the literature that is relevant to the subject to gain a greater knowledge of the subject and to place the case study within a larger theoretical context.
This study was based on an open-source platform called the KMMLU Leaderboard [50], along with its Korean-specific benchmarks HyperCLOVA X and LDCC Solar (figure 1 below). The results of this experiment showed that L2 Korean learners were particularly dependent on the influence of native models. They were more likely to select incorrect answer options that were literal interpretations of the prompts, deviating from accurate pragmatic inference. They also showed a strong tendency to include their own text, or "garbage," to their responses, which further hampered their quality of response.
Furthermore, the participants of this case study were primarily L2 Korean learners who had attained level 4 in the Test of Proficiency in Korean (TOPIK) at the end of their third or second year of university and were hoping to achieve level 6 for their next test. They were questioned about their WTC/SPCC, pragmatic awareness, understanding and knowledge of the world.
The interviewees were given two situations, each involving an imagined interaction with their co-workers and asked to choose one of the following strategies to employ when making a request. They were then asked to provide the reasons behind their decision. Most of the participants attributed their rational opposition to their personalities. For instance, TS claimed that she was difficult to connect to, and so she was reluctant to inquire about her interactant's well-being with an intense workload despite her belief that native Koreans would ask.