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Study of Chinese Learners' Pedagogical Choices in Korean
CLKs' understanding and ability to tap into the benefits of relationships, as well as learner-internal elements, were important. For instance, RIs from TS and ZL both cited their local professor relationships as an important reason for them to choose to not criticize an uncompromising professor (see the second example).
This article reviews all local published pragmatic research on Korean up to 2020. It focuses on key practical issues, including:
Discourse Construction Tests
The Discourse Completion Test (DCT) is an instrument that is widely used in research that is based on pragmatic principles. It has many advantages, but also a few disadvantages. The DCT, for example, does not take into account individual and cultural variations. Furthermore the DCT can be biased and may cause overgeneralizations. This is why it should be analyzed carefully before using it for research or for assessment purposes.
Despite its limitations, the DCT is a useful tool to study the relationship between prosody and information structure in non-native speakers. Its ability in two or more stages to alter the social variables that are related to politeness could be a benefit. This can assist researchers understand the role of prosody in communication across cultural contexts, a key issue in cross-cultural pragmatics.
In the field of linguistics DCT is among the most effective tools used to analyze the communication habits of learners. It can be used to investigate numerous issues, like politeness, turn-taking, and lexical choices. It can also be used to assess the phonological complexity of the learners their speech.
A recent study employed an DCT to evaluate EFL students' refusal skills. Participants were given various scenarios and were asked to select an appropriate response from the choices provided. The authors concluded that the DCT was more efficient than other methods of refusal, including a questionnaire and video recordings. Researchers warned, however, that the DCT should be employed with caution. They also suggested using other methods for data collection.
DCTs are often designed with specific linguistic criteria in mind, like the content and the form. These criterion are intuitive and is based on the assumptions made by the test designers. They may not be precise, and they could misrepresent the way that ELF learners actually refuse requests in real-world interactions. additional resources calls for further study on alternative methods for assessing refusal competency.
A recent study examined DCT responses to requests submitted by students via email versus the responses gathered from an oral DCT. The results showed that the DCT was more direct and traditionally indirect request forms and a lower use of hints than the email data did.
Metapragmatic Questionnaires (MQs)
This study examined Chinese learners making pragmatic choices when using Korean. It employed various experimental tools such as Discourse Completion Tasks, metapragmatic questions and Refusal Interviews. Participants were 46 CLKs at the upper-intermediate who participated in DCTs, MQs, and RIs. They were also asked to provide reflections on their assessments and refusals in RIs. The results indicated that the CLKs were more likely to reject native Korean pragmatic norms, and that their choices were influenced by four main factors: their identities, their multilingual identities, their ongoing life histories, and relationship advantages. These findings have implications for L2 Korean assessment and teaching.
The MQ data were examined to identify the participants' pragmatic choices. The data was classified according to Ishihara (2010)'s definition of pragmatic resistance. Then, the choices were compared with their linguistic performance on the DCTs to determine whether they reflected pragmatic resistance or not. Interviewees were also required to explain why they chose an atypical behavior in certain situations.
The results of the MQs and DCTs were then analysed using descriptive statistics and z-tests. The CLKs were discovered to use euphemistic words like "sorry" or "thank you". This is likely due to their lack experience with the target languages, which led to an insufficient knowledge of korean's pragmatic norms. The results revealed that CLKs' preferences to diverge from L1 and L2 norms or to be more convergent towards L1 norms varied based on the DCT situations. In situations 3 and 12 CLKs preferred diverging from both L1pragmatic norms - and L2-pragmatic norms while in Situation 14, CLKs preferred convergence to L1 norms.
The RIs further revealed that the CLKs were aware their pragmatic resistance in each DCT situation. The RIs were conducted on a one-to-one basis within two days of participants having completed the MQs. The RIs, which were recorded and transcribed by two coders independent of each other, were then coded. The coding process was iterative by the coders, re-reading and discussing each transcript. The results of coding are contrasted with the original RI transcripts to determine if they captured the underlying pragmatic behavior.
Refusal Interviews (RIs)
One of the most important questions in pragmatic research is the reason why learners are hesitant to adhere to pragmatic norms that native speakers use. A recent study sought to answer this question by employing a range of experimental instruments, including DCTs MQs, DCTs and RIs. Participants included 46 CLKs and 44 CNSs from five Korean Universities. They were required to complete the DCTs in their first language and complete the MQs either in their L1 or their L2. They were then invited to an RI where they were asked to reflect and discuss their responses to each DCT situation.
The results showed that on average, the CLKs disapproved of native-speaker pragmatic norms in more than 40% of their responses. They did this even when they could produce patterns that closely resembled natives. They were aware of their practical resistance. They attributed their choice to learner-internal factors such as their personality and multilingual identities. They also referred to external factors like relational advantages. For instance, they discussed how their relationships with professors led to a more relaxed performance in regards to the intercultural and linguistic standards of their university.
However, the interviewees also expressed concerns about the social pressures and punishments that they could face if they flouted their social norms. They were worried that their native friends might perceive them as “foreignersand believe that they are ignorant. This is similar to the concerns expressed by Brown (2013) and Ishihara (2009).
These results suggest that native speakers pragmatic norms aren't the norm for Korean learners. They may still be useful for official Korean proficiency tests. But it is advisable for future researchers to reassess their relevance in specific scenarios and in various cultural contexts. This will help them better understand the impact of different cultures on the classroom behavior and interactions of students in L2. This will also aid educators improve their methods of teaching and testing Korean pragmatics. Seukhoon Paul Choi, principal advisor at Stratways Group in Seoul, is a geopolitical risk consultancy.
Case Studies
The case study method is a method that focuses on intensive, participant-centered research to explore a particular subject. It is a method that utilizes various sources of information to help support the findings, such as interviews or observations, documents and artifacts. This type of investigation is useful for examining unique or complex subjects that are difficult to quantify with other methods.
The first step in the case study is to clearly define the subject and the objectives of the study. This will help determine which aspects of the subject matter are essential for research and which are best left out. It is also useful to read the literature to gain a better understanding of the subject. It will also help place the case in a wider theoretical context.
This case study was based upon an open-source platform called the KMMLU Leaderboard [50] along with its benchmarks for Koreans, HyperCLOVA X and LDCC Solar (figure 1 below). The results of the study revealed that the L2 Korean students were particularly vulnerable to native models. They were more likely to select incorrect answer options that were literal interpretations of the prompts, thereby ignoring accurate pragmatic inference. They also showed a distinct tendency to include their own text or "garbage" to their responses. This lowered the quality of their answers.
Furthermore, the participants of this case study were L2 Korean learners who had reached level 4 in the Test of Proficiency in Korean (TOPIK) at their third or second year of university and were aiming for level 6 for their next test. They were asked questions about their WTC/SPCC, their pragmatic awareness and understanding and perception of the world.
The interviewees were presented two scenarios, each of which involved an imaginary interaction with their interlocutors and asked to choose one of the following strategies when making a request. The interviewees were asked to justify their decision. Most participants attributed their pragmatic opposition to their personality. TS, for example, claimed that she was difficult to approach and was hesitant to inquire about the health of her co-worker when they had a lot of work, even though she thought native Koreans would.