CLKs' awareness and capacity to tap into the benefits of relationships, as well as learning-internal factors, were significant. Researchers from TS and ZL for instance, cited their relationship with their local professor as a key factor in their decision to stay clear of criticism of a strict professor (see examples 2).
This article examines all local pragmatic research on Korean published until 2020. It focuses on core pragmatic issues such as:
Discourse Construction Tests (DCTs)
The discourse completion test is a popular instrument in pragmatic research. It has numerous advantages, but also a few disadvantages. For instance it is that the DCT cannot take into account the cultural and individual differences in communicative behavior. The DCT can also be biased and result in overgeneralizations. It should be carefully analyzed before being used for research or assessment.
Despite its limitations the DCT is a valuable tool to investigate the connection between prosody, information structure and non-native speakers. Its ability to use two or more stages to manipulate social variables that affect politeness can be a strength. This characteristic can be utilized to study the impact of prosody in various cultural contexts.
In the field of linguistics the DCT is now one of the most important instruments for analyzing learners' communication behaviors. It can be used to examine various issues that include politeness, turn-taking, and lexical selection. It can be used to determine phonological complexity in learners speaking.
Recent research used a DCT as a tool to assess the skills of refusal among EFL students. Participants were presented with a range of scenarios to choose from and then asked to choose the appropriate response. The authors found the DCT to be more efficient than other methods of refusal like the use of a questionnaire or video recordings. However, they cautioned that the DCT should be employed with caution and include other types of data collection methods.
DCTs can be designed with specific linguistic criteria, such as the form and content. These criteria are based on intuition and based upon the assumptions of test developers. They are not necessarily accurate, and they may incorrectly describe the way in which ELF learners actually resist requests in actual interactions. This issue calls for further research on alternative methods of assessing refusal competency.
A recent study compared DCT responses to requests made by students via email with those obtained from an oral DCT. The results revealed that the DCT encouraged 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 decisions regarding their use of Korean by using a range of experimental tools, such as Discourse Completion Tasks (DCTs), metapragmatic questionnaires, and Refusal Interviews (RIs). Participants were 46 CLKs of upper-intermediate who participated in DCTs, 프라그마틱 무료체험 슬롯버프 MQs, and RIs. They were also asked to reflect on their evaluation and refusal responses in RIs. The results showed that CLKs often chose to resist native Korean norms of pragmatism. Their choices were influenced primarily by four factors: their personalities and multilingual identities, their current life experiences as well as their relational affordances. These findings have pedagogical implications for L2 Korean assessment.
The MQ data were analyzed to determine the participants' choices in terms of their pragmatics. The data were classified according to Ishihara's (2010) definition of pragmatic resistance. Then, we compared the choices with their linguistic performance on the DCTs to determine if they were indicative of pragmatic resistance. The interviewees also had to explain the reasons for choosing a pragmatic behavior in certain situations.
The findings of the MQs and DCTs were then analysed using descriptive statistics and Z-tests. The CLKs were found use euphemistic words like "sorry" or "thank you". This was probably due to their lack experience with the target languages, which led to a lack of understanding of the korean pragmatic norms. The results showed that CLKs' preference to diverge from L1 and L2 norms or to move towards L1 varied depending on the DCT situations. In Situations 3 and 12, CLKs preferred diverging from both L1- and L2-pragmatic norms, while in Situation 14 CLKs preferred a convergence to L1 norms.
The RIs also revealed the CLKs were aware of their own pragmatism in each DCT situation. The RIs were conducted one-to-one within two days after participants had completed the MQs. The RIs, which were transcribed and recorded by two coders who were independent and then coded. The coding process was an iterative process, in which the coders listened and discussed each transcript. The results of coding are contrasted with the original RI transcripts to determine if they reflected the actual behavior.
Interviews for refusal
The key issue in research on pragmatics is: Why do some learners choose not to accept native-speaker norms? A recent study sought to answer this question employing a variety of research tools, including DCTs, MQs and RIs. The participants consisted of 46 CLKs, 44 CNSs, and 45 KNSs from five Korean universities. Participants were asked to complete the DCTs and MQs either in their L1 or L2 levels. They were then invited to an RI, where they were required to think about and discuss their responses to each DCT situation.
The results showed that CLKs, on average, did not adhere to the pragmatic norms of native speakers in more than 40 percent of their responses. They did this even though they could create native-like patterns. They were also aware of their pragmatic resistance. They attributed their decision to learner-internal factors like their personalities and multilingual identities. They also spoke of external factors like relational benefits. They outlined, for instance how their relationships with their professors allowed them to function more easily in terms of the linguistic and social expectations of their university.
The interviewees expressed concern about the social pressures and penalties they could face when their social norms were violated. They were concerned that their native friends would think they are "foreigners" and believe they are unintelligent. This worry was similar to the one expressed by Brown (2013) and Ishihara (2009).
These findings suggest that native-speaker pragmatic norms are not the norm for Korean learners. They could still be useful for official Korean proficiency tests. However, it is prudent for future researchers to reconsider their relevance in specific scenarios and in various cultural contexts. This will help them better understand the effect of different cultural contexts on the behavior of students and classroom interactions of L2 students. This will also assist educators to improve their methods of teaching and testing Korean pragmatics. Seukhoon Paul Choi is principal advisor for Stratways Group, a geopolitical risk consultancy based in Seoul.
Case Studies
The case study method is a strategy that utilizes deep, participatory investigations to investigate a specific topic. This method utilizes numerous sources of information like documents, interviews, and observations to prove its findings. This type of investigation can be used to study unique or complex issues that are difficult to other methods to assess.
The first step in a case study is to define the subject and the goals of the study. This will help determine what aspects of the subject matter are essential for investigation and which ones are best left out. It is also useful to study the literature to gain a general understanding of the subject and place the situation in a wider theoretical context.
This study was conducted on an open source platform such as the KMMLU leaderboard [50], and its benchmarks that are specific to Korea, HyperCLOVA X and LDCC-Solar (figure 1 below). The results of this study revealed that L2 Korean learners were particularly susceptible to the influence of native models. They were more likely to select incorrect answer choices which were literal interpretations. This was a departure from the correct pragmatic inference. They also had a strong tendency to include their own words or "garbage" to their responses. This lowered the quality of their answers.
Additionally, the participants in this study were L2 Korean learners who had attained level 4 in the Test of Proficiency in Korean (TOPIK) in their second or third year at university, and were aiming to reach level 6 in their next attempt. They were questioned about their WTC/SPCC, their pragmatic awareness and understanding and their understanding of the world.
The interviewees were presented with two situations, each involving an imagined interaction with their interactants and were asked to select one of the following strategies when making an inquiry. Interviewees were then asked to justify their choice. Most participants attributed their pragmatic opposition to their personality. For instance, TS claimed that she was difficult to connect to, and she therefore did not want to inquire about the well-being of her friend with an intense workload despite her belief that native Koreans would ask.
