An Interlanguage Study of the Speech Act of Complaints Made by Chinese EFL Speakers in Taiwan

• Main Authors: Mei-he Chen, 陳美合
• Other Authors: Shu-Chen Ou
• Format: Others
• Language: en_US
• Published: 2009
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/fjbrp9

碩士 === 國立中山大學 === 外國語文學系研究所 === 97 === This study aimed to investigate Chinese EFL interlanguage complaint behaviors in terms of production collected by role play and DCT. Four contextual factors were involved: social distance, social status, gender and obligation. A total of 320 role plays were elicited from 80 college students, including 20 native speakers of English, 20 native speakers of Chinese, 20 EFL-low proficiency learners and 20 EFL-high proficiency learners. Additionally, the DCT data were elicited by 180 participants, including 60 native speakers of Chinese, 60 native speakers of English, 30 EFL-high proficiency learners and 30 EFL-low proficiency learners. Three aspects of complaints were examined: complaint strategies, complaint modifications and the effect of language proficiency. Results showed that no matter in role play or on DCT, participants tended to use more indirect strategies to avoid conflicts with others. Below the level of Reproach was the main complaint strategy they used. Besides, the complaint strategies used by the four groups were quite similar in role play. However, they differed in the frequency of strategy use, the preference orders, and modifications used in making their complaints. On the other hand, participants performed quite differently on DCT. They differed in strategy use, but there were no significant difference in frequency use, preference orders, and the use of modifications. Furthermore, NS-E tended to use more direct strategies than EFL learners. This result echoed Olshtain and Weinbach’s (1993) findings that learners would use less severe strategies than native speakers because learners would try to “…avoid straightforward face-threatening interactions at all costs” (p. 115). Besides, proficiency effect is found in EFL learners’ interlanguage complaints production. It is more difficult for EFL-L learners to make complaints because of their low L2 proficiency. For future studies, gathering natural occurring data to compare the differences between role play is suggested. Besides, due to time limitation, the issue of interlocutor gender differences is not discussed and future work could include this matter to provide a more comprehensive understanding of the speech at of complaints.