veronika timpe-laughlin* adult learners acquisitional

Veronika Timpe-Laughlin*

Adult learners’ acquisitional patternsin L2 pragmatics: What do we know?

DOI 10.1515/applirev-2015-2005

Abstract: Language pedagogy designers are faced with the challenge of engi-neering learning experiences that are in harmony with how second and foreignlanguages (L2s) are developed. In the field of L2 pragmatics learning andteaching, this challenge has sparked a considerable amount of research oninstructional methods, facilitative interventions, and input enhancements. Toa lesser degree, researchers have also investigated L2 pragmatic learningprogressions that might inform L2 instruction. This review paper canvassesempirical research into the acquisitional sequences of interlanguage prag-matics (ILP) in adult L2 learners conducted after 2002, the year in whichKasper and Rose’s seminal book, Pragmatic Development in a SecondLanguage, was published. The paper synthesizes the findings of 16 system-atically identified empirical studies. Based on this synthesis of findings, newinsights and tendencies in L2 pragmatic development are discussed, and areasin need of further research are identified.

Keywords: L2 acquisition, pragmatics, learning trajectories

1 Introduction

In recent years, the field of second and foreign language (L2) pragmaticsteaching and learning research has witnessed a considerable upsurge in pub-lications providing suggestions and implications for L2 pragmatics instruction(for a detailed overview see Taguchi 2015). Several studies have examined theteachability of pragmatics, yielding results that support the effectiveness of L2pragmatics instruction in different environments (e. g., Jeon and Kaya 2006;Kasper 1997; Takamiya and Ishihara 2008). Other research has providedevidence that pragmatics teaching has positive effects on the pragmatic devel-opment of L2 learners at all proficiency levels, from beginner to advanced(e. g., Alcón Soler and Safont Jorda 2008), and that explicit pragmatics

*Corresponding author: Veronika Timpe-Laughlin, Center for English Language Learning andAssessment, Educational Testing Service, 660 Rosedale Rd, Princeton, NJ 08540-2218, USA,E-mail: [email protected]

Applied Linguistics Review 2017; 8(1): 101–129

instruction tends to result in more L2 pragmatic development than implicitpragmatics instruction (Jeon and Kaya 2006; Salazar Campillo 2007). Moreover,different types and lengths of pedagogical interventions have been found toyield different degrees of L2 pragmatic development (Bataller 2010; Cohen andShively 2007).

In contrast, research investigating the order of L2 pragmatics acquisition arestill rare. Kasper and Schmidt (1996) and Cohen (1996) were among the first toemphasize the need to investigate the development of L2 pragmatics. Cohen(1996: 263), for instance, asked whether “adults go through developmentalsequences in their acquisition of speech act ability in the same way as theyhave been found to do in the acquisition of morphemes and syntactic structuressuch as negation”. While several seminal studies have been published since1996 (e. g., Kasper and Rose 2001), there is an ongoing need for L2 pragmaticsresearch that focuses on “identifying and accounting for stages of development”(Bardovi-Harlig 2012: 159).

The purpose of this article is to review studies conducted in the area ofinterlanguage pragmatics (ILP) development after 2002, the year in whichKasper and Rose’s seminal book, Pragmatic Development in a SecondLanguage, was published. Following Kasper and Rose (2002: 1), this articlewill report on the findings of 16 systematically identified, empirical investiga-tions into “acquisitional processes, conditions, and sequential patterns” in L2pragmatics in order to provide a state-of-the-art overview of what we knowabout receptive and productive ILP development in adult L2 learners.

2 L2 pragmatics

Crystal (1997) described pragmatics as “the study of language from the point ofview of users, especially of the choices they make, the constraints they encoun-ter in using language in social interaction and the effects their use of languagehas on other participants in the act of communication” (p. 301). This descriptioncharacterizes pragmatics as focused on the language user in a particular con-text, encoding and decoding utterances in relation to a number of socioculturalfactors. That is, a pragmatically competent language user has “the ability tocontrol the complex interplay of language, language users, and language usecontexts” (Taguchi 2008c, p. 204).

Mastering the pragmatics of communication poses a challenge to alllanguage users, and for L2 learners this challenge is particularly demanding.

102 Veronika Timpe-Laughlin

When L2 learners do not fully comprehend the relationship between anutterance’s propositional meaning (i. e., the apparent meaning) and itsintended illocutionary meaning (i. e., the intended effect), pragmatic failuremay occur, leaving the hearer offended or making the speaker appear unin-telligent, rude, or impolite (Thomas 1983; Washburn 2001). In order to prepareL2 learners for pragmatic challenges in L2 contexts, researchers have calledfor increased L2 pragmatics instruction (Ishihara and Cohen 2010; Kasper1997; Timpe 2013).

Studies in the domain of L2 or interlanguage pragmatics have primarilyinvestigated the use of pragmatic phenomena rather than the developmentof pragmatic abilities. Given the preponderance of language use studies,Bardovi-Harlig (1999) has suggested distinguishing between interlanguagepragmatics and acquisitional pragmatics. While ILP refers to the domainwhich “examines how nonnative speakers comprehend and produce actionin a target language” (Kasper and Rose 2002: 5), acquisitional pragmaticsdescribes the sub-domain of ILP dedicated exclusively to investigating howthe L2 pragmatic system develops. Studies that focus on acquisitionalpragmatics adopt a predominantly SLA-oriented perspective, focusing on L2pragmatics learning progressions and (individual) learning trajectories. Thus,to borrow Bardovi-Harlig’s (2013: 69) words: “[a]ll studies of L2 pragmaticsbelong to interlanguage pragmatics, but not all interlanguage pragmaticsstudies are acquisitional”.

3 L2 pragmatic development patterns

A large number of L2 pragmatic research claims to be developmental in nature.Studies oftentimes report an increase in pragmatic competence as measured attwo different points in time by means of data collection instruments intended toassess a given pragmatic phenomenon. Although these studies may account forthe outcomes of pragmatic development, they rarely provide insight into theprocess(es) of L2 pragmatic acquisition, as they were not designed to investigatedevelopment. Kasper and Rose (2002: 61), for instance, argue that many studiesonly consider developmental sequences in “post hoc explanations of findingsrather than serving as the motivating force of a study”. Thus, this review soughtto identify works – both cross-sectional and longitudinal – whose original,primary focus was to explicitly investigate learning trajectories and levels ofadult L2 pragmatic development.

Adult learners’ acquisitional patterns in L2 pragmatics 103

3.1 Methodology

Following Timpe-Laughlin et al. (2015), this study employed a systematic biblio-graphic search1 to identify a body of empirical studies that investigated L2pragmatic development. Five key terms – pragmatics, learning, acquisition, L2,and development – were employed in Boolean AND-OR search combinationsacross the following indices and databases, primarily selected from In’nami andKoizumi’s (2010) list of frequently used databases in applied linguistics:Academic Search Complete, Educational Resources Information Center (ERIC),PsychInFO, and Google Scholar. Studies were selected for inclusion in theanalysis based on the following four criteria:1) The study was published between 2002 (the year of Kasper and Rose’s

seminal publication) and March 2015 (when the present review wasconducted).

2) The study had a clear developmental focus; it was conceptualized toobserve and document stages and/or developmental aspects.

3) The study investigated the development of one or more L2 pragmaticphenomena.

4) The study observed adult (i. e., post-critical period) L2 learners.

Based on these criteria, 16 studies were identified for analysis.2 The studies fellinto three general categories: (a) receptive skills, (b) awareness, and (c) produc-tion. While Kasper and Rose (2002) only distinguish between the two categoriesof “pragmatic comprehension” and “pragmatic and discourse ability,” the lattercategory seems to combine pragmatics production, discourse ability, and meta-pragmatics awareness/knowledge. While the research available in 2002 may nothave allowed for further parsing of this large category, Kasper and Rose high-lighted that “we also need to probe learner knowledge [i. e., meta-pragmaticawareness]” (134). At present, several studies have focused on production andknowledge, respectively, allowing for the more fine-grained and distinct cate-gorization employed in this review.

1 Note that, similar to Kasper and Rose (2002), this paper does not claim to provide anexhaustive review. The first 100 search results for each keyword combination were screenedfor relevance, and studies that met the criteria outlined above were included in the reviewprocess. Given this systematic approach, there may be some empirical studies that were notcaptured. Nevertheless, this approach was adopted in an attempt to reveal, in a more objectivefashion, studies that show the main tendencies in the field of L2 pragmatic development.2 The studies identified and included in the analysis are marked with an asterisk in thereference section.


In the sections that follow, each will begin by outlining the relevant prag-matic skill. Findings of the reviewed studies will then be compared to explorepatterns of development, variability, and inconsistencies in the order of acquisi-tion of elements of L2 pragmatic ability that emerge among the three domains.

3.2 Development of receptive L2 pragmatic abilities

Pragmatic comprehension involves both understanding the literal meaning of anutterance and the implied meaning, or illocutionary force, behind it. Thus, ahearer needs to process an utterance at two levels. This entails “the ability tounderstand implied speaker intention by using linguistic knowledge, contextualclues, and the assumption of relevance” (Taguchi 2005: 544), competencieswhich can be particularly challenging for L2 learners because of the frequentdiscrepancy between literal and intended meaning.

As outlined in detail in Taguchi (2012), the mechanisms of pragmatic infer-encing have been explained by two theories: Grice’s (1975) Cooperative Principleand Sperber and Wilson’s (1995) Relevance Theory. When engaging in discourse,language users share “certain presumptions about how people should (linguis-tically) behave in a given sociocultural context” (Timpe-Laughlin et al. 2015: 14).Grice subsumed these presumptions under the label cooperative principle (CP).The CP is described as a universal norm of human communication which holdsthat interlocutors behave in a conversationally (not necessarily socially) coop-erative manner in order to achieve mutual conversational goals. That is, when aspeaker makes an utterance, the listener automatically assumes that the linguis-tic message is truthful, clear, concise, and relevant to the discourse at hand (fora detailed overview see Grice 1975). Based on these shared assumptions, andwith reference to context, the listener is able to infer the speaker’s intendedmeaning.

Sperber and Wilson’s (1995) Relevance Theory (RT) expands on Grice’s CP,outlining in more detail the cognitive mechanisms involved in inferential pro-cessing. RT holds that the recognition of interlocutor intentions is fundamentalto communication. In order to infer a speaker’s intention, a listener conductstwo successive steps: (a) decode the linguistic stimuli and (b) interpret contex-tual clues. While Grice relegates contextual clues to the external (i. e., physical)situational context, relevance theory treats all assumptions an interlocutor mayhave as contextual cues – for example, “expectations about future, scientifichypotheses or religious beliefs, anecdotal memories, general cultural assump-tions, [and] beliefs about the mental state of the speaker” (Sperber and Wilson1995: 15). The entire set of a language user’s assumptions are involved in the


process of inferring meaning, and this set of assumptions is referred to as“cognitive environment” (Wilson and Sperber 2012: 87; italics in the original).Searching for relevant information in the cognitive environment comes with acost in the form of mental processing effort. Listeners achieve efficiency byselecting only the most relevant from among the many possible assumptionsin their cognitive environment, expending the smallest possible processing effortto arrive at an interpretation of the speaker’s intended meaning. Processingeffort, as Taguchi (2012: 29) explained, is determined by “utterance complexity,size of context and accessibility of the context”.

While these inferential processes have been investigated extensively incognitive psychology (e. g., Fiske and Taylor 2013), comprehension of pragmaticmeaning is still “the most underrepresented domain in ILP research” (Taguchi2012: 30). In 2002, Kasper and Rose described a handful of L2 pragmaticcomprehension studies that were conducted in the 1980s and early 1990s(Bouton 1988, 1992, 1994; Carrell 1981; Kerekes 1992; Koike 1996). WhileKasper and Rose (2002) criticize the studies for not “illuminat[ing] the develop-mental process” (2002: 119) and “not actually document[ing] development inpragmatic comprehension” (2002: 123), they point out findings in these studiesthat shed some light on pragmatic development, such as the lack of a significantcorrelation between proficiency and the ability to interpret implicatures – afinding which was supported by later L2 pragmatics research (e. g., Garcia2004; Taguchi 2005). Thus, Kasper and Rose (2002) argued that proficiency isa necessary, but not sufficient, prerequisite for pragmatic comprehension.Moreover, they concluded that L2 learners seem to develop the ability to com-prehend assertiveness markers in sentence-final position before understandingthem in sentence-internal positions, and that the ability to decode implicaturesthat contain culture-specific aspects tend to be acquired at later stages of L2development. However, based on their review, they concluded that the limitednumber of studies on the development of L2 pragmatic comprehension did “notdescribe, let alone explain, the process with any real specificity” (Kasper andRose 2002: 124). Since the time of Kasper and Rose’s review, the field has mademodest progress. Among the longitudinal and cross-sectional studies identifiedin this review, only five – all conducted by the same researcher – have focuseddirectly or indirectly on developmental aspects of L2 pragmatic comprehensionprocesses (Table 1).

In several longitudinal studies, Taguchi (2007, 2008a, and 2008b) examinedthe development of Japanese English language learners’ ability to understandindirect refusals and indirect opinions. She administered a lexical access test,the TOEFL ITP English language proficiency test, and a computer-based Englishlistening test with 48 multiple-choice items featuring short dialogues with


indirect refusals (k= 24) and indirect opinions (k= 24). The learners’ listening testresponses were analyzed for two types of processing load encoded in theimplicatures: comprehension speed (the average time taken to answer allitems) and accuracy of comprehension (the number of items answered cor-rectly). Taguchi’s findings across the three studies suggest differences in thedevelopment of accuracy and speed in comprehending implied meaning, thusproviding evidence that comprehension accuracy and comprehension speedexist as two separate facets of receptive pragmatic ability.

In her 2007 study, for example, Taguchi found that her sample of Englishas a foreign language (EFL) learners made significant gains in accuracy and

Table 1: Empirical studies on the development of receptive L2 pragmatic abilities.

Studydesign

Pragmaticphenomena

N Participants’L

Targetlanguage

Measures Studylength

Taguchi()

Longitudinal Implicatures(refusals/opinions)

Japanese English MC listeningitems,LexicalAccess Test,TOEFL ITP

weeks

Taguchi(a)



weeks

Taguchi(b)

Longitudinal implicatures(refusals/opinions)


months

Taguchi()

Cross-sectional

Implicatures(refusals/opinions)


n.a.

Taguchi()



months

Note: Taguchi (2012) was categorized under multiple review sections (i. e., receptive,awareness, and/or productive) as it provides insights into the development of multiple skills.


comprehension speed over a 7-week period of instructional intervention.However, the students’ gains in comprehension accuracy were much largerthan their gains in comprehension speed. In her 2008a study with ESL leaners,she found the opposite pattern. Over a 5-week period, English as a secondlanguage (ESL) learners showed gains in both comprehension accuracy andspeed, but the effect size of the gain in speed was considerably larger.Comprehension speed and accuracy were not correlated, suggesting differentcognitive processing loads that do not develop simultaneously over time.

Additionally, the pace of development of comprehension speed and accu-racy seems to differ depending on the learning environment. For example, in theESL context, Taguchi (2008a) found exposure to target-language input corre-lated significantly with comprehension speed, but not with accuracy. In con-trast, EFL students showed a much smaller gain in comprehension speed, butlarger gains in accuracy (see Taguchi 2007). Given that pragmatic comprehen-sion requires the coordination of linguistic, sociocultural, and cognitive pro-cesses which need to be automatized to achieve speedy comprehension, Taguchi(2012) hypothesized that these processes may take longer to develop in EFLenvironments. ESL learners’ greater gains in comprehension speed may be theresult of their having more incidental opportunities in the target language (TL)environment for practicing, and thus automatizing, form-function mappings.However, even ESL learners may lack the feedback necessary to develop higheraccuracy. For all learners, balanced development appears to require both abun-dant exposure to input (to provide opportunities for processing practice) andguidance or feedback regarding accuracy.

Taguchi’s studies also provide insight into English language learners’ (ELLs)development of ability to comprehend refusal and opinion speech acts whenencoded with different degrees of directness. Building on earlier research (e. g.,Bouton 1992 and 1994), Taguchi (2008a: 34) hypothesized that “[i]mplicaturesconveyed through conventional forms are easier to comprehend, once the con-ventions are learned or they are shared between the first language (L1) and L2.Nonconventional implicatures, on the other hand, are difficult to comprehendbecause they require extensive inferential processing”. She argued that indirectrefusals can be regarded as conventional, as they follow a “common, routinizeddiscourse pattern” (2008a: 35), while indirect opinions are less conventionalizedbecause the meaning is not connected to particular routinized, linguistic expres-sions. Confirming her hypothesis, Taguchi (2007, 2008b, and 2012) found that,regardless of the learning context, comprehension of indirect refusals precededthe development of ELLs’ ability to decode indirect opinions.

In line with findings from earlier research (e. g., Bouton 1992), Taguchi’s(2012) results lend support to the argument that pragmatic comprehension is


mediated by conventionality. In instances where conventions were sharedbetween the L1 and the target language, Taguchi found a steady increase EFLlearner’s comprehension of indirect refusals over the course of nine months.However, for culture-specific conventions, comprehension development wasfound to be slower. These findings indicate that conventionalized responsepatterns require less processing because adult ELLs can draw on their inferentialskills and pragmatic knowledge from their L1 in order to interpret the speech actin their L2. Hence, these learners’ development needs would lie in the domain oflinguistic knowledge rather than pragmatic knowledge, a supposition that seemsto be substantiated by Taguchi’s (2012) finding that EFL learners’ comprehensionof conventional implicatures correlated significantly with their scores on theTOEFL listening section. She concluded that comprehension of conventionalimplicatures “develops naturally with the increase in general listening skill”(2012: 243).

Conversely, Taguchi (2012) found that the development of ability to decodeless conventional implicatures, such as indirect opinions, is quite different. Shereported that learners exhibited “lower accuracy scores and slower responsetimes when comprehending non-conventional implicatures than conventionalimplicatures” (2012: 99), hypothesizing that the comprehension of indirect opi-nions demands more inferential processing. That is, when interpreting non-conventional implicatures, ELLs need to rely more on word-level processingand bottom-up strategies to arrive at the intended meaning. The ability todecode non-conventional implicatures appears to be a higher-order inferentialprocessing ability, developing more slowly than the ability to decode conven-tional implicatures. Thus, the conventionality of implicatures seems to mediatelearners’ development of comprehension ability.

To summarize, Taguchi’s findings both confirm and expand upon earlierresearch, providing additional insights into the development of L2 pragmaticcomprehension. First, her results show a clear distinction between the acquisi-tion of comprehension accuracy and speed in reference to different L2 learningcontexts. While Kasper and Rose (2002) concluded that an “acquisition-richcontext and sufficient time [aid] learners’ ability to interpret implicatures”(Kasper and Rose 2002: 121), Taguchi shows that different conditions and envir-onments impact different dimensions of receptive L2 pragmatic development.Second, Taguchi’s findings confirm Kasper and Rose’s (2002) observation thatgeneral L2 proficiency constitutes a necessary-but-not sufficient prerequisite forunderstanding implicatures, with ‘conventionality’ as the mediating factor in thedevelopment process. While comprehension of direct and implied meaningsconveyed through highly conventionalized forms seems to develop along withgeneral L2 listening skills, less conventionalized utterances (such as indirect


opinions) seem to require higher-order inferential processing, which tends todevelop later in the SLA process. Hence, Taguchi refines Kasper and Rose’sobservation, which only allowed them to distinguish between early and “late-acquired implicature types” (p. 124). Adult L2 learners can utilize their L1 knowl-edge and draw upon already learned conventions and discourse patterns, trans-ferring them from the L1 to assist comprehension in the L2. Knowledge aboutculture-specific, non-conventionalized forms, however, seems to take longer todevelop, given that the forms need to be newly learned and exposure may not beas frequent.

While Taguchi’s research yields important first insights into the develop-ment of L2 pragmatic comprehension, it needs to be emphasized that the find-ings reviewed in this section are based on a relatively homogenous sample of L1Japanese learners of English. Thus, it may be premature to generalize thefindings beyond the cross-cultural context of English-Japanese. Moreover,Taguchi’s research has focused on implicatures regarding only two differentspeech acts – refusals and opinions. Given that she found differences in thedevelopment of L2 learners’ reception of both speech acts, it is likely that thereare idiosyncrasies in the development patterns of other speech acts as well.Expanding research on the development of implicatures and other pragmaticphenomena, such as the development of interpreting assertiveness in the L2across different languages and groups of L2 learners, is crucial in order to arriveat a more comprehensive understanding of how L2 learners’ receptive pragmaticabilities develop.

3.3 Development of L2 meta-pragmatic awareness

Before turning to pragmatic production, it is relevant to consider L2 learners’recognition of pragmatic phenomena, also referred to as meta-pragmatic aware-ness (see Table 2 for the studies included in this review). Pragmatic comprehen-sion and meta-pragmatic awareness are similar insofar as they both deal withthe receptive part of pragmatic ability. However, meta-pragmatic awareness –the ability to identify L2 pragmatic phenomena – is broader in scope, includingthe ability to recognize “pragmalinguistic forms and their contextual require-ments” (Taguchi 2012: 35). It requires knowledge and orchestration of linguisticform, Gricean maxims, semantic strategies, sociocultural conventions, and situa-tional requirements (see also Taguchi 2012).

Although Kasper and Rose (2002) did not identify meta-pragmatic aware-ness as an independent category of pragmatic ability, they did highlight it asdistinct from pragmatic production, primarily in reference to individual learner


characteristics and knowledge. For example, in reference to DuFon’s (1999)study on the acquisition of Indonesian address terms, Kasper and Rose pointedout that “the learners’ journal entries showed more knowledge about addressterms than was apparent from their production” (Kasper and Rose 2002: 133).Thus, they argued that “learner’s [sic.] pragmatic knowledge may not be accu-rately represented in their production” (134). With regard to the development ofmeta-pragmatic awareness in relation to attention and noticings of L2 pragmaticforms, they speculated that L2 proficiency most likely did not constitute aprimary factor that impacts development. Instead, they argued that individuallearner characteristics, such as intrinsic motivation to learn the L2, may result in

Table 2: Empirical studies on the development of L2 pragmatic awareness.

Study

design

Pragmatic

phenomena

N Participants’L

Target

language

Measures Study

length

Bardovi-

Harlig

()*

Cross-

sectional

Routine

formulae

Various English Discourse

Completion

Tasks (DCTs)

–

Barron

()*

Longitudinal Requests,

offers,

refusal

Irish English German Discourse

Completion

Tasks (DCTs);

role-plays;

retrospective

interviews; pre-

and post-

questionnaires

months

Hassall

()

Longitudinal Address

terms

Australian Indonesian Written pre-post

tests,

interviews,

journal entries

–weeks

Hassall*

()

Longitudinal Address

terms

Australian Indonesian Written pre-post

tests,

interviews,

journal entries

weeks

Matsumura

()

Longitudinal Advice Japanese English MC

questionnaire

months

Shively

()*

Longitudinal Requests &

address

terms

English Spanish Audio-

recordings,

interviews,

journal entries

weeks

Note 1: Studies marked with an asterisk were categorized under multiple review sections(i. e., awareness and productive) as they provide insights into the development of multipleskills.


higher levels of meta-pragmatic awareness, especially for L2-specific featuressuch as idiomatic expressions which, for example, were found by Takahashi(2000) to be noticed more often by highly motivated L2 learners. Thus, Kasperand Rose (134) highlighted the “need to probe learner knowledge” andinvestigate aspects that contribute to the development of L2 meta-pragmaticawareness – something several studies have done to date (Table 2).

The first confirmatory evidence for Kasper and Rose’s speculation that meta-pragmatic awareness and production constitute two distinct dimensions in L2pragmatic development was provided by Barron (2003). Using retrospectiveinterviews, she probed the meta-pragmatic awareness of 33 Irish learners ofGerman who studied abroad in Germany for one year. Particularly with regardto offer-refusal exchange structures, she found that the “level of awareness ofcross-cultural differences was actually higher than the production data” (Barron2003: 165). That is, although the learners’ awareness of German pragmaticnorms increased over the course of their study abroad, they insisted on follow-ing their L1 norms in offer-refusal exchanges. Although Barron used thesefindings primarily as a means of interpreting the learners’ L2 pragmatic produc-tion and did not focus on the development of meta-pragmatic awareness, shedid confirm the distinction between meta-pragmatic awareness and pragmaticproduction, further reporting that the longer the time spent abroad, the morepragmatically aware the students seemed to be, even though her participantsnever reached L1-speaker level. A possible explanation for this finding is that thelearners may have had limited opportunities to interact with L1 German speak-ers. They may not have been exposed to the necessary input that would haveallowed them to notice and acquire target pragmatic norms.

It has been argued in ILP research that the recognition of pragmatic phe-nomena in a given target language is a prerequisite for their use by L2 learners.For example, in her 2009 study, Bardovi-Harlig investigated the relationshipbetween recognition and production of conventionalized expressions among 122ESL learners at four proficiency levels ranging from low-intermediate to low-advanced. Although it is unclear how Bardovi-Harlig selected the conventionalexpressions included in her study (e. g., Nice to see you, Thanks for your time, orYou’re welcome), she found four different patterns of routine development acrossall learner levels with regard to the relationship between recognition and pro-duction: (a) high recognition and high, target-like production of a routine;(b) low recognition and low production; (c) high recognition and high, over-generalized production (i. e., overuse of one routine across contexts in which L1speakers would not use it); (d) some recognition with varying production acrosslearner proficiency levels. With regard to patterns b and d, in which in whichrecognition and production rates were not parallel, Bardovi-Harlig observed that


“[o]f 2,716 reports by learners that an expression had been heard, 1,458 (54%)did not result in corresponding production of the expression in an appropriatecontext; in contrast, of 165 reports of not having heard an expression, only12 (7%) resulted in a corresponding production” (2009: 774).

Hence, while her results seem to suggest that recognition of pragmatic formis a prerequisite for production, they are also indicative of other factors impactingdevelopment, providing evidence that the trajectory is U-shaped. That is to say,learners can “only use a conventional expression favored by NSs if they recognizethe expression and they interpret the relevant context as requiring a speech act ofthe same illocutionary force, the same pragmatic strategy, and the same content”(2009: 782). Thus, the recognition of pragmatic phenomena can be viewed as anintermediate step necessary to integrate the diverse knowledge bases needed forsuccessful form-function mapping in both the decoding and encoding of mean-ing. However, whether learners actually use a given conventionalized routine orpragmalinguistic form in production may be influenced by additional factors,such as sociopragmatic knowledge or even personal preference.

While Bardovi-Harlig’s (2009) cross-sectional study provides snapshots ofdevelopmental stages, Matsumura’s (2003) structural equation modelling (SEM)study, as well as Shively’s (2011) and Hassall’s (2013 and 2015) longitudinalinvestigations, shed further light on factors that influence the actual acquisitionof L2 pragmatic awareness. Employing SEM to investigate the effects ofL2 exposure and proficiency on the development of L2 pragmatics, Matsumurafound L2 exposure to be more important than proficiency. While she reported a“persistent effect of pragmatic competence on itself” (2003: 465), she found thedirect effect of proficiency on pragmatic recognition to be “very weak and non-significant” (2003: 485) – a result that seems to support Takahashi’s (2000)findings that TL proficiency was not a main factor in the development ofL2 pragmatic knowledge (Kasper and Rose 2002: 287). However, she observedan indirect effect of proficiency on pragmatic awareness via exposure. Thus, sheconcluded that “amount of exposure can be seen as a cause of pragmaticdevelopment” (2003: 484).

Shively (2011) and Hassall (2013 and 2015) conducted longitudinal studiesthat lend support to Matsumura’s conclusions regarding the relationshipbetween proficiency, exposure, and pragmatic awareness, while providingmore insight into individual learner characteristics that impact the developmentof L2 pragmatic awareness. Triangulating requests made by L2 learners ofSpanish in naturally occurring service encounters during an 11-week studyabroad in Spain with journal entries made by the same learners, Shively (2011)observed that L1 transfer, overgeneralization, and explicit and implicit feedbackimpacted students’ development of L2 pragmatic awareness. Moreover, she


pointed out that participants in her study “all had high standards for their ownL2 proficiency” (p. 1833), an observation that may hint at relatively high levels ofintrinsic motivation to approximate L1 speaker norms and behavior. Whileobserving that the majority of students progressed from more indirect to moretarget-like, direct request realizations during the study abroad, she found thatindividual learners differed considerably in their levels of awareness and“understanding of the social meanings of the request forms” (p. 1832) – anobservation that was also reported in Hassall (2013).

Expanding DuFon’s (1999) earlier line of research, Hassall (2013) used amulti-method approach to explore L2 learners’ acquisition of Indonesian addressterms during a short study abroad. By means of pre- and post-tests, oral elicita-tion tasks, written tests, interviews, and diaries, Hassall found that some lear-ners acquired knowledge about Indonesian vocatives very rapidly, while otherstook longer. In addition to observing great variability in the learners’ amountand speed of acquisition, Hassall (2015) also identified a number of factors thatinfluenced their development of meta-pragmatic awareness, including amountof formal training, L1 transfer, amount of exposure to different types of addressforms, and corrective feedback.

Although the number of studies in the area of meta-pragmatic developmentis still quite limited, the studies reviewed here not only expand the limitedliterature base available to Kasper and Rose (2002), but they also provide newevidence that supports many of the authors’ original conclusions, while alsocontributing new insights. For example, studies that investigated the acquisitionof both meta-pragmatic awareness and production confirmed higher levels ofknowledge than oftentimes apparent in production data, thus underscoring aclear distinction between L2 pragmatic production and meta-pragmatic aware-ness or knowledge. Additionally, L2 proficiency seems to influence the develop-ment of L2 meta-pragmatic awareness only indirectly, insofar as it is necessaryto notice and understand specific pragmatic phenomena. Finally, research hasidentified individual characteristics such as amount of exposure, intrinsic moti-vation, L1 transfer, formal instruction, and corrective feedback as contributing tothe development of L2 meta-pragmatic awareness. While these factors wereidentified as influencing the development of L2 pragmatic awareness, moreresearch is needed to explain their potential interrelatedness, as well as theirimpact on individual variations found in developmental processes. Hence, theoverall development of pragmatic awareness, triggered primarily by exposure totarget language input, seems to occur via interactive and dynamic processes thatare shaped by a variety of variables, resulting in individual, non-linear learningtrajectories reminiscent of the developmental paths described by dynamic sys-tems theory (de Bot 2008; Ellis 2008; Larsen-Freeman 2012).


3.4 Development of L2 pragmatic production

Kasper and Rose (2002) surveyed the longitudinal and cross-sectional literaturein L2 pragmatics development. Based primarily on the longitudinal findings ofAchiba (2002), Ellis (1992), and Schmidt (1983), they proposed a five-stageprocess of global L2 request development (Table 3). In this process, L2 learnersbegin with a very limited range of pragmalinguistic forms, oftentimes using one

Table 3: Stages of L2 request development.

Stage Description Characteristic Example

Pre-basic Learners are dependent uponthe context and a few lexicalitems.

Highly contextdependent, no syntax,no relational goals

“Me no blue”/“Sir.”

Formulaic Learners have specific phrasesand formulaic chunks that theyrely on to make the request.They have not developed thelinguistic means to freelymanipulate pragmalinguisticelements.

Reliance on unanalyzedformulas andimperatives

“Let’s havelunch.” “Don’tlook!” “Pass thesalt!”

Unpacking Learners begin to analyze andunderstand the components offormulaic expressions andmanipulate the phrases inrelation to context. This phase ischaracterized by an increase inuse of indirect strategies.

Formulas incorporatedinto productivelanguage use shift toconventionalindirectness

“Can you passthe saltplease?”

Pragmaticexpansion

Learners add newpragmalinguistic forms to theirrepertoire. They can moderatethe force of their utterance byusing downgraders or upgradersand making use of more complexsyntax.

Addition of new formsto pragmalinguisticrepertoire, increaseduse of mitigation, morecomplex syntax

“Can you passthe pen pleaseso I can writethis down?”

Fine-tuning Learners have considerablecontrol over pragmalinguisticfeatures of their requests, andthey use this control to conveytheir understanding of thedemands of the situation.

Fine-tuning ofrequestive force toparticipants, goals, andcontexts

Source: Adapted from Kasper and Rose (2002).


form or a particular formula for a range of functions. Thus, the early stages ofL2 request development are often characterized by overgeneralizations.Moreover, learners in the early stages rely heavily on context and extralinguisticresources, such as repetition or laughter, to communicate their intent. As theirgeneral L2 proficiency increases, they first shift to using formulaic expressionsand then gradually expand their pragmalinguistic repertoire by adopting newform-function mappings. This gradual expansion allows L2 learners to use thetarget language creatively, to mitigate the force of their utterances, and toencode requests in ways appropriate to the socio-cultural and linguistic conven-tions of a given language use context.

Given the increasing complexity hypothesized in these stages, Kasper andRose (2002) highlighted a strong interconnection between grammatical andpragmatic development, arguing that grammatical limitations may pose limita-tions on pragmatic realizations. For instance, they observed that learners seemto contribute more in conversations as their grammatical and pragmatic compe-tence grows, given that increasing grammatical and pragmatic proficienciesallow for higher levels of conversational involvement. While most of theirobservations were based on beginner-level learners, they noted that evenamong higher-level learners mitigation seems to remain challenging. Thus,they concluded that mitigation of speech acts develops later in L2 pragmaticproduction – a supposition that can also be supported by the more complexlinguistic structure involved in the downtoning or softening of pragmalinguisticforce.

As shown in Table 4, several studies have provided further evidence forKasper and Rose’s (2002) development structure across a range of pragmaticphenomena, such as requests and other speech acts (e. g., Al-Gahtani andRoever 2012; Bardovi-Harlig 2009; Barron, 2003; Bella 2012; Chang 2010;Pearson 2006; Shively 2011; Taguchi 2012) and discourse markers (Polat2011), showing that L2 learners progress through a number of stages on theway to multifunctionality, using more external modifications, supportivemoves, and intensifiers as their proficiency and sociopragmatic awarenessincrease.

Al-Gahtani and Roever (2012), for example, employed conversation analysisto investigate requests made by 20 ELLs in role-plays. Focusing particularly onthe pre-expansion stages (i. e., stages before the level of pragmatic expansion),they explored if the learners, subdivided into four proficiency groups, usedsupportive moves to introduce their requests in dyadic interactions. The authorsreported that, in beginner- and low-intermediate-level ELL role-plays, supportivemoves almost never occurred. Instead, students immediately uttered theirrequests, as in the following example (2012: 50):


Table4:

Empiricalstud

ieson

thede

velopm

entof

L2prag

matic

prod

uction

skills.

Study

Study

design

Prag

matic

phen

omen

an

Participan

ts’

LTa

rget

lang

uage

Datacolle

ctioninstrumen

t(s)

Study

leng

th

Al-Gah

tani

&Ro

ever

()

Cross-section

alRe

quests

Arabic

English

Role-plays

–

Barron()*

Long

itud

inal

Requ

ests,offers,

refusal

IrishEn

glish

German

Discourse

Com

pletionTasks

(DCTs);role-plays;

retros

pectiveinterviews;

pre-

andpo

st-que

stionn

aires

mon

ths

Bardo

vi-Harlig

*()

Cross-section

alRo

utineform

ulae

Various

English

Discourse

Com

pletionTasks

(DCTs)

–

Bella

()

Cross-section

alRe

queststrategies

Various

Greek

DCTs

–Cha

ng()

Cross-section

alApo

logies

Chine

seEn

glish

Written

DCTs

–Hassall*

()

Long

itud

inal

Add

ress

term

s

Aus

tralian

Indo

nesian

Written

pre-

andpo

st-tests,

interviews,

journa

len

tries

wee

ks

Pearso

n()

Long

itud

inal

Directives

English

Spa

nish

Pre-

andpo

st-tests

with

written

andoral

DCTs

mon

ths

Polat()

Long

itud

inal

Discourse

marke

rs

Turkish

English

Oralconv

ersation

smon

ths

Shively

()*

Long

itud

inal

Requ

ests

&ad

dress

term

s

English

Spa

nish

Aud

io-recording

s,interviews,

journa

len

tries

wee

ks

Tagu

chi()*

Long

itud

inal

Refusals/opinion

s

Japa

nese

English

MClis

tening

item

s,Lexical

AccessTest,TO

EFLITP

mon

ths

Note:

Studies

marke

dwithan

asterisk

werecatego

rizedun

dermultiplereview

sections

(i.e.,receptive,

awaren

ess,

and/

orprod

uctive)as

they

provideinsigh

tsinto

thede

velopm

entof

multipleskills.


[1] 1. P: ↑Excuse me::2. I: yes3. P: I (.) want bread4. I: Ok

In contrast, students with upper-intermediate and advanced English languageproficiency all provided pre-expansions and supportive moves, as illustrated inthe following excerpt (ibid.):

[2] 1. P: hi ((name))2. I: hi ((name))3. P:.hhh >actually< I wanna ask you something?4. I: Su::re.5. P:!.hhh today I have too many (.) assignments to do =6. I: = Yeah7. P:! “so I have no:: more time (.1) to do my shopp[ing8. I: [.hh9. P:! for today (.) a::nd I’m running out (.) the bread so could you (.3) buy10. some bread for me?11. I: su::re (.)

Al-Gahtani and Roever (2012) argued that “pre-expansions showed clear differ-ences between proficiency levels, and [that] greater linguistic ability allowedhigher level learners more control of the progress of their request” (2012: 53).Hence, in line with Kasper and Rose’s supposition, with increasing proficiency,learners tend to demonstrate ability to mitigate their requests, making themmore indirect and less forceful.

Bella (2012) reported similar results when investigating the request behaviorof L2 learners of Greek as measured by a discourse-completion task. Sherecruited learners of three different proficiency levels (lower intermediate, inter-mediate, advanced), as well as a group of L1 Greek speakers, and explored theparticipants’ performance of requests in formal and informal situations, focusingprimarily on external and internal modification devices. She found that, overall,lower intermediate learners hardly exhibited any modification devices, whereasintermediate-level participants used the highest number of external modifiers,followed by advanced learners, and finally L1 Greek speakers. Thus, learnersgradually approximated L1 speaker behavior, substantiating the finding that thevariety of modifiers used by the learners increased with proficiency. Bella’soverall findings support Kasper and Rose’s (2002) five-stage progression towardmultifunctionality, while highlighting an additional, developmental aspect


which, although related to proficiency, is significantly different: strategic prag-matic behavior.

In line with Al-Gahtani and Roever (2012) and Pearson (2006), Bella (2012)reported that as her study’s participants’ L2 proficiency increased, so did theappropriateness and diversity of their use of pragmatic strategies, ranging froma preference for direct requests to an increasing use of (conventionalized)indirectness. All three studies found that learners with lower levels of targetlanguage proficiency used more direct strategies to articulate a given speech act,and they did not change their utterances to adapt their appropriateness whenspeaking to interlocutors with different power relationships. For example,Al-Gahtani and Roever and Bella both reported that low-proficiency learnerspredominantly used what Pearson (2006) referred to as “want and need state-ments” (2006: 479). Al-Gahtani and Roever’s example [1] above, and the follow-ing excerpts taken from Greek and Spanish learners (Bella 2012: 1929; Pearson2006: 479), illustrate this type of statement:

[3] a) Παρακαλώ θέlω xρόνo για την εργασία περiσσότερο […]‘Please I want more time for the assignment’

b) Θέλω να πληρώσεις εσύ παρακαλώ πολύ […]‘I want you to pay please [very much]’

c) Quiero las aspirinas, por favor.‘I want the aspirin, please.’

d) Mi amiga, la cocina está muy sucia. Quiero que limpie lo.‘My friend, the kitchen is very dirty. I want you [formal] to clean it.’

Learners in the initial stages of L2 development appear to show a markedpreference for direct request strategies regardless of the communicative context –a preference that may at least be partially explained by the fact that directstrategies tend to require fewer words and less complex morphosyntax.However, as can be seen in example [3], ELLs with lower proficiency do showan effort to use supportive moves to mitigate the force of their requests by meansof politeness markers, such as παρακαλώ or por favor (please). These supportivemoves indicate that L2 learners, even at lower levels of L2 proficiency, possess acertain level of sociopragmatic awareness (Bella 2012). Supportive and mitigatingdevices may be transferred from learners’ L1 repertoire, or they may constituteinstances of repetitions of gambits and strategies that stem from interlocutor input(Barón and Celaya 2010). Hence, as Al-Gahtani and Roever (2012) concluded,“these competences are available to learners regardless of proficiency, but profi-ciency may affect whether learners can deploy them in real-time discourse” (2012:59) – a supposition that is in line with Barron’s longitudinal findings.


In her longitudinal investigation, Barron (2003) reported that learnerstended to transfer and overgeneralize politeness markers such as bitte (please)at earlier stages. This overgeneralization eventually gave way to more morpho-syntactically complex downtoners, followed by the move of bitte from sentence-final to an embedded, intra-sentential position. She attributed these changes tolearners’ increasing automatization of processing, arguing that relatively easysyntactic structures require a lower cognitive processing load and become auto-matized prior to more complex structures. Thus, she concluded that “the overallincreases in the complexity of the syntactic downgraders employed by learnerswould appear to relate to improvements in learners’ control of processing”(Barron, 2003: 213). However, even though she found an increase towardsL1-like lexical and phrasal downgrading in offers, refusals, and requests, thedowngraders that learners used in the post-test data were judged as non-native-like – a finding that seems to support Kasper and Rose’s proposition thatmitigation develops rather late, potentially in the post-expansion phase. Incontrast to low- and intermediate-level learners, more proficient L2 learnersshow a broader repertoire of pragmatic strategies, indicating that L2 proficiencyand the ability to deploy pragmatic strategies in online communication developin parallel (Al-Gahtani and Roever 2012; Bella 2012; Chang 2010). As showcasedin Al-Gahtani and Roever’s (2012) example [2] above, the advanced learner posesa question to initiate the request and then provides an explanation, before usinga conventionally indirect request strategy, appealing to the ability of the listener(i. e., could you (.3) buy some bread for me?). Similarly, Shively (2011) found thatrequests made by university-level learners’ of Spanish changed in their pragma-linguistic realizations over the course of a semester abroad from speaker-oriented to hearer-oriented, thus approximating local L1 speaker norms.Hence, as the linguistic resources in their L2 repertoire increase, learners seemto acquire an increasing breadth of pragmatic strategies and employ them inproduction.

However, to say that grammatical or general L2 proficiency developmentand pragmatic strategy expansion are one and the same would be false. Eventhough more proficient L2 learners tend to show more “pragmalinguistic sophis-tication” (Taguchi 2012: 120), they do not necessarily communicate in ways thatare pragmatically target-like or conventionalized. Taguchi (2012), for example,explored the pragmatic development of 48 ELLs at a Japanese university, inves-tigating individual differences in the students’ learning trajectories. She notedthat her participants’ ability to appropriately navigate the logistics of a givenevent, such as an academic advising session, developed naturally over time. Thepragmalinguistic resources, however, did not develop as quickly. For example,one of the learners, Yuko, was quite proficient in English. In a task in which the


participants were asked to share an opinion about a class with the professor,Yuko gave her opinion as follows: “I like your class, but I’m interested in Frenchpop culture, so I’d like you to talk about present French culture” (Taguchi 2012:171; italics in the original). In a follow-up interview, Yuko justified her choice ofwords: “I used ‘would like to’ because it is a professor. I thought ‘want to’probably means the same thing, but ‘would like to’ is politer, so I used itinstead. It was in the high school English textbook” (Taguchi 2012: 171).

This explanation reveals that Yuko possessed a certain degree of socioprag-matic awareness, but was not able to use the more complex bi-clausal structurethat tends to be used by L1 English speakers in high-imposition requests (i. e.,I was wondering if + clause). After further questioning about the conventiona-lized form “I was wondering if…,” Taguchi noted that Yuko did in fact knowsome of the conventional request strategies and expressions related to theformula, but she was uncertain as to when to use it. Moreover, it was challen-ging for Yuko to quickly retrieve less conventionalized formulae in online com-munication – a finding that Taguchi observed across participants, with high-imposition speech acts in particular. While low-imposition speech acts seemedto develop incrementally across proficiency levels, high-imposition speechacts proved more challenging, with form-function mappings developing moreslowly even among advanced L2 learners. Hence, the appropriate mapping ofsociopragmatic meaning to form is a main concern even at higher levels ofL2 proficiency. As Chang (2011) noted, L2 learners “often wrestle with thelinguistic form-pragmatic force relationship and have difficulty appropriatelydemonstrating their sociopragmatic competence” (2011: 796) – an observationthat underlines Barron’s (2003: 250) finding that the development of L2 prag-matic competence is oftentimes hindered by the level of acquisition of socio-pragmatic ability, that is, the lack of knowledge of appropriate pragmatic norms.

In addition to form-function mapping, L2 learners – especially moreadvanced learners – need to practice controlling L2 pragmalinguistic represen-tations and automatizing retrieval processes, which Baron and Calaya (2010) call“pragmatic fluency” (2010: 38).

In a longitudinal study, Polat (2011) found that students struggled withform-function mapping issues much like Yuko’s in the acquisition of L2 dis-course markers. Polat documented the use of three focal discourse markers (well,you know, like) in a developmental learner corpus produced over the course ofone year by Alex, an L1 speaker of Turkish who lived in the U.S. and worked in agrocery store, but had not received any formal instruction in English. Polatreported great variation in Alex’s usage of the pragmatic markers. He used youknow very frequently at the beginning of the year, but his usage decreasedconsistently over 12 months until it reached what Polat referred to as “a very


native-like frequency” (2011: 3753). Alex hardly used like in the beginning of theyear, but his use of the marker increased exponentially towards the middle ofthe year and decreased again toward the end. Polat never observed Alex use wellthroughout the entire year, reporting that “[a]lthough Alex uses well frequentlyas an adverb, he does not appear to have recognized it as a discourse marker”(2011: 3753; italics in the original). Given the frequency with which well is usedas a pragmatic marker in English, Alex must have been exposed to it in everydaycommunication. However, he neither noticed nor used it with target-languagefunctionality. Hence, Polat concluded that “left completely to their own devices,learners may pick up on some discourse markers more readily than others,resulting in uneven distribution of these important pragmatic devices” (2011:3754). Moreover, learners may use them indiscriminately across different func-tions, or they may not use them with all functions or in the same contexts asL1 speakers. In line with Taguchi’s (2012) findings, Polat’s study suggests thatlexical items have to be learned before target pragmatic functions can beinferred from them – a process that tends to proceed according to non-linear,individualized trajectories.

In fact, different researchers have observed a great deal of variation – withinand across individuals – and U-shaped developmental paths in form-functionmapping processes (Barron 2003; Hassall 2015; Polat 2011; Taguchi 2012). Forexample, Alex’s ability to perform each of the three discourse markers well, youknow, and like in oral communication developed quite differently. Moreover,follow-up interviews revealed that at times he was not aware of the functionalmeaning or the frequency with which he used or did not use a given pragmaticmarker. Presenting case studies of different ELLs, Taguchi (2012) confirmeddifferent levels of awareness and great variability in learners’ developmentaltendencies. While she observed a general trend of increasing productive prag-matic ability across learners, individual learners also showed considerabledecreases and growth at different times of measurement. Moreover, Taguchifound developmental differences within individual learners between knowledge(as measured by appropriateness and grammaticality scores) and processing (asmeasured by planning time and speech rate). Knowledge and processing seemto be associated processes that develop independently and to different degreesin each learner, displaying non-linear growth with variations in pace and timing.

Building on Taguchi’s (2012) findings, Hassall (2015) examined individualvariation in L2 learners’ acquisition of Indonesian address terms, revealingfactors that seem to influence the development of L2 pragmatic production.Hassall studied two Australian learners of Indonesian, Amy and Ross, in studyabroad contexts. He found that the two learners’ investment in the foreign


culture, their experiences, and their identity construction vis-à-vis the targetlanguage and culture impacted their L2 pragmatic development. While bothlearners began their study abroad experience with a positive outlook, Amyhad rather negative experiences, felt alienated, and eventually adopted a ratherdistanced stance vis-à-vis the L2 environment, which seems to have “greatlyconstrained […] her ability to learn L2 pragmatic norms” (Hassall 2015: 57). Incontrast, Ross, who started his experience abroad with no prior knowledge ofIndonesian, reported very positive experiences, which led to “striking pragmaticgains” (2015: 57). Hassall investigated contextual influences and variables thatmight have impacted the participants’ development, concluding that “low initialproficiency, prior foreign language learning experience, timing of formal instruc-tion, and the presence of peer L2 learners during naturalistic interactions” all aidL2 pragmatic acquisition (2015: 33). In contrast, Hassall identified distancebetween L1 and L2 norms, lack of integration into the target language commu-nity (i. e., L2 identity as foreigner), and perceptions of the target culture in theL1 culture as variables that made learners resist the adoption of L2 pragmaticnorms, sometimes even deliberately avoiding target-language conventions in L2communication in favor of L1 norms. Hassall even went so far as to concludethat “great individual variation resists attempts to explain it in terms of quantifi-able factors, such as amount of L2 exposure or L2 interaction during thesojourn” (2015: 34).

To summarize, several studies have built upon and expanded Kasper andRose’s (2002) research, providing further evidence for individualized and variedlearning trajectories within the original five-stage development pattern. Allstudies highlighted that the development of L2 pragmatic production seems tobe tied to learners’ overall L2 proficiency, thus substantiating Kasper and Rose’soriginal observation. With increasing target language proficiency, L2 learnerstend to exhibit a broader repertoire of pragmalinguistic means to verbalizecommunicative intents appropriately. Thus, pragmatic aspects that are tied toL2 grammatical proficiency may be problematic for beginning learners. Withincreasing L2 proficiency, learners gain access to linguistic tools that enablethem to perform multiple functions, use the target language creatively, mitigatethe force of utterances, and encode meaning in ways appropriate to the socio-cultural and linguistic conventions of different language use contexts. However,the extent to which L2 learners deploy form-function mapping processes appro-priately depends on their awareness of speech conventions (i. e., their socio-pragmatic knowledge), their automatization of the retrieval process, and theirinvestment in and willingness to actually use sociopragmatically appropriaterepresentations.


4 Concluding Remarks

A considerable body of research has been added to what Kasper and Rose (2002)described as the “meager evidence of progression” that existed at the beginningof the millennium (2002: 157), providing support and further insights into thedevelopment of L2 pragmatics. Across all the studies reviewed above, supportiveevidence was provided for the following propositions put forth by Kasper andRose: (a) the ‘complexification hypothesis’, (b) the interconnectedness betweengrammatical competence and interlanguage pragmatic competence, (c) theinfluence of the learning environment, and (d) the assumption that learners’pragmatic ability is not necessarily accurately reflected in their pragmaticproduction.

Although the complexification hypothesis was originally proposed based ona very small number of empirical studies (n= 4) that only focused on the speechact of requests, almost every study since 2002 has provided supportive evidencefor Kasper and Rose’s (2002) five-stage framework (see Table 3 above). Studiesthat focused on pragmatic phenomena such as apologies, refusals, opinions,and discourse markers (e. g. Bardovi-Harlig 2009; Polat 2011; Taguchi 2008aTaguchi 2008b, 2012) also found a tendency on the part of learners to graduallytransition from pre-grammaticalized, routinized production toward overgenera-lization into a phase in which they have more command over a range of differentfunctions, thus expanding Kasper and Rose’s sequence beyond requests. Incontrast to Kasper and Rose, whose review focused primarily on beginninglevel learners, findings from newer studies suggest that even very proficientL2 speakers struggle and rarely become native-like at the level of fine-tuning.Thus, while the larger frame of the complexification hypothesis has been sup-ported by a continuously increasing research basis, less is known about the rathernon-linear, individualized trajectories learners seem to take when journeyingthrough the phases. Cutting across all studies, individualized trajectories seemto be mediated by a number of variables, such as conventionality and frequencyof a given pragmatic phenomenon as well as individual learner variables.

Among these variables, as hypothesized by Kasper and Rose (2002), lexico-grammatical competence and the learning environment seem to influence lear-ners’ individual progressions through the phases. For example, most studiesreported a relationship between overall L2 proficiency and interlanguage prag-matic development, while also highlighting affordances of the given learningenvironments. Studies such as Matsumura (2003) found L2 exposure to be moresignificant than proficiency. Taguchi provided further insights into the advan-tages of different learning environments, highlighting that formal instruction


may be more conducive to the development of accuracy, while a second-language (non-formal) learning environment, providing exposure to TL input,may promote the acquisition of comprehension speed. Hence, comparative, long-itudinal investigations of the development of L2 proficiency and interlanguagepragmatics in relation to different (formal and informal) L2 learning contexts mayprovide even further insights into acquisional sequences – a call for furtherresearch that still remains to be answered (see also Kasper and Rose 2002: 311).

Finally, research has substantiated Kasper and Rose’s assumption thatpragmatic production does not necessarily constitute an accurate representationof learners’ L2 meta-pragmatic awareness or knowledge. Several studies haveshown that learners, even though they were fully aware of the TL pragmaticnorms, choose not to adhere to them for different reasons.

However, despite the substantiation of original propositions and the newinsights gained by the increasing body of research, we are still only beginning tounderstand how L2 pragmatics learning unfolds. Hence, the following aspectswill need to be investigated in more detail to provide a more comprehensivepicture of L2 pragmatic acquisition:1. Although the number of longitudinal studies has increased since Kasper and

Rose’s (2002) review, most research is still cross-sectional in nature and onlyinvestigates expertise or pragmatic knowledge at different stages of devel-opment. While longitudinal research demands considerable time andresources, it is critical if the field is to investigate causal relationshipsamong variables related to pragmatic development, moving beyond theanalysis of aggregated data in cross-sectional studies that only investigateexpertise, or pragmatic knowledge at different, oftentimes randomly deter-mined stages of development. The studies reviewed in this paper focused onthree L2 pragmatic skills without investigating them within the larger con-text of interactional competence. Microanalytic, fine-grained analyses oflongitudinal interactional data, coupled with verbal report data, promisesto advance our understanding of learning trajectories in productive prag-matic development, and their relationship to the superordinate ability tointeract in real-world communication.

2. While learner factors have received attention in some development studies(e. g., Hassall 2013 and 2015), there is a clear need to investigate them inmore detail. Synergistic effects of learner factors, for instance, could beexplored to identify potentially effective constellations of variables thatimpact pragmatic learning.

3. The studies reviewed here all focus exclusively on verbal communicationskills. However, as Savignon (2002) argued, the nonverbal dimension of


communication needs to be considered as well in order to account for themultimodality of language use. Future developmental research may benefitfrom including non-verbal modalities (e. g., gestures, facial expressions, eyecontact, posture, tone of voice etc.), investigating how learners acquire theability to align different modalities to create meaning in communicativeinteraction (see also Timpe-Laughlin et al. 2015).

To conclude, this review paper has canvassed existing empirical researchinto the acquisitional sequences of interlanguage pragmatics in adultL2 learners. While L2 pragmatic development is an interesting area of researchin its own right, the tendencies revealed here could also inform L2 pedagogy,insofar as these insights could be employed in engineering learning experi-ences that are in harmony with how second and foreign languages (L2s) aredeveloped.

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