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Assessing Interlanguage Pragmatic Competence on Speech Acts in a Filipino ESL Context

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Abstract

This study aims to assess the pragmatic competence of Filipino ESL learners along comprehension and production through pragmatic assessment tools that are contextualized to the local needs of Filipino ESL learners. The tools were developed in several steps such as generation of speech acts situations, likelihood investigation, organization of situations, checking for content validity, and checking for reliability. The developed research instruments were a multiple-choice tool for the pragmatic comprehension test and a WDCT for the pragmatic production test. The situations for the pragmatic tools were contextualized to Filipino ESL learners. The tools were administered to 70 AB English majors. The results revealed that the Filipino ESL learners’ level of pragmatic comprehension is high while their pragmatic production is slightly off but acceptable as rated by American English native speakers. The results imply that there is still a need to promote Filipino learners’ pragmatic competence as a crucial part of their communicative competence.

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Data Availability

Raw data were gathered at Don Mariano Marcos Memorial State University in San Fernando, La Union, Philippines. Derived data supporting the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author (Rinarose B. Budeng) on request.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank Don Mariano Marcos Memorial State University for providing financial support for this research.

Funding

This research study has received funding from Don Mariano Marcos Memorial State University

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Don Mariano Marcos Memorial State University, La Union, Philippines

    Rinarose B. Budeng & Hartwell Norman M. Merza

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  1. Rinarose B. Budeng
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Contributions

RB is the lead author, conceived of the presented topic, did the gap analysis and wrote the proposal. HM helped in the introduction, methodology and data gathering. Both authors discussed the results and contributed to the final manuscript.

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Correspondence to Rinarose B. Budeng.

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Ethical Approval

This study was conducted at Don Mariano Marcos Memorial State University in San Fernando, La Union, Philippines. The study was approved by the University Research Ethics Committee.

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Budeng, R.B., Merza, H.N.M. Assessing Interlanguage Pragmatic Competence on Speech Acts in a Filipino ESL Context. Corpus Pragmatics 7, 85–102 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s41701-023-00137-y

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