The impact of pragmatic consciousness-raising tasks on EFL learners’ speech act strategy use

Although there are growing attempts to equip learners with strategies in the ESL/EFL classroom, there has not been much effort to implement strategies to assist learners in the learning of speech acts. This study investigated the impact and effectiveness of instruction on EFL learners’ use of speech act strategies. A group of 131 Iranian undergraduate students were instructed through deductive consciousness-raising, inductive C-R, and L1-based C-R tasks for seven weeks. The results obtained through Cohen and Ishihara’s speech act strategy inventory indicated that instruction had a significant impact on participants’ utilization of speech act strategies. It also came to light that the learners were generally receptive to deductive and L1-based pragmatic C-R tasks. The findings suggest that pragmatic C-R tasks and especially L1-based tasks are effective means for applying strategies to supporting learners in the acquisition of speech acts.