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Psychology of Language
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INTRODUCTION: ENGLISH AS A SECOND/FOREIGN
LANGUAGE
However, there are lots of challenges which English teachers and students are having
to face. Teaching English as a mother tongue is not the same as teaching it within the
frame of ESL or EFL. Teaching English to speakers of other languages (TESOL) is a
complex process in which teacher should be: a person with an adequate professional
qualification, a person who is truly aware of the cultural background of his/her
students, and someone who knows how to use scientifically based and practically
justified techniques of teaching. According to Fareh (2010), teachers in ESL/EFL
classroom: create and manage interaction in such a classroom; can enhance students'
levels of motivation; modify and shape the curriculum in accordance with the
''educational reality''; make learning more meaningful; diagnose various problems and
provide suggestiong for their resolution; can support textbooks and are able to handle
their shortcomings as well. Chen and Goh (2010) identified two main clusters of
problems (challenges) that ESL/EFL teachers encounter ± external constraints (large
class sizes, lack of teaching resources...) and internal constraints (low self-efficacy,
insufficient and inadequate pedagogical knowledge...).
Two groups of teachers are identified with regard to the notion that they are native
(NESTs) or non-native English speakers (NNESTs or non-NESTs). According to
Medgyes (1999), NNESTs are characterized by the fact that English is their foreign
or second language (1), their students are monolingual groups of English learners (2),
they work in an EFL/ESL setting (3), and the fact that they speak the same native
ϭ
language as their students (4). There are several assumptions associated with NEST
and NNEST groups of teachers (Medgyes, 1994):
1. NESTs and NNESTs differ with regard to their English language proficiency.
2. The discrepancy in their English language proficiency accounts for most of the
differences in their teaching behaviors.
3. Hence, these groups of teachers differ in terms of their teaching behaviors.
4. They could be almost equally successful teachers from their own point of views.
There is a fact that is called the linguistic handicap in non-native English teachers.
Despite that, these group of teachers could compensate it by further education in the
field of the English language teaching, by interacting with native speakers of this
language, and by using available teaching resources and materials that are written by
the scholars whose mother tongue is English. Of course, NNESTs should be aware of
the differences between them and NESTs and try to get closer to their qualities.
Medgyes (1999) listed several differences between NESTs and NNESTs in greater
details: the use of real vs. ''bookish'' language; using English more vs. less
confidently; focusing on meaning, fluency, oral skills, language in use, and colloquial
registers vs. focusing on grammar rules, accuracy, print word, form, and formal
registers; teaching items in context vs. isolation; tolerating vs. correcting/punishing
errors; supplying more vs. less cultural information; setting fewer/more tests; using a
variety of materials vs. a single textbook; favor group/pair work vs. frontal work;
preferring free vs. controlled activities; using a more flexible vs. guided approach;
having far-fetched vs. real expectations, and so on. As can be noticed, NESTs are
more spontaneous, tolerant and casual than NNESTs. On the contrary, NNESTs are
more cautious, rigid and committed to the process of teaching and ESL/EFL students'
academic performance.
ESL/EFL students
Ϯ
these kind of students are the following: learning how to spell different words,
acquiring English accent, understanding English interlocutors when they speak fast,
understanding various vernaculars, reducing the level of speaking anxiety, figuring
out that some part of English cannot be literally translated into their mother tongue,
and speaking/writing English automatically (i.e. proficiently).
There are plenty of studies on determinants of ESL/EFL academic success. Zin and
Rafik-Galea (2010) investigated the impact of Malay ESL students' anxiety levels on
their academic reading performance. They stated that academic performance in ESL
learning is highly influenced by students' English reading skills. These researchers
applied the Foreign language reading anxiety scale (FLRAS) along with the
Cognitive interference questionnaire (CIQ). They got a positive and weak but
statistically significant coefficient of correlation which indicated that reading anixety
is associated with cognitive interference in students. These two variables were in a
moderate and positive relationship with reading comprehension test. Thus, anxiety
was an important factor to the academic performance of ESL students.
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(extraversion, neuroticism, conscientiousness, agreeableness and openness to
experience) and basic psychological needs (autonomy, competence, and relatedness)
with final English grades of Turkish students. This study showed that neuroticism
was in negative correlation with final grades whereas the other four personality traits
were positively associated with students' final grades. The level of satisfaction of all
three psychological needs was in a strong, positive relationship with students' final
English grades. Therefore, it is important that students are emotionally stable,
extraverted, agreeable, conscientious and flexible persons in order to succeed in
English courses. In addition, their needs shoud be met. In other words, ESL/EFL
should have a sense of self-worth (self-respect), personal freedom, and enough space
and time to be connected with other students.
ϯ
language learning process. These authors divided relevant factors into the following
two categories:
$QRWKHU WKHRULVW '|UQ\HL OLVWHG FRPSRQHQWV RI IRUHLJQ (in our case, the
English) language learning motivation. In fact, these are levels or domains that
influence motivational level of ESL/EFL students:
ϰ
feedback quality, modelling, goal-orientedness, group cohesion, classroom goal
structure, and norm and reward system);
c) Language level (integrative and instrumental motivational subsystems).
Second or foreign (in our case, English) language acquisition process includes three
major related components/elements (Kearney, 1984):
a) Linguistics (the main locus is language itself);
b) Psycholinguistics (the principal locus is the mind of learners);
c) Sociolinguistics (the chief locus is the social context or background of learners).
As indicated (Figure 1), the student should be motivated to learn English and this
process can be facilitated by high levels of verbal intelligence. Students should also
make invidividual efforts in order to succeed. Teachers' professional skills are that
what matters, as well. Finally, there are learner's and teacher's cultural background
along with English/American cultural specificity that influence the process of
learning English.
ϲ
LINGUISTICS IN GENERAL AND THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE
Linguistics is the scientific study of language meaning, form and its usage in different
social contexts and for various purposes. Main branches of linguistics are: phonetics,
phonology, syntax, morphology, semantics, orthography, generative linguistics,
cognitive linguistics, psycholinguistics and sociolinguistics. Psycholinguistics and
sociolinguistics will be explained later, because there are two chapters that cover
them in details. Additionally, applied linguistics is a term that can refer to various
subfields of linguistics.
Linguistics disciplines
Phonetics
It is a subfield of linguistics that is concerned with how sounds are produced (in the
speech organs), transmitted to others and perceived by others (Vikner, 1986). There
are four improtant phenomena studied by scholars who are interested in phonetics:
aspiration, stops, voicing and air mechanism in general. Based on the way of
producing sounds, they can be divided into four groups: fricatives, affricates, laterals,
and nasals. Regarding points of articulation (i.e. spots where the airstream is impeded
or stopped), consonants can be divided into the following groups (Bickford & Floyd,
2006):
a) Alveolar (''t'' and ''d'')
b) Velar (''k'' and ''g'')
c) Bilabial (''p'' and ''b'')
d) Labiodental (''f'' and ''v'')
e) Interdental (''th'' as in ''then'')
f) Palatal (''s'' and ''z'')
g) Uvular (''r'' produced with the uvula which is in the back of the vocal system)
Similar, but not quite the same discipline, namely phonology, studies the function of
sounds when they come in groups (i.e. in relation to each other). For example,
ϳ
phonology deals with minimal pairs (e.g. ''pat'' vs. ''cat'', which are two phonemes that
differ only in a segment of a sound sequence).
Syntax
There are some other SVO languages: Bosnian, Croatian, Estonian, French, Italian,
Serbian, Spanish... There is also a group of SOV languages: Japanese, Latin, Korean,
Turkish (with a few exceptions)... , and a group of VOS, VSO, OSV and OVS
languages. Some of the languages allow two or more combinations of these features
(e.g. Finnish, German, Hungarian and Russian).
Syntax also deals with types of sentences in a language. For instance, there are four
types of sentences in English language with regard to their structure: simple (subject
+ predicate), compound (two independent/complete sentences joined by a coordinate
1
Stars were used for indicating ungrammaticality of these sentences.
ϴ
conjunction), complex (one independent sentence and one dependent/subordinate
clause, with a conjunctive adverb or without subject or predicate), and compound-
complex sentences (two or more indenpedent sentences and two or more dependent
clauses). Two examples of simple sentences are ''He is late'' and ''Barbara and John
are going to write their English exams''. Some examples of compound sentences are:
''Mary submitted her essay, but she missed the deadline'', ''He missed the train, so he
has to walk to his job'', and ''Mrs. Robert is in a hurry, and she does not have enough
time to pick up her children.'' Two examples of complex sentences are ''Because they
are going to have a baby, they save their money'' and ''Whenever I want to speak in
the class, my teacher tells me to be quiet.'' Taking into account compound-complex
sentences, we can illustrate them by the following two examples ''Although I don't
like to study, I studied French yesterday, and I put a lot of efforts to master it'' and
''My girlfriend wanted to go on a party, but I was so tired, which was perceived by
her as laziness.''
Regarding their contents, aim, and purpose, English sentences can be divided into:
interrogative, declarative, imperative, exclamatory and conditional sentences (Table
1).
ϵ
If she had written to him, she would have been in a relationship
with him (third conditional).
There is also a syntactic topic, called the hierarchy of phrases in sentences, within
which noun and verb phrases (NP and VB, respectively) can be found. Noun phrases
(NP) consist of a noun (or two or more of them) and all relevant descriptors of it
(Sternberg & Sternberg, 2012). Some of them are: ''a blue sweater'', ''an extraordinary
tale'', ''a white, small dog'', and ''a totally different world''. Verb phrases (predicates)
consist of a verb and some auxiliary elements (prepositions, adverbs, prepositions...).
For instance, ''is eating'', ''are swimming'', ''stayed at home'', and ''tried to do so'', are
all verb phrases. A noun phrase can be incorporated into a verb phrase. The example
is ''learns a difficult lesson'' (''a difficult lesson'' Ù determiner + adjective + noun).
Thus, ''a difficult lesson'' is a noun phrase and ''learns a difficult lesson'' (VB) is
positioned higher in this phrase-hierarchy. There are prepositional phrases (PP), as
well. Some examples are: ''by the cat'', ''from the country'', ''to the university'', ''in the
ϭϬ
picture'', and ''of the group''. If we say or write: ''of the chemical compound'', a noun
phrase (''chemical compound'' Ù adjective + noun) takes place within a prepositional
phrase. The hierarchy of phrases in sentences is illustrated in Figure 2 and 3.
Figure 2. The hierarchy of phrases in the sentence: ''Andy successfully passed the final exam.''
As can be seen (Figure 2), there are two noun phrases (''Andy'' and ''the final exam'')
and a verb phrase (''successfully passed the final exam'') in the first sentence (S1).
One of the noun phrases was incorporated into the verb phrase along with an adverb
(''successfully'') and a verb (''passed''). There is also a determiner (D) ''the'', an adverb
(ADV) ''successfully'', and an adjective ''final''. ''V'' stands for a verb (''passed'') and
''N'' stands for nouns (''Andy'' and ''exam'').
Next figure (Fig. 3) shows the same sentence (labeled as ''S2'') expressed in a passive
voice (''The final exam was passed successfully by Andy.''). The noun phrase (''the
final exam'') and the verb phrase (''was passed successfully by Andy'') are at the same
horizontal line in the hierarchy of phrases. The first phrase includes a determiner
(''the''), an adjective (''final''), and a noun (''exam''). The verb phrase consists of two
verbs (the verb ''to be'' in the past tense and the verb the past participle of the verb
''pass''), an adverb (''successfully''), and a preposition phrase (PP). The preposition
phrase includes a preposition (''by'') and a noun (''Andy''). Hence, these sentences are
grammatically different; however, their meaning is the same.
ϭϭ
Figure 3. The hierarchy of phrases in the sentence: ''The final exam was passed successfully by
Andy.''
Morphology
ϭϮ
significance significant significantly to signify
empathy empathic empathically to empathize
Semantics
ϭϯ
go with to happen as a result (of something)
run down to criticize
run into to meet, bump into, rush into
run to to have enough money (for something)
run over/through to check (something)
As can be noticed (Table 3), a particle (about, along, down, over, with, into, to...)
changes the meaning of the main verb (come, go, run).
Orthography
Another group of examples includes words that sound similar to each other (i.e.
homonyms): ''their'' vs. ''they're''; ''here'' vs. ''hear''; ''die'' vs. ''dye''; ''dessert'' vs.
''desert''; ''to'' vs. ''too'' vs. ''two''; ''weather'' vs. ''whether'', ''see'' vs. ''sea''; ''know'' vs.
''no''...
ϭϰ
Orthography comprises cases where somebody has to make a distiction between
using comma or semicolon. Semicolon is, for instance, used when we want to
separate two independent clauses that convey similar ideas. It is also used when we
want to connect two long independent clauses with so-called coordinating
conjunctions (so, and, but, or, nor, and yet). We also put a semicolon before the
following words (with which two or more clauses can be linked): ''however'',
''therefore'', ''moreover'', ''for example'', ''consequently'', ''on the contrary'', ''of course'',
''as a result''... They usually come before so-called transitional phrases and are
followed by a comma.
Generative linguistics
It was founded within the frame of structuralism. It postulates that syntax is given a
priori; therefore, it is quite autonomous, apart from other language features (Lakoff,
1991). The most well-known name in this field is that of Noam Chomsky2, who is a
founder of generative/universal grammar. This concept entered linguistics in the
1950s and 1960s and today there are still debates by which it is surrounded. The first
book published on this topic was entitled Syntactic structures (Chomsky, 1957).
According to Chomsky, there are two types of language structure ± deep and
superficial. In other words, although superficially distinct, two sentences can mean
the same thing. Universal grammar (UG) is ''the basic design underlying the
grammars of all human languages''; besides, this term refers to ''the circuitry in
children's brains that allows them to learn the grammar of their parents' language''
(Pinker, 1994, 483). This concept is a part of innatism or innatist theory.
Cognitive linguistics
One of the most important concepts in cognitive linguistics is the access principle (or
ID principle). According to Evans (2007, 2), it can be defined as follows: ''any
linguistic expression that names or describes a particular element in a given mental
ϯ
Chomsky provided us with the similar example: ''Colorless green ideas sleep furiously. / Furiously sleep
ideas green colorless.'' (Chomsky, 1975)
ϭϲ
space may be employed in order to access an element in a distinct mental space that
is linked to it via a connector''.
Mental map
It is another concept that is considered crucial in cognitive linguistics. It is a mental
representation which helps someone to store, recall, code, and decode various
information, concepts, words, perceptions and images. Two illustrations of this
concept are given in Figures 4 and 5.
Figure 4. An illustration of mental map where its nodes are connected with regard to emotional
significance for a person
As can be noticed (Figure 4), the first one is about someone's childhood and his/her
experiences during this period of life (experiences with siblings, parents,
grandparents, friends, children play, school and teachers). The concepts of ''village''
and ''nature'' were acquired when a person visited his/her grandparents. Additionally,
the concept of ''play'' was learned while interacting with friends in the playground.
ϭϳ
Figure 5. Another illustration of mental map where nodes are mutually connected with regard to
hierarchical relationship between them or some obvious associations
Looking at Figure 5, it can be noticed that ''wild animals'' and ''domestic animals'' are
subordinated categories of a much more broader category of ''animals''. ''Wolf'' and
''bear'' are at a certain degree lower in this hierarchy whereas concepts such as
''freedom'' and ''extinction'' are more abstract.
Applied Linguistics
Within applied linguistics, the following ten problems are of a great interest (Grabe,
2010):
ϭϴ
3. Language assessment problems (fairness, responsibility, usability, reliability and
validity);
4. Language learning problems (attitudes, expertise, awareness, skills, use, rules,
context, automaticity...);
5. Language teaching problems (practice, training, interaction, understanding,
motivation, outcomes, resources...);
6. Language pathology problems (dyslexia, aphasia, and other physical disabilities);
7. Language and technology problems (assessment, learning, access...);
8. Language planning and policy problems (political factors, ecology of language,
and status, corpus and acquisition planning);
9. Language use problems (registers, dialects, discourse communities, as well as
limited access to services and resources); and
10. Literacy problems (learning issues, orthography development, new scripts, and
resource development).
In essence, all linguistic disciplines can be classified as both theoretical and applied.
If we carry out an empirical study on English syntax or orthography, our study can be
described as a contribution to applied linguistics. At the same time, it contributes to
the theoretical knowledge in these disciplines as well.
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ϭϵ
''Aufgabenstellungen'' (= tasks), etc. On the other hand, there is a small number
analytic languages (e.g. Mandarin Chinese and Vietnamese).
In fact, almost all languages are a mixture of synthetic and analytic elements.
However, there is an overbalance of one group of this elements which allows us to
categorize various languages. Robert Millar (2008) claims that these are not two
distinct categories. According to this theorist, we should consider it as a bipolar
continuum, with two extrema ± synthetic and analytic pole. For example, Finnish is
very close to the synthetic pole whereas some little known languages (e.g. Tok Pisin)
are close to the analytic pole. This author puts English close to the analytic pole, as
do some other theorists.
As can be noticed (Table 5), lots of these words are a combination of a prefix (e.g.
''un'', ''mis'' ) + a noun/verb/adjective (e.g. ''member'', ''patriate'') + a suffix (e.g. ''ly'',
''able'').
ϮϬ
Table 6. Some examples of analytic elements in English
Example Explanation
In order to tell someone that this professor is female,
we use the pronoun ''she''. Thus, we do not need to add a
suffix to the word µ¶teacher¶¶ (in contrast, there is a
She is a very good professor.
gender-specific pair in Spanish: µ¶professor¶¶± professora¶¶
to indicate that she teaches successfully, we use
adjective µ¶good¶¶ along with the adverb µ¶very¶¶.
In order to tell our readers that somebody (he) is a
Everybody knows him, because he
well-known actor, musician, artist... , the following
is a superstar.
words were used: ''everybody knows him''.
unnecessary'' is expressed as ''not'' + ''necessary''
It is not necessary to be a worker
and ''highly-qualified'' is expressed as ''(a worker) who
who has high qualifications.
has high qualifications''
It is a house that we can afford. affordable'' is replaced by ''that we can afford''
''his whereabouts'' are replaced by a sequence of
We want to know where he is now.
these words: ''where he is''
Looking at Table 6, we can see that the meaning (contents) of a sentence can be
expressed in different way by using pronouns (''we'', ''she'', ''him''...), verbs (to afford),
nouns (''qualifications''...), adjectives (''good''...), and adverbs (''very''...).
Collocation consists of several words that can be placed together. They are common
word combinations automatically known and produced by native speakers of a
language. Collocations are usually different in different languages. For example,
Oxford English dictionary of collocations includes more than 150,000 of them 4 .
Table 7 shows some English collocations and wrongly used combinations of words
related to them.
4
Retrieved from http://www.freecollocation.com/ (October 30, 2016)
Ϯϭ
catch a cold kick a cold
fall asleep get asleep, take asleep, go to asleep
fall in love go in love, get down in love
keep records do records, continue records
have a coffee/dinner/sandwich take a coffee/dinner/sandwich
highly likely/probable hugely/largely likely/probable
strong coffee hard/heavy coffee
heavy traffic/rain strong/hard traffic/rain
terribly sorry much sorry
a big surprise large surprise
to the best of my knowledge on the best of my knowledge
As noticed in Table 7, collocations are not always logical or regular. Hence, students
should pay attention to those which are different in their mother tongues. Learning
collocations helps them to think in whole phrases, and as a result of that, spoken
fluency will be improved.
The issue related to false friends is another tricky topic while learning foreign or
second language. There are the words or phrases that look and sound similarly to
those in somebody's mother tongue. However, they have different meanings (for
some examples, see Table 8).
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manufactured good, 'komoditet'', 'roba'', ''materijal'', ' '
commodity
raw material 'komotnost'' artikal''
crowd of people,large open area
'gomila ljudi'', ''veliki
Concourse inside or in front of a public 'konkurs''
hol''
ibuilding
Besides, lots of words that sound or look alike really mean the same thing: ''park''
(Bosnian: ''park''; French: ''parc''; Italian: ''parco''), ''institution'' (Bosnian: ''institucija'';
German: ''Institution''), ''university'' (Bosnian: ''univerzitet''; French: ''uQLYHUVLWp
6SDQLVK
XQLYHUVLGDG
,WDOLDQ
XQLYHUVLWj
*HUPDQ
8QLYHUVLWlW
PDULWLPH
(Bosnian: ''maritimni/a/o''), ''situation'' (Bosnian: ''situacija''; French: ''situation''),
''biology'' (Bosnian: ''biologija''; German: ''Biologie''; French: ''biologie''), etc.
Ϯϯ
PSYCHOLINGUISTICS: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND AND
RESEARCH
Psycholinguistics models
Unlike the previous model, there is the Two-lexicon model, proposed by Menn
(1983). Within this model, there are two types of lexicon ± the input lexicon (a set of
words that can be recognized by the child) and the output lexicon (a set of word
representations that are referred to when child tries to talk about something). Here
adult words directly influence the input lexicon (i.e. recognition store) whereas the
output lexicon (i.e. production store) is influenced by the input lexicon, modified by
reduction rules (Menn, 1983). The very first part of the model includes ''abstracted
underlying forms'' that are connected with input lexicon through true phonological
rules. On the other hand, the relationship between the output lexicon and the output
(i.e. speech) is mediated by production rules and articulatory instructions.
Models that were mentioned above are labeled as box-and-arrow models. On the
other hand, there are so-called connectionist models. The latter ones are computer-
based models, where processing units (nodes) are linked with each other in order to
create a network (Baker et al., 2001). Thus, a language can be acquired by activating
nodes, and the speed and quality of acquisition depend on connection strength
between nodes. For instance, there are lexical, semantic, and phonological nodes and
the relationships between them could be labeled as excitation or inhibition (these
relationships, actions, or processes depend on specific words that should be acquired
or learned, specific external and internal stimuli, etc.).
Language acquisition
As can be noticed, this period is critical for language acquisition of the mother
tongue. However, there are some children that are bilingual or multilingual which
means that they have to acquire two or more languages in parallel.
Speech acts
One of the chief psycholinguistic topics is that of ''speech acts''. Speech acts are the
ways by which we can express our thoughts, demands, emotional states, wishes,
needs and intentions. There are two groups of speech acts ± direct (five subtypes, see
Table 9) and indirect (four subtypes, see Table 10). John Searle (1975a) identified the
following direct speech acts: expressive, directive, representative, commissive, and
declaration/perfomative. He also identified four indirect speech acts used while
expressing: reasons, abilities, desire, and future actions (Searle, 1975b). Indirect
speech acts are less straightforward compared to direct speech acts.
Ϯϲ
pride, resignation, love, A child: ''Dad, I am really happy to
joyment... hear that.''
Asking somebody to assist/help An ESL student: ''Mr. Cameron, could
us do something, or to give us a you help me with this vocabulary
Directive favor. For this purpose, we can exercise, please?''.
use more indirect forms of speech, A classmate: ''Jim, help me with my
or just direct demands. homework´
This speech act is used to Prof. Cameron³It is important to
Representative transfer one's belief/opinion teach students how to use their
that a proposition is true. WH[WERRNV´
Commissives are: contracts, An EFL teacher: ''Look, I cannot
promises, assurances, pledges, provide you with the feedback now,
Commissive
guarantees and other but I will be able to share it with you
commitments. WRPRUURZ´
A statement or a group of Prof. Morrisson: ''I know that you had
statements that result in a new studied hard for the exam. You only
state of affairs. got 35% of correct answers. You fail.
Declaration/
In other words, the situation of student cannot continue with his
Performative
a speaker (doer, addressee) studies, because it was mandatory to
will be changed due to this pass this course).
statement.
If we compare the contents of Table 9 and Table 10, it can be noticed that indirect
speech acts are more polite ways to tell somebody to do a particular thing or to
undertake a specific activity.
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if'' is an effective way of getting me how many hours you spend
someone to do something for us. in studying English.¶¶
Here ''would'' is used instead 'Would you show me your
of ³will´ and it is milder than notebook?''
Future actions
direct speech act (''Show me your ³Would you answer the last
notebook!''). questLRQ"
´
Indirect speech acts are useful when we want to ask somebody something unpleasant,
which causes discomfort, shame or animosity (i.e. strong hostility). However, if our
interlocutor understands the point and does not like circumlocution, he will behave
like he heard a manipulative utterance. Hence, we should be careful when
pronouncing such kind of phrases (speech acts).
According to Steven Pinker5, M. A. Nowak, and J. J. Lee (2008), indirect speech acts
have the following three purposes: relationship negotiation, plausible deniability, and
serving as a digital medium of indirect and direct communication. Relationship
negotiation is when somebody uses indirect speech because of ambiguity of a
situation. For instance, our friend yawns and holds her/his head down. Somebody can
say: ''Oh, I think that we need some sleep.'' As a result of this utterance, our friend
can stop yawning or s/he can go home for a sleep. An example of plausible
deniability is the situation when someone wants to indirectly suggest somebody an
action. For example, a man wants to have sex with a women whom he met in a night
club. He could say to her: ''Do you want me to show you where the toilet is?'' If she
realizes that this man wants to have sexual intercourse with her, she cannot say: ''He
directly asked me for having sex''. Finally, indirect speech acts are sequences of
words that reveal the true (actual) state of affairs. Therefore, it can serve as a device
that indirectly conveys obvious (direct) perceptions and observations.
Speech acts are a part of pragmatics, a linguistic discipline which deals with
language use for different practical purposes. For example, we use polite phrases in
ϱ
Steven Pinker (1954-) teaches in the Department of Psychology at Harvard University. It is an experimental
psychologist, who tries to make scientifically-based connections between mind, language and human nature
in general. Some of his best known books are: How the mind works, The stuff of thought, The language
instinct, and The blank slate (Retrieved from http://stevenpinker.com/biocv; November 27, 2016).
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one context (e.g. applying for the scholarship offered by a prestigious university) and
slang in the other (communicating within our family or friends).
Interlanguage
Interlanguage (IL) is a mixture of native language (NL or L1) and target language
(TL or L2) features. It is an important term within second language acquisition
(SLA). In addition, IL consists of the elements that are originally neither a part of NL
nor of TL. According to Susan Gass 6 , J. Behney, and L. Plonsky (2013), this
language (i.e. internalized system) encompasses dynamic and consistent elements
which are nothing but available linguistic data, organized by a learner (student) in a
specific way. These authors reported two terms that are central to the concept of
interlanguage ± fossilization and stabilization. Fossilization means bringing the
learning process to an end by permanently establishing the distance from a target
language. In other words, second language learner would probably never speak as a
native (target) language speaker. The second relevant term is stabilization, which is
used to describe ingrained, firmly fixed linguistic forms utilized by a TL learner. This
concept is used because we do not know with certainty when target language learning
is terminated. Hence, it is recommended discussing on stabilization rather than on
fossilization.
Pollio, Finn, and Custer (2016) examined the meaning and nature of body concepts in
everyday language. The participants of their study were expected to put body-related
terms into several categories. By the means of multidimensional scaling and
clustering, authors then identified five categories of participants' perceptions, actions,
and reflexions related to body. These are: visible/not visible; inside/outside;
instrument and object; vitality and activity; as well as appearance and self-expression.
ϲ
Susan Gass (1943-) is a university professor in the Department of Linguistics at Michigan State University.
Her main field of interest is psycholinguistics (more precisely, second language acquisition ± SLA). Gass
wrote and published lots of books and scientific papers. Some of them are: Varieties of English, Second
language learning data analysis, Interlaguage refusals: A cross-cultural studies of Japanese-English,
Stimulated recall methodology in applied linguistics and L2 research, and Second language teacher manual
(Retrieved from http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/9781405198431.wbeal0445/abstract; November
28, 2016).
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Therefore, phenomenology and linguistics research revealed that participants think of
their body and describe it in five hypothetical dimensions. According to
phenomenologist, we also use language to describe, understand, and conceptualize
time, world and others (along with the social order).
Erdocia, Zawiszewski, and Laka (2014) carried out a research into the first (L1) and
second (L2) language processing with regard to ''subject-object-verb'' (SVO or
canonical) and ''object-subject-verb'' (OSV or non-canonical) scheme. Their findings
point out to faster processing of the SVO scheme (typical for participants' L1)
compared to OSV scheme (a structural feature of their L2). In addition, these authors
got differences between electrophysiological indicators of processing patterns when
native and non-native speakers were compared. In other words, the speed and the
pattern of neural processes were different.
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SOCIOLINGUISTICS: THEORY AND RESEARCH
Sociolinguistics is concerned with the study of various dialects (both sociolects and
regional dialects), vernaculars, genderlects (i.e. gender differences in understanding
and using language), and some other ways of language use in social interactions. A
definition offered by Radford and his colleagues (2009, 14) states that
''sociolinguistics is the study of the relationship between language use and the
structure of society''. Another definition is given in the book Sociolinguistics (in the
chapter entitled The social study of language): [It is] ''the field that studies the
relation between language and society, between the uses of language and the social
structures in which the users of language live'' (Spolsky, 1998, 3).
According to Bernard Spolsky (1998), whose definition was already mentioned, this
lintguistic discipline covers the following topics:
a) The ethnography of speaking and the structure of conversation.
b) Locating variations in speech (degrees of formality; styles of speech patterns;
regionally or socially located dialects; special varieties /registers and jargons/ that are
used in particular profession; as well as gender, slang and social stratification).
c) Bilingual speakers (language socialization, problems that bilingual speakers face
and switching between two languages in a single conversation).
d) Societal multilingualism (historical and political perspective; language conflict;
cross-linguistic contact; language shift and maintenance; social relations; ethnic
identity; language rights; and diglossia).
e) Sociolinguistics applied to some controversial social issues (language education,
planning, and policy, English imperialism/hegemony; normativism; and
prescriptivism).
Diglossia
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comprises of lots of languages, dialects, and varieties, it can be considered as an
''umbrella'' of Indian speech) and English. Another example includes Belgium, where
three official languages exist: German, Dutch, and French.
Bernstein (1971) proposed the Theory of language code. According to this theoretical
framework, therea are two registers (''codes'') that are used by different social classes:
the restricted one and the elaborated one. Restricted code is widely used by lower
social class and is characterized by short, poorly informative sentences with lots of
personal pronouns. On the contrary, the elaborated code includes more complex
sentences with lots of modifiers. In addition, their contents are more self-explanatory.
This type of language code is used by higher social classes.
Next, females, compared to males, use language more to speak or write about their
family, relationships, and feelings. On the other hand, males use it more for talking
and writing about personal success, business, sport events, as well as concrete,
feasible things (Newman et al., 2008). Moreover, females use more emphatic words
or phrases (e.g. ''Oh, that's very, very nice coat!'', ''Oh, my God, this was
awesome!''...). Males speak less about their feelings, expectations, fantasy and
relationships with intimate partners or their family members.
Sociolinguists also examine phenomena such as the usage of different words for the
same concept. The example is ''soda''. Depending on where the American English
speakers come from, ''soda'' could be: ''carbonated water'', ''pop'', ''soda water'',
''tonic'', ''soda pop'', and ''carbonated drink''. Another example is the phrase ''waiting
in queue'' (British English usage), along with ''standing/waiting in line'' (American
English usage). In New York, there is a variation of the latter phrase. It is:
''standing/waiting on line''.
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linguistic phenomenon is pidgin language which is mostly used by immigrants. For
example, immigrants who came to the USA try to speak English with the accent of
their own native tongue and/or with using words which are known to them through
their mother tongue (i.e. these which sound similarly to some words of American
English).
Dialects
Macaulay (2002) carried out a comparative study of urban speech in two towns in
Scotland (Ayr and Glasgow). He examined the frequency of derivative adverbs in ±ly
(e.g. automatically, entirely, actually, really, badly, clearly, happily, literally...). The
results showed that Ayr's middle-class members had higher frequency of these
adverbs in their speech, compared to lower-class members. Similar effect was found
in the Glasgow subsample: middle-class members outperformed the members of
working-class. Morevoer, data were analyzed with regard to participants' gender:
boys, compared to girls, use this kind of adverbs more frequently. This researcher
also analyzed the frequency of use of dead and pure in adolescents (such as in the
sentence ''This is pure embarrassing'' and ''This is dead embarrassing''). The findings
revealed that adolescents in the middle-class outperformed those in working-class
regarding the frequence of use of both words. Participants from the working class
used pure more and dead less than participants from the middle-class. In addition,
girls used these two words more frequently compared to boys (Macaulay, 2002).
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Another group of findings is related to the use of just (e.g. ''Oh, it's just out of this
world''). Within the middle-class, adults use just less frequently than adolescents.
Boys use it more frequently than girls; however man and women (adults) use it
almost equally. On the other hand, within the working-class, women and girls use just
more frequently than men and boys.
These results can be explained referring to the restrictive code (i.e. the use of
relatively simple adverbs and adjectives in a context of communication where we
expect to be understood without saying lots of words, names, specific explanations or
determiners). Restrictive code is opposed to the public language (i.e. the elaborated
code), which is more precise, specific and understandable.
Xia (2013) conducted a study where gender differences were examined. He identified
four aspects of language use within which gender differences were found to be
statistically significant: pronunciation, intonation, vocabulary, and syntax. According
to this study, almost 2/3 of men pronounce the suffix ±ing in a wrong way. On the
RWKHU KDQG RQO\ ó RI ZRPHQ GR VR :RPHQ WHQG WR VSHDN LQ D KLJK-pitch voice,
because there is an influence of emotional state that is usually instable in women.
Women use a specific feminine vocabulary (''color words''; lots of adjectives and
adverbs that are related to emotions; a lot of diminutives; and first person plural
pronoun, compared to men who usually use first and second person singular
pronoun). Females also use tag questions more frequently than men whereas men
tend to use imperative sentences.
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COMMON RESEARCH METHODS IN LINGUISTICS
The first technique is doing interviews with ESL/EFL students and teachers as well as
with native speakers of a language. Interviews should be as structured as possible.
This means that the interviewer has to prepare a list of questions that will be posed to
each interlocutor in the same order. The interviewer should carefully take notes or
record the conversation. By using interview transcripts, we can do the content
analysis, which is another technique widely used in linguistics. For example, an
English learner could be asked the following questions:
1. What is the hardest English domain for you (grammar, writing, listening, or
speaking)?
2. How many years have you been studying English (less than a year, 1-2 years, 3-5
years, 6-10 years, or more than 10 years)?
3. Do you like to watch English films and/or TV series without subtitles?
4. How often do you communicate in English (every day, once a week, twice a week,
once a month, twice a month, once a year, two or three times a year, never) outside
the classroom?
5. Have you ever visited a foreign country where you had an opportunity to speak in
English?
6. In your opinion, what can be done to improve the quality of English classes in your
school/university?
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According to Morgan (1993), content analysis a quantitative (statistical) analysis of
qualitative data. One should decide the list of keywords and codes to be used in this
kind of analysis in advance. It is highly recommended that there should be not only
one estimator, but for example three or more of them. This is because of the
objectivity issues. The researcher can also conduct a content analysis based on
written language forms (i.e. Facebook messaging, SMS texting, suicidal notes,
literary works, lyrics, etc.).
The third one is experiment. It is usually used in phonetics and cognitive linguistics
where the most popular approach is the psychophysicological research. It
encompasses both independent and dependent variable(s). By conducting
experimental research, we are able to examine the causal relationship between them
while controlling or excluding the impact of some other variables. In order to
determine the causality effect between two variables, three preconditions should be
met:
a) Two variables are in statistically significant correlation with each other;
b) One of them should precede the other one (the first one is called ''the cause'' or
independent/input variable and the second one is called ''the consequence'' or
dependent/output variable);
c) We should examine the impact of other relevant variables on the independent and
dependent one; and control or exclude it.
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language). These examples include independent samples (English learners and
English native speakers; males and females; children and adults). Next, the grades
(performance) of English learners on midterm and final exam could be compared to
each other, as well. The last example included dependent samples because there is the
same group of English learners tested in two time (measuring) points.
Two commonly used statistical techniques within (quasi) experimental design are t-
test and analysis of variance (ANOVA). T-test could be performed for independent
samples and dependent samples (so-called dependent or paired-samples t-test). It is
used to test the difference between two groups of participants (e.g. boys and girls;
English and French teachers; high school and university students). ANOVA is
performed when we want to compare two or more groups of participants. ANOVA is
also used to examine the influence of more than one independent variable (e.g.
gender and marital status; age, socioeconomic status, and level of education) onto a
dependent variables (e.g. participants' scores on TOEFL).
1. Reading additional learning materials (e.g. short stories and poems in English)
2. Speaking English with native speakers
3. Listening to English music and short conversations
4. Writing essays in English
5. Learning complex grammar structures
6. Translating English texts into students' mother tongue
7. Learning phrases used in academic English writing.
The last one (although there are many other less important linguistic techniques) is
structured observation, within which a researcher investigates a group of people who
speak a language of interest and takes notes in an unbiased and already planned way.
Structured observation is usually defined as the systematic recording and description
of behaviors, artifacts and events in the social setting which is previously chosen for a
particular study (Marshall & Rossman, 1989).
The researcher (i.e. observer) can also become a member of such groups in order to
get a deeper insight in a particular language use. However, there is a problem of
subjectivity and bias, so the researcher should know in advance how to handle it.
Additionally, this kind of researcher should have at least basic knowledge of
sociology, social psychology, anthropology and ethnology.
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INTERCULTURAL (CROSS-CULTURAL) PSYCHOLOGY
What is culture?
The word ''culture'' comes from the Latin verb cultivare which means ''to cultivate''. It
is the antonym of ''nature'', because nature alludes to rawness, coarse state and
spontaneity. Culture is a set of (folk) customs, norms, standards, common behavioral
patterns, attitudes, aspirations and values. Culture is not the same as nation or ethnic
group. Nations/ethnic groups have their own cultures; however, there are nations that
share the same culture. Damen (1987) listed six important characteristics of culture in
general:
1. Cultural patterns change across time.
2. Culture is learned (thus, it is not inherited).
3. Culture is a universal fact (or state) of human life.
4. Culture and language are interactive i.e. closely related to each other.
5. Culture functions as a filtering device between the broad range of stimuli in
environment and culture's bearers (we are those that possess or bear our own culture).
6. Our culture provides us with sets of selected, unique and interrelated blueprints for
living. In addition, there are accompanying sets of beliefs and values which serve to
support these blueprints.
According to this author, culture learning can be regarded as the fifth dimension in
the language classroom (Damen, 1987). This kind of learning is an inseparable part of
our socialization and education. This is due to the fact that we have to acquire
primary customs typical for our culture in order to be socially accepted, respected and
regarded as ''normal'' person. People who extremely deviate from their cultural
surroundings are usually considered ''crazy'', ''mentally ill'', or ''socially maladjusted''.
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The association between culture and language is represented by the following five
key ideas which were given in Teaching and learning languages: A guide (Scarino &
Liddicoat, 2009):
a) Cultural framework plays a central role in ways meanings are interpreted.
b) Culture is in its essence related to language.
c) Culture can be seen as both information and practices.
d) Every culture is characterized by diversity and variablity.
e) ''The intercultural'' is a process which is beyond the idea of ''knowing a culture'';
thus, it is not the same as ''culture''.
There are four approaches to teaching culture (Liddicoat, 2005). A teacher can
highlight the importance of (1) artefacts and institutions, (2) facts, (3) practices, and
(4) processess within culture. If a teacher combines teaching cultural facts, artefacts,
and institutions, this is called the static approach to cultural context and learning. If
s/he wants to teach cultural processes, artefacts, and institutions, this is, in the same,
the static approach to content and dynamic approach to learning. Next, if teacher
wants to focus on processes and practices, this is called the dynamic approach (i.e.
active engagement with some practices of a certain cultural group). Lastly, teachers
who want to combine cultural facts and practices are guided by the static approach to
learning and dynamic approach to content. Hence, there are static and dynamic
processess, as well as learning- and content-related approaches.
Cross-cultural psychology
Berry, Poortinga, Segall, and Dasen (2002) defined cross-cultural psychology in the
following way: it is the scientific study of variations in human behavior that can be
attributed to and influenced by cultural context. Two other psychological disciplines
greatly overlap with cross-cultural psychology. They are cultural and indigenous
psychology. According to Jahoda (1992), cross-cultural research commenced when
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people from one culture (guided by their specific customs, standards, values and
beliefs) started to observe and pay attention to another culture(s) in search of
similarities and dissimilarities between foreign and their own culture. Accordingly,
layman's perception of foreign cultures are impregnated by lots of stereotypes,
prejudice and generalizations. Hence, one of the objectives of scientific approach is
to objectively examine other cultures while minimizing these stereotypes and
negative, biased perceptions.
In addition, she perceives the branch of indigenous psychology as Hwang (1998) did:
this is a field that deals with transforming informal folk theories into psychological
(that is, scientific) theories and models. Compared to cultural psychology, indigenous
psychology goes one step further and utilizes more strict methods borrowed from
cross-cultural psychology (Greenfield, 2000).
There are three main concepts that should be taken into account while discussing on
cross-cultural differences and similarities:
a) absolutism (the assumption that a personality trait, emotion, behavioral pattern, etc.
is in its nature and expression the same in every cultural context);
b) relativism (our all behavior is influenced by our specific cultural background);
c) universalism (every psychological trait, function, or process is basically the same;
however, the culture moderates and modifies it in certain way and to some extent).
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Cultural Intelligence Quotient (CQ)
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interaction requires it'' and ''I vary the rate of my speaking when a cross-cultural
situation requires it'' (behavioral CQ); ''I am confident that I can socialize with locals
in a culture that is unfamiliar to me'' and ''I am confident that I can get accustomed to
the shopping conditions in a different culture'' (motivational CQ).
Ng, Van Dyne, and Ang (2012) provided a summary of findings related to CQ.
According to their article, cultural intelligence is associated with emotional
intelligence, general cognitive abilities and social intelligences. Some antecedents of
cultural intelligence are: Big Five personality traits (extraversion/introversion,
emotional stability/neuroticism, openness to experience, agreableness and
conscientiousness), international (non)work experience, intercultural contact, virtual
team experience, as well as cross-cultural programs (service learning, study
abroad...). There are four types of outcomes of cultural intelligence (Ng, Van Dyne,
& Ang, 2012):
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d) performance outcomes (the emergence of leadership, adaptive performance, job
performance, development of social networks and cross-border leadership
effectiveness).
Levine, Norenzayan, and Philbrick (2001) carried out a reseach into cross-cultural
differences in helping strangers in three settings: ''dropped pen'', ''hurt leg'', and
''helping a blind person to walk across the street''. Helping in one of these three
situations was associated with the frequency of helping behavior in the other two
situations. These correlations were low, but statistically significant. The authors of
this study calculated the overall helping index, as an average value of scores obtained
within each of the three mentioned situations. The research took place in 23 countries
all over the world. The results show that the highest values of helping index were
obtained for Brazil (in Rio de Janeiro), Costa Rica (in San Jose), Malawi (in
Lilongwe), India (in Calcutta), and Austria (in Vienna). The countries with lowest
ranks were: Bulgaria (Sofia), Netherlands (Amsterdam), Singapore (Singapore), USA
(New York), and Malaysia (Kuala Lumpur). In addition, population size, walking
speed and the dimension of individualism-collectivism did not have impact on these
results. There is only one factor that influenced the results ± the economic one. In this
research, it was about how much the average income earned in each country allows
its citizens to purchase what they want. If a coutry is richer, its citizens are willing to
provide less help to strangers. The correlation was moderate and statistically
significant.
Lee et al. (2002) conducted an interesting research on the value structure related to
mobile internet usage in Korea and Japan. Their results revealed that mobile internet
was more functionally, emotionally, socially, and monetary valuable to the Japanese,
compared to the Koreans. However, satisfaction with this type of internet is almost
the same in these two samples. In both samples (nations), the emotional value is the
most important quality of mobile internet whereas the monetary value is the less
important quality of it.
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There is a plethora of research conducted to examine linguistic relativity or linguistic
universals in perception and affective meanings of color. An old study, carried out by
Adams and Osgood (1973), included 23 countries. The researchers used the semantic
differential technique in order to take insight into emotional meanings of colors in
different cultures. They got the following findings: black and grey were perceived as
bad; blue, white, and green were perceived as good; red and black seemed strong;
white, grey, and yellow seemed weak; red was perceived as an active color; and black
and grey were perceived as passive colors. In conclusion, there were cross-cultural
similarities (i.e. universals) in feelings associated with different colors.
Yu (2014) noticed that each color can have positive and negative connotations (i.e.
symbolic meanings) in different cultures. These meanings are influenced by
historical, religious, political, linguistic, mythical, and linguistical associations,
experiences, and perceptions. For example, in ancient Rome, red represented fertility
and love. In contrast, it meant something destructive in ancient Egypt (as red can be
associated with blood, sin, sex and murder). Another example is yellow in China (the
meaning: life-giving power, the beginning of something new and strong) and in
Western countries (yellow can be associated with jaundice i.e. with disease and
quarantine). In the Western World, black is usually associated with death, white with
moral purity and surrender, blue with depression, green with youth (along with lack
of life experience), grey with boredom and conservatism; and red with aggression
and sex.
Kline, Horton, and Zhang (2008) examined the difference between American and
East Asian students in communicating love (by caring, trust, honesty, and respect).
East Asian students reported that caring has the greatest importance in expressing
love in marriage. The Americans reported that shopping, preparing food and sports
are main ways of expressing love during the marriage. Unlike them, East Asian
participants express love by talking to their partners (e.g. chatting) and preparing
food together. Both samples (i.e. cultures) underlined the importance of open
discussion and sharing of common experiences with their partners, as well as physical
intimacy, family time and relaxing together. Of course, there are some similarities
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and dissimilarities with regard to love in friendship/marriage and gender of
participants.
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SOME PSYCHOLOGICAL VARIABLES RELEVANT TO
INTERCULTURAL COMPETENCE
We cannot discuss about (inter) cultural competence without taking into account
some well-established psychological constructs or variables. Those are: extraversion
(vs. introversion), openness to experience (vs. conservatism/conventionality), social
self-esteem, and social/emotional intelligence.
Extraversion
Extraversion is one of the fundamental, broad personality traits that includes the
following qualities: gregariousness, assertiveness, positive emotions, activity,
energetic and enthusiastic personality... (McCrae & John, 1992). Extraverts,
compared to introverts, approach other people more and like to be in parties, to do
collective activities and to belong to various social groups. They have lots of friends
and such kind of people communicate with others a lot. Unlike introverts, extraverted
people are usually more interculturally competent because they have better social and
communication skills.
Fazeli (2012) examined the relationship between extraversion and foreign (i.e.
English) language learning strategies (ELLS) in Iranian students. His study revealed
weak (but statistically significant) and positive correlation between extraversion and
memory, metacognitive as well as social learning strategies. The relationship was not
statistically significant in the case of cognitive, compensation and affective learning
strategies. However, introverts are better in written English when compared with
extraverts. This statement is supported by a study conducted by Boroujeni, Roohani
and Hasanimanesh (2015): introverts outperformed extraverts in almost all aspects of
English writing (vocabulary, mechanics, language and content). Extroverts did better
only in organization of their English writing.
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Openness to experience
Oskouei and Ramezani (2011) conducted a research where the relationship between
openness to experience and English learning strategies was investigated. The results
of this study indicated positive and statistically significant correlation of openness to
experience with memory and social strategies used to learn English as a foreign
language (EFL). In addition, their study revealed positive correlation between another
personality trait (emotional stability) and (meta)cognitive strategies used for
facilitating of English learning process.
Social self-esteem
Figure 7. The relationship between self-image and the two levels of self-esteem
There are four types of self-esteem (Figure 8): social self-esteem, collective self-
esteem (a perception of one's own nation or social group somebody belongs to),
physical self-esteem (a perception of one's own physical beauty and strength), and
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academic self-esteem (a perception of one's academic performance along with his/her
abilities to learn, pass exams, and achieve other rewards related to elementary school,
secondary education or tertiary level contexts).
Figure 8. Four types of self-esteem; the general one is on the top of the hierarchy
The most widely used instrument for measuring social self-esteem is The social self-
esteem inventory (SSEI, Lawson, Marshall, & McGrath, 1979). It comprises of 30
items that adequately represent the contents of this construct. It is a valid and reliable
instrument, according to its authors and other researchers who tested its psychometric
properties.
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Mayer and Salovey (1997), emotional intelligence can be regarded as a combination
of four sets of abilities:
a) the ability to accurately perceive, appraise and express various emotions;
b) the ability to understand emotions along with having a considerable amount of
emotional knowledge;
c) the ability to access and/or generate thought facilitating feelings; and
d) the ability to regulate these emotions in order to promote not only emotional but
intellectual growth, as well.
Beheshtifar and Roasaei (2012), in one of their papers, proposed that social
intelligence can be regarded as a set of the following aspects: attunement (via
listening with full attention and receptivity), primal empathy (paying attention to
others' non-verbal emotional signals and taking their viewpoint); social cognition
(being familiar with the basic principles and ''laws'' related to the social world);
empathy accuracy (understanding feelings, needs, intentions and thoughts of other
people); synchrony (on both verbal and non-verbal level of communication),
influence (one can, to a certain degree, shape and design the direction and outcome of
social interactions), concern (telling others that we care about their needs and
feelings, while behaving accordingly), and self-presentation (we should be able to
present ourselves to others in an effective, positive way).
ϱϭ
According to Herbert A. Marlowe (1986), social intelligence includes the following
five domains: social performance skills, prosocial attitudes, empathetic ability, social
confidence and emotional expressiveness. In other words, ''social intelligence'' is a
multidimensional construct. This author also highlighted the role of social interest
and social self-efficacy (vs. social anxiety) in describing and understanding the
concept of social intelligence. Those who have high levels of extraversion have better
social skills and are expected to have high levels of social/emotional intelligence as
well.
High level of social intelligence can be beneficial for intercultural sensitivity. In other
words, people who are socially intelligent have greater respect for cultural difference.
They also have high levels of interaction enjoyment, engagement, attentiveness and
confidence (i.e. social self-esteem). They are interested in other cultures and they do
not think that their own culture is superior to other cultures. This is because they have
respect for values, beliefs and customs that are typical for other cultures.
Beheshtifar and Roasaei (2012) have found that a lot of aspects of social intelligence
were associated with experienced leadership, positive interpersonal experience and
enhanced social problem-solving abilities. Thus, social intelligence (along with the
emotional one) is an essential part of interpersonal, intergroup and crosscultural
communication.
These concepts are, thus, mutually related and frequently used to examine one's
performance while dealing with distinct social situations of intercultural relevance.
ϱϮ
COMMUNICOLOGY: THE SKILL AND SCIENCE OF
SOCIAL INTERACTIONS
ϱϱ
THE ROLE OF ENGLISH IN INTERCULTURAL
COMMUNICATION AND COMPETENCE
ϱϲ
However, there is only a tiny difference between ESL and EFL. The government of
lots of countries introduced the English learning and its usage into education,
administration and bureaucracy.
Students who learn English as a second/foreign language can communicate with the
people who also speak English but who are the members of different cultures in the
following ways: by communicating with English speakers (e.g. tourists) in their home
country; by visiting cultural centers of various foreign countries; by communicating
with teachers who came to the country of origin of these students; by interacting with
people through social networks (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram...), Viber and Skype;
or by visiting foreign countries where English is spoken by lots of their citizens. They
will become more self-confident if they frequently use some of these ways of
ϱϳ
communication and, consequently, will improve their level of intercultural
competence.
In English, there is no word (to be more specific, a pronoun) for telling someone that
we treat her/him with respect and politeness. We mean it in a sense of ''T-V
distinction''. This term was coined by abbreviating French words ''tu'' and ''vous''
(eng. ''you'' in familiar/informal and formal manner, respectively). The first one
means ''you'' in everyday speech and the second one means ''you'' when we want to
tell someone that s/he is the authority, older than us, or a person of a great respect.
The first word is the 2nd person singular form whereas the second word is the 3 rd
person plural form. There are lots of examples, showed in Table 11 that depict the
simplicity of the English language with regard to the ''T-V distinction'' tradition in
lots of other languages (Italian, Spanish, German, Bosnian, Croatian, and Serbian).
As can be noticed in Table 11, to stress ''politeness'' or formality of ''you'' for a single
person in Italian, we use the 3rd person singular form (''Lei''). In the case of two or
more people, we use the 3rd person plural form (''Loro''). In Spanish, we say ''usted''
and ''ustedes'', respectively. The situation in German is more simple: we say ''Sie''
regardless of the number of persons whom we treat with a great level of respect.
These forms are called Umgangsformen (eng. ''manners''). If we say to somebody
ϱϴ
''du'' it is called duzen, and if we say to her/him ''Sie'', it is known as siezen. In
Bosnian, Croatian, and Serbian, we use the 2 nd person plural form (''Vi'') for both
aforementioned cases. In Italian, German, Bosnian, Croatian, and Serbian, the first
letter of these pronouns is capitalized.
In order to emphasize the politeness in English, we should use the words such as
''Mr.'', ''Professor'', ''Madam'', ''Sir'' etc. , some polite phrases (starting with ''would'',
''could'', ''can''...), along with the pronoun ''you'':
Professor Roberts, could you give me some advice on how to understand English
idioms?
Mr. Jackson, can you ask your daughter if she wants to go out with me tonight?
Dear Sir, I kindly want to inform you that the meeting will take place in London...
Hence, it is very important to know other cultures and their expressions of politeness.
For example, Italians like to be called ''dottore'' (eng. ''doctor''), ''professore'' (eng.
''Professor'') ''maestro'' (eng. ''teacher'', ''expert''). People from the Balkans region
want us to use formal words such as ''PRãWRYDQLJRVSRGLQH, ...'' (eng. ''Respected Sir,
...''). Last decade, the Balkan nations spontaneously accepted English phrases such as
''Dragi gospodine Popov, ...'' (eng. ''Dear Mr. Popov, ...'') ili ''DraJDJRVSRÿR
HQJ
''Dear Madam'').
According to the sixth edition of The world's largest ranking of countries by English
skills7, the highest ranks were attributed to: Netherlands (1), Denmark (2), Sweden
(3), Norway (4), and Finland (5). Some other examples are: Romania (20th), Russia
(34th), Brazil (40th), Pakistan (48th), Turkey (51st), Egypt (55th), and Libya (71st). The
countries are divided into five groups, based on the level of English proficiency of
their citizens:
ϳ
Retrieved from http://www.ef.com/epi/ (November 28, 2016)
ϱϵ
a) Very high proficiency (e.g. Denmark and Sweden; citizens of these countries can
negotiate a contract with a native English speakers, use appropriate/nuanced language
in social situations and read with ease texts written in advanced English)
b) High proficiency (e.g. Austria and Poland; they can make a presentation in English
at their workplace, read English newspapers and understand English TV shows);
c) Moderate proficiency (e.g. Slovakia and Dominican Republic; they can participate
in meetings in one area of expertise where English is spoken, understand English
song lyrics and write professional emails on familiar subjects in English);
d) Low proficiency (e.g. Japan and Russia; their citizens can engage in small talks
with colleagues in English, go to an English-speaking country as toursits while
getting along with their citizens and understand emails written in simple English);
and
e) Very low proficiency (e.g. Panama and Colombia; they can understand simple
signs, give basic instructions to foreign visitors, and introduce themselves by telling
them their own name, age, profession and country of origin).
These results are based on the scores of approximately 950,000 test takers and the
proficiency bands are adjusted to the Common European Framework of Reference
(CEFR). The first level corresponds to B2, the next three levels to B1, and the very
low proficiency to A2.
ϲϬ
PUTTING IT IN A NUTSHELL: CAN DEMOCRACY,
CAPITALISM, EDUCATION AND GLOBALIZATION PERSIST
WITHOUT ENGLISH?
The answer to this question is ''most likely - not''. English crawled into almost every
core of international relations. If somebody wants to make a good profit, to study
abroad, or to be involved in diplomatic negotiations, it is mandatory that s/he has
some English knowledge and skills.
According to Ciprianova and Vanco (2010), English as a global language can enable
inequality reduction between countries of a different economic prosperity. It
facilitates communication between such countries and helps them to make various
deals from which both sides can make a profit. These authors also stated thet English
ϲϭ
learning and use is closely linked to so-called ''international ELT market''. This kind
of ''market'' gives to the Third World countries the opportunity to share their services
and goods with the global market by presenting themselves in the best possible way.
Their native languages are spoken by a limited group of people; therefore, they have
to communicate and make self-presentation in English. Their efforts are and will be
studied within the frame of sociolinguistics, cognitive linguistics, intercultural
psychology, communicology and psycholinguistics.
However, some other authors and researchers do not share this kind of thinking. For
instance, Tochon (2009) warns us that English can be considered a tool for
persuasion, influence and even a subtle form of modern colonization (i.e. imposing
the Western value system to citizens of less-developed countries). Of course, the truth
is somewhere in between.
Since the Second World War, English became the principal language of science,
telecommunications, and aviation, as well as the main language of intergovernmental
and transnational organizations (Humblet, 1984). Its popularity and usefulness grows
rapidly, so to say, exponentially.
English for academic purposes (EAP) is to a certain degree different from the
quotidian, widely-used English. Accordingly, students should be able to spot the
difference between academic words/phrases and those used in everyday speech (i.e.
informal language). Table 12 shows this kind of difference.
Colloquial (informal) English words and phrases English words for academic purposes
Tremendous influence major influence
ϲϮ
Subjects get better... Subjects' health improved...
there wasn't any evidence... there was no evidence...
a couple of few
a lot of many, several, a great deal of
finally, lastly on the whole, in conclusion
øf provided, on the condition that,
as you can see/notice... as can be seen/noticed...
look into investigate
hard difficult, complicated
big extensive, considerable
EAP is a version of formal English language. It can also be regarded as English for
specific purposes (ESP). EAP includes the use of passive constructions (e.g. ''It was
stated that...''; ''It was concluded...''; ''English is spoken by...''), gerunds (e.g.
''Learning new skills is essential part of ...''; ''Conducting such a research will lead
to...''), and fixed academic phrases (e.g. ''The main aim of this study is to...''; ''The
objective of this research...''; ''The purpose of this paper is...''; ''This article critically
examines...''). In constrast, the use of contractions (''It's...'', ''They can't...''),
metaphors, and idioms should be avoided. Additionally, the following words and
phrases can be used in EAP: ''moreover'', ''therefore'', ''to exemplify,...'',
''consequently,...'', ''in other words,...'', ''as a result,...'', ''nevertheless'', ''on the other
hand,...'', ''besides,...'', ''for instance,...''
The use of hedging words is highly recommended. These words do not imply
certainty. They rather convey ideas that are not definite. Examples are the following:
''might'', ''may'', ''could'', ''probably'', ''looks'', ''seems'', ''appears'', ''should'', ''can'',
''would'', ''perhaps'', ''possibly'', ''presumably'', and ''tends''.
Hernandez and Paredes (2002) pointed out the need to integrate English for specific
academic purposes (ESAP) into mainstream English courses. They also highlighted
another option ± to introduce two parallel courses. The first one is that of general
English (GE) and the other is English for specific academic purposes (ESAP). Of
ϲϯ
course, these new courses should meet students' needs and interests. However, it
seems that students are more interested in GE than in ESAP.
There are several efforts that can determine the future of global English and English
for specific purposes. The first group of them includes publishing scientific, peer-
reviewed journals: Journal of English for Academic Purposes, Journal of Teaching
English for Specific and Academic Purposes, Global English-Oriented Research
Journal (GEORJ), The Journal of English as an International Language, and
International Journal of English Studies.
According to Gray (2002), the rise of transitional corporations have impact on the
spread of English, because their business activities and relations are geographically
dispersed. Internet is the main medium through which English is and will be
promoted. English is an important part of postgraduate education as well, especially
at international universities. Thus, there is a growing demand for teaching this
language and the result of that is widespread of ELT (Alfehaid, 2014). In lots of
countries (e.g. China, Japan, Slovenia, Spain, Germany...), English is already taught
in kindergartens and it became an inevitable component of lifelong education.
ϲϰ
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