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Making a Request for a Service in

Spanish: Pragmatic Development in
the Study Abroad Setting
Rebeca Bataller

Foreign Language Annals

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160 Spring 2010

Making a Request for a Service in

Spanish: Pragmatic Development
in the Study Abroad Setting
Rebeca Bataller
The University of Southern Mississippi

Abstract: This study addresses the development of the request strategies used in two
service encounter scenarios by 31 nonnative speakers of Spanish spending 4 months
living and studying in Valencia, Spain. The main method of data collection was an open
role-play in which participants interacted with a Spanish native speaker. Results show
that while there were some aspects of the learners’ request production that changed after
the study abroad experience, there were other aspects that remained unaffected. Know-
ing which aspects from the nonnative speakers’ request production are acquired and
which ones are not after a student has been immersed in the target culture for 4 months
is relevant to informing second language acquisition, specifically the field of interlan-
guage pragmatics in the study abroad setting.

Key words: interlanguage pragmatic development, requests for a service, second

language acquisition, Spanish pragmatics, study abroad

Introduction
Common belief suggests that a learner’s foreign language improves significantly by
studying in the country where that language is spoken. The rich exposure to target
language (TL) input and the ample opportunity to use it offered by this context
support this belief (Kasper, 2000). However, studies investigating the linguistic
effect of the study abroad (SA) experience on the participants’ TL have only started
to appear in the last few decades and as a result, much more is known about the
development of a foreign language in the foreign language setting than in the SA
context (Freed, 1995; Huebner, 1998).
Interlanguage pragmatics involves learners’ ability to interpret, communicate,
and interact successfully in different contexts according to the TL rules of appro-
priateness. The assumption that spending time in the target country is one of the
primary means for learners to acquire pragmatic ability makes research in this area
an important endeavor. Yet looking at the existing literature in this field, research-
ers have not found clear results on the effect of the SA experience on the
development of interlanguage pragmatics. The results from most studies have
shown that after the experience abroad, some aspects of the learners’ pragmatic

Rebeca Bataller (PhD, University of Iowa) is Assistant Professor of Spanish and For-
eign Language Education at The University of Southern Mississippi, Hattiesburg.
Foreign Language Annals
vol. 43, No. 1
ability tend to change toward the native
speaker (NS) norm (Barron, 2003; Cohen,
Paige, Shively, Emert, & Hoff, 2005; Cohen
& Shively, 2007; Cole & Anderson, 2001;
DuFon, 1999; Hassall, 2006; Hoffman-Hicks,
1999; Kondo, 1997; Magnan & Back, 2006;
Matsumura, 2001; Schauer, 2004; Shively,
2008). On the other hand, other studies have
shown very little or no development in the
particular speech act investigated after the SA
experience (Rodrı́guez, 2001; VonCanon,
2006).
For example, Cole and Anderson
(2001), Magnan and Back (2006), and
Schauer (2004) analyzed the development
of the request production of learners of
different languages (Japanese students of
English, American students of French, and
Irish students of German, respectively).
They all noted some changes toward the NS
norm in their participants’ request perfor-
mance after the SA experience. Cole and
Anderson (2001) observed that after a 10-
month stay abroad, learners’ requests be-
came more indirect, and they started using
a variety of mitigating devices that they had
not used before. Schauer (2004) also ob-
served a correlation between participants’
length of stay and their development of in-
ternal mitigation on requests. Magnan and
Back (2006) noted that those learners
whose proficiency had improved after a
semester in France also started using more
indirect request strategies, similar to the
French NS group in their study.
Other studies, such as Barron (2003)
and Hoffman-Hicks (1999), examined
learners’ performance of different speech
acts, and they found that while the SA
experience had an effect on some of the as-
pects they investigated, it did not have as
much of an effect on others. Barron (2003)
investigated Irish learners’ production of
refusals, offers, and requests in German.
Barron found that after an academic year
abroad, the participants’ discourse structure
in their offers and their use of mitigation in
requests became increasingly target-like;
however, she did not note significant chan-
ges in their mitigation of refusals in
161
German. Hoffman-Hicks (1999) examined
the effect of SA experience on the acquisi-
tion of compliments, greetings, and leave-
taking strategies on American students of
French studying abroad for an academic
year. She observed a more significant de-
velopment in the participants’ use of
greetings and leave-taking strategies than in
their use of compliments, an area where the
learners ‘‘remained quite non-target like’’
(p. 257). Finally, Rodrı́guez (2001) ana-
lyzed the perception of requests of two
groups of learners: a group of American
learners of Spanish studying abroad in
Spain for a semester (the SA group) and a
group of students studying at an American
university (the at-home group). Rodrı́guez
found very little change in the SA partici-
pants’ perception of requests after the time
abroad. More surprisingly, she did not find
any significant differences indicating an ad-
vantage for the SA over the at-home group
in her study. As the results of these studies
show, the effect of the SA experience in the
development of interlanguage pragmatics is
far from being clear.
Requests were chosen as the main focus
of this study because, as Hassall (1997) no-
ted, requests are complex speech acts that
allow the analysis of several aspects of
learners’ pragmatic competence. In order to
make requests in the TL, learners need to
have not only a certain degree of linguistic
competence, which involves the use of a
number of syntactic structures and lexical
devices, but, in addition, they need to un-
derstand the rules of appropriate usage in
the target culture. Moreover, service en-
counter requests are speech acts that
frequently arise in the everyday lives of
learners studying abroad. Therefore, the
researcher expected that learners’ produc-
tion of these types of requests would change
after spending 4 months immersed in the
target country.
In order to understand the develop-
ment of learners’ request production,
I present an overview of the research studies
comparing English with Peninsular Spanish
NSs’ request production below.
162
Requests in Peninsular Spanish
Studies comparing English and Peninsular
Spanish NSs’ request production suggest
that Peninsular Spanish NSs use a higher
degree of directness in their requests
than English NSs (Mir, 1993). In a study
comparing the request performance of Pen-
insular Spanish, American English NSs, and
Spanish learners of English via a written
questionnaire, Mir (1993) observed that the
most frequently used strategy among both
groups of NSs was the conventionally indi-
rect request, and that overall, English NSs
used fewer direct strategies than the Span-
ish group. Both Pinto (2002) and Carduner
(1998) compared the request production of
American learners of Spanish and Spanish
NSs living in the United States, including
NSs from Spain. Both studies used a written
questionnaire as the main method of data
collection. The learner group completed
this questionnaire both in Spanish and in
their first language (L1) (English).
Both of these studies concurred on
some of their findings. On the one hand,
both Carduner (1998) and Pinto (2002)
noted a frequent use of the query willing-
ness form (te/le importarı́a [would you
mind]) in the Spanish NS data, while the
English NSs chose query possibility re-
quests more frequently („es posible? [is it
possible?]). Moreover, they both found that
the English NS participants rarely used the
query ability („Me puedes poner un café con
leche? [Can you bring me a coffee with
milk?]), an indirect strategy that was one of
the Spanish NSs’ main strategy choices. Fi-
nally, all three studies noted the use of the
simple interrogative strategy by the Spanish
NSs (e.g., „Me dejas tu coche? [Will you lend
me your car?]), a strategy that did not occur
in the English NS data. As Pinto (2002) no-
ted, this finding may be because this
strategy appears to be a conventionalized
form to request in Spanish, but not in En-
glish.
The results of these studies showed that
overall, Spanish NSs tend to use more direct
strategies. Moreover, Spanish NSs used the
query willingness, query ability, and simple
Spring 2010
interrogative much more frequently than
the English NSs.
Although the results of these studies
provide interesting insights for the present
study, it is important to note that they did
not focus on service encounter requests ex-
clusively and that they all used a written
discourse completion task as their main
method of data collection instead of an
open role-play.
Interlanguage Requests
Although the speech act of requests has
been investigated in several studies in in-
terlanguage pragmatics, few longitudinal
studies have analyzed how learners’ request
production evolves during a period of time.
Schauer (2004, 2007) looked at the in-
ternal and external devices used to mitigate
requests by a group of 12 German students
studying abroad in Great Britain for an aca-
demic year. She noted a clear pattern of
development in the use of mitigating de-
vices by the learners studying abroad that
was linked to the length of stay in the target
environment. An example of the mitigating
devices acquired during their stay abroad
was ‘‘small talk’’ (e.g., ‘‘good to see you’’);
moreover, participants started using syn-
tactic mitigating devices such as the
conditional clause with more frequency to-
ward the end of their stay abroad (e.g., ‘‘I
would like to ask if you could complete
this’’). However, Schauer also found several
deviations from the norm that showed great
individual variation.
Cole and Anderson (2001) followed
the development in the request production
of a group of 35 Japanese high school stu-
dents studying in Canada for 10 months.
They noted that the Japanese learners in
their study reduced the use of direct strate-
gies considerably after a year abroad (e.g.,
‘‘Open the door please’’ to ‘‘Can you open
the door please?’’), hence moving toward
the NS norm in this respect.
Barron (2003) analyzed the develop-
ment in the request, offer, and refusal
production of 33 advanced Irish students
Foreign Language Annals
vol. 43, No. 1
studying abroad for a year in Germany. She
found that aspects such as the discourse
structure of offer exchanges and mitigation
in requests became increasingly target-like.
There was an overall increase in the learn-
ers’ reliance on pragmatic target-like
routines like (Ich wolte fragen ob [I wanted
to ask if]), and a decrease in second lan-
guage (L2) interlanguage specific routines
(e.g., Ich wundere mich [I wonder if]).
Cohen et al. (2005) looked at the prag-
matic development in requests and
apologies of 86 learners studying in Spain,
France, and several Latin American coun-
tries. There were two groups of participants
in the study. The experimental group re-
ceived a guide with learning strategies,
attended a 2-hour pre-departure orienta-
tion, and submitted seven electronic
journal entries about different sections of
the guide throughout their stay abroad. The
control group did not receive the guide, at-
tend the workshop, or write the journal
entries. The results of this study showed
that both groups’ speech act performance
was rated higher in the posttest than in the
pretest. No statistical differences were
found in terms of pragmatic development;
however, the qualitative analysis illustrated
that those learners in the experimental
group had increased their use of mitigating
devices in their requests to a higher extent
than the control group.
Magnan and Back (2006) looked at the
development in the pragmatic features as-
sociated with requests for help in French of
six learners of French studying in France
for a semester. They noted that after the
experience abroad, the learners increased
their use of the formal form of address and
of both direct and indirect strategies when
making requests. The results suggested that
as the learners’ proficiency increased, so did
their use of indirect requests, strategies that
were also more commonly used by the
French NS participants in this study.
Following an ethnographic approach,
Shively (2008) analyzed the development
of politeness and social interactions of
seven American students of Spanish study-
163
ing abroad for a semester in Spain. She
analyzed their performance in different ser-
vice encounter situations during their stay
abroad. Shively found that after the experi-
ence abroad, most learners had acquired
some of the TL rules of politeness regarding
service encounter requests. Learners had
changed from using speaker-oriented re-
quests (e.g., puedo tener [can I have]) to
using hearer-oriented ones (e.g., „me pones?
[you give me]) and elliptical requests (e.g.,
dos cervezas [two beers]). Previous research
has shown that both hearer-oriented and
elliptical requests are commonly used by
Peninsular Spanish NSs (Mir, 1993; Placen-
cia, 1998).
As the preceding studies have shown,
overall, after the SA experience learners
have begun using more native-like request
strategies and more internal mitigating de-
vices in their requests. The present study
added to this body of research by focusing
on a quantitative analysis of a specific type
of request: service encounters. Moreover, it
used the role-play, a method that was used
only by Magnan and Back (2006) from the
above-mentioned studies.
Method
Participants
There were two groups of participants in
the present study: the SA participants and a
control group of Peninsular Spanish NSs.
The SA group consisted of 31 English-
speaking learners from the United States
participating in an SA program in Valencia,
Spain, for 4 months (September–December
2004). Twenty-four of the learners were
university students from a large university
on the East Coast, and the rest came from
different parts of the United States.
They had already completed a minimum of
three semesters of college Spanish (or the
equivalent) prior to their SA experience.
None of them had ever studied abroad in
the past or was a heritage speaker of Span-
ish. There were 16 males and 23 females,
and their ages ranged from 18 to 22, with an
average age of 20. The Spanish NS group
164
was composed of 32 Spanish NSs: 12 males
and 20 females. They were all university
students from the University of Valencia.
Their ages ranged from 18 to 24, with an
average age of 21. They provided the base-
line data to compare learners’ interlanguage
pragmatic development.
Data from the nonnative speaker group
were collected at two different times: at the
beginning (NNS1) and toward the end of
the participants’ SA experience (NNS2).
Therefore, the analysis of the data presents
a comparison of the data coming from these
three groups of participants: a Peninsular
Spanish native speaker group (NS), nonna-
tive speakers at the beginning (NNS1), and
nonnative speakers toward the end of their
stay abroad (NNS2).
All participants interacted with the
same 31-year-old Spanish woman who per-
formed the role of a server at a cafeteria and
of a shop assistant at a shoe shop in the two
role-play scenarios.
Instruments
An open role-play was used for data collec-
tion. The role-play was selected because it
allowed negotiation and interaction with an
interlocutor, and it offered the opportunity to
observe a great variety of pragmatic features
that are also found in natural conversations
and that are often lost when other methods of
data collection such as written question-
naires are used (Kasper & Dahl, 1991;
Olshtain & Blum-Kulka, 1985; Sasaki,
1998). Moreover, as Barron (2003) ex-
plained, written questionnaires are methods
in which participants have time to think
about their responses, and the task involves
recalling pragmatic information from mem-
ory rather than using it. In ‘‘real-time’’
methods such as the role-play, learners’
pragmatic competence is presented in a
spontaneous manner. Therefore, as Barron
suggested, if the focus of a study is on learn-
ers’ pragmatic development, then it should
employ a method of data collection that pro-
vides ‘‘real-time’’ data, such as the role-play.
Finally, as Félix-Brasdefer (2003) mentioned,
Spring 2010
role-plays represent an approximation of
spoken discourse and allow the researcher to
control social variables, unlike natural data.
As a result, in the last 2 decades several
pragmatic studies have started using the
open role-play as the main method to collect
production data from their participants
(Borderı́a-Garcı́a, 2006; Einstein & Bodman,
1986; Félix-Brasdefer, 2002, 2005, 2007;
Garcı́a, 1989a, 1989b, 1993, 1999; Margalef-
Boada, 1993; Márquez-Reiter, 2000; Owen,
2001; VonCanon, 2006).
The Role-Play Scenarios
The two service encounter scenarios in-
cluded a low-imposition scenario (requesting
something to drink) and a more imposing
one (asking to exchange a pair of shoes
without the receipt). Participants received a
card with the description of the situations:
1. You are in a cafeteria close to campus
because you want to get a drink (water,
a Coke, some juice, coffee . . .). You go
up to the counter and order something
to drink from the girl working behind
the counter. You do not know her.
2. Yesterday you bought a pair of shoes
downtown. Today you try them on again
at home and they don’t seem to fit so
well. You don’t want to keep them be-
cause they are too tight, and you decide
to exchange them. The problem is that
you cannot find the receipt anywhere.
Nevertheless, you go to the shop and you
talk to the shop assistant, who is the same
girl who helped you yesterday.
The Spanish NS woman acting as the
server and as the shop assistant also received
a card with the description of the situations
that she was to perform. These cards de-
scribed the portrayal of the person she had to
play and the context of the scenarios.
The Coding Scheme
The coding scheme used to analyze the
main strategies used to make requests in
the two different service encounter sce-
narios was an adapted version of the
Foreign Language Annals
vol. 43, No. 1
Cross-Cultural Speech Act Realization Project
(CCSARP) used by Blum-Kulka, House, and
Kasper (1989). The main differences between
the request coding scheme used in the present
study to analyze the main request strategies
and the CCSARP were the following:
1. The researcher added two categories in
the present study’s framework: the
simple interrogative (e.g., „Me pones un
café? [Will you serve me a coffee?])
and the elliptical form (e.g., un café [a
coffee]), strategies that had already
been used in studies such as Carduner
(1998) and Pinto (2002).
2. Following Mir (1993), four different
query preparatory indirect strategies
were distinguished: the query ability,
which includes semantic devices con-
cerning the hearer’s ability to carry out
the act (e.g., „Podrı́as cambiarme estos
zapatos? [Would you be able to ex-
change these shoes for me?]); the query
willingness, which involves semantic
devices concerning the hearer’s willing-
ness to carry out the act (e.g., „te
importarı́a? [would you mind?]); the
query possibility, which involves the
possibility that the act can be performed
(e.g., „Es posible cambiar estos zapatos?
[Is it possible to exchange this pair of
shoes?]); and the query permission,
which involves the speaker asking for
permission to carry out the act (e.g.,
„Puedo cambiar estos zapatos? [Can I ex-
change this pair of shoes?]). Other
researchers have already included this
differentiation in their classification of
requests (Carduner, 1998; Pinto, 2002;
Owen, 2001).
3. I integrated mild hints and strong hints
under one category: hints. In mild hints,
Blum-Kulka et al. (1989) have stated
that ‘‘the locution contains no elements
which are of immediate relevance to the
intended illocution or proposition’’ (p.
280) (e.g., asking for a ride to the air-
port: Tengo que ir al aeropuerto pero no
tengo coche [I have to go to the airport
but I don’t have a car]). In strong hints,
165
on the other hand, ‘‘the illocutionary in-
tent is not immediately derivable from
the locution; however the locution re-
fers to relevant elements of the intended
illocutionary and/or propositional act’’
(p. 280) (e.g., asking for a ride to the
airport: Tengo que recoger a mis amigos al
aeropuerto y tú tienes un coche [I have to
pick up my friends from the airport and
you have a car]).
4. Explicit and hedge performatives were
also integrated under one category: per-
formatives. In explicit performatives,
such as Blum-Kulka et al. (1989) ex-
plained, ‘‘The illocutionary intent is
explicitly named by the speaker by using
a relevant illocutionary verb’’ (p. 181)
(e.g., Le pido que me cambie los zapatos [I
am asking you to exchange those shoes
for me]). In hedge performatives, ‘‘the
illocutionary verb denoting the request-
ive intent is modified, e.g., by modal
verbs or verbs expressing intention’’ (p.
181) (e.g., Quiero pedirte que me cambies
estos zapatos [I want to ask you to ex-
change those shoes]).
Table 1 shows the main request strate-
gies following an adapted version of Blum-
Kulka et al.’s CCSARP model (1989). Below
I provide a definition of each strategy with
an example.
Direct Strategies
1. Mood derivable: Mood derivable
strategies are those where the grammat-
ical mood of the locution determines its
illocutionary force as a request. The
command is the most common form.
The following illustrates this:
(1) Ponme un café con leche [Bring me a
coffee with milk].
2. Elliptical phrase: Only the object
that is being requested is mentioned.
(2) Un café con leche [A coffee with
milk].
3. Explicit/hedge performative: The ill-
ocutionary intent is explicitly stated by
using an illocutionary verb that may be
166 Spring 2010

TABLE 1 differs as it requires a modal verb while

Coding Scheme for Request
Strategies
Direct Mood derivable
Ellipsis
Simple/Hedge
performative
Obligation
statement
Want statement
Need statement
Simple
interrogative
Indirect Query ability
Query willingness
Query permission
Query possibility
Suggestory formula
Hints
modified by modal verbs expressing
intention.
(3) Quiero pedirte que me cambies estos
zapatos [I want to ask you to exchange
this pair of shoes for me].
4. Obligation statement: The illocutio-
nary point is directly obtained from the
semantic meaning of the locution.
(4) Tengo que cambiarlos por un tamaño
más grande [I have to exchange them
for a bigger size].
5. Want/need statement: The utterance
communicates the speaker’s desire that
the event referred to in the composition
comes about.
(5) Quiero un café con leche [I want a
coffee with milk].
6. Simple interrogative: In order to
construct simple interrogative requests,
such as Carduner (1998) explained, the
speaker takes an indirect object pro-
noun that represents the recipient of
the request. The main verb agrees with
the subject of the sentence. This struc-
ture does not exist in English, and its
closest equivalent would be formed by
the future particle ‘‘will’’; therefore it
in Spanish it does not.
(6) „Me pones un café? [Will you bring
me a cup of coffee?]
Indirect Strategies
7. Query ability: As Owen (2001)
explained, this is an indirect strategy, in
which the hearer must infer that the
question concerning his or her ability
to carry out a specific action counts as
an attempt from the speaker to make
the hearer do so.
(7) „Me podrı́a poner una Coca-cola?
[Could you serve me a Coke?]
8. Query willingness: This is an indirect
request strategy in which the hearer
must infer that the question concerning
his or her willingness to carry out
a specific action counts as an attempt
on the speaker to make the hearer do so
(Owen, 2001).
(8) „Te importarı́a dejarme el libro?
[Would you mind lending me the
book?]
9. Query permission: This makes refer-
ence to the hearer’s permission to let
the speaker conduct an action.
(9) „Puedo tener agua, por favor? [Can
I have water, please?]
10. Query possibility: This makes ref-
erence to the possibility of carrying out
a request, e.g.,: „es posible? [is it possi-
ble . . .?], „serı́a possible . . .? [would it
be possible?]
(10) „Es posible para devolver estos zap-
atos? [Is it possible to return these
shoes?]
11. Hint: As Trosborg (1995) ex-
plained, hints are opaque structures in
which the lack of transparency is in-
tentional. The hearer needs to infer the
intent of the speaker in terms of the
desired action to be performed.
(11) Es que vine ayer a comprarme unos
zapatos, y me los he probado en casa,
y resulta que no me vienen::, muy bien,
yo creo que, me vienen pequeños [The
Foreign Language Annals
vol. 43, No. 1 167

thing is that I came here yesterday to In addition to the quantitative analysis,

buy a pair of shoes and I have tried
them on at home, and they don’t fit very
well, I think they are too small].
The following section provides a descrip-
tion of the analyses performed in the data.
I also conducted a qualitative analysis of
several aspects in the interactions. As pre-
vious research has shown, a qualitative
analysis can reveal important aspects about
request behavior that would remain unre-
vealed in the quantitative analysis alone
(Carduner, 1998; House, 1996).

Analysis of the Data

The role-play data were audiotaped and
then transcribed. The researcher calculated
the frequency of the main request strategies
used and compared it across groups. In ad-
dition to the raw data and the percentages,
proportion and difference of proportion
tests were used to observe whether the
strategy choice (direct vs. indirect strate-
gies) was significantly different among the
three groups of participants (Peninsular
Spanish NS group, the nonnative speakers
at the beginning [NNS1], and those toward
the end of their stay abroad [NNS2]).
Results
Request Strategies: Requesting
Something to Drink
Table 2 shows the type of request strategies
that each group of participants used in the
first scenario. The request strategies are sub-
divided into direct and indirect strategies.
Among the direct strategies participants
used were want statements (e.g., quiero [I
want]), simple interrogatives (e.g., „me
pones? [will you bring me?]), mood deriv-
ables (e.g., ponme, [bring me]), need state-
ments (e.g., necesito [I need]), and elliptics

TABLE 2
Request Strategies: Requesting Something to Drink

NS NNS1 NNS2
(N 5 32) (N 5 31) (N 5 31)
Direct strategies (DS) Freq % Freq % Freq %

Simple interrogative 13 41% 0 0 0 0

Want statement 4 13% 14 45% 22 70%
Mood derivable 1 3% 1 3% 2 6%
Need statement 0 0 3 10% 0 0
Elliptic 4 13% 1 3% 4 13%
DS total 22 69% 19 61% 28 87%
Indirect request strategies (ID)
Query ability 10 31% 1 3% 1 3%
Query permission 0 0 11 35% 2 6%
Query possibility 0 0 0 0 1 3%
ID total 10 31% 12 39% 4 13%
Total strategies 32 100% 31 100% 32 100%
168
(e.g., una Coca-Cola [a Coke]). Among
the indirect strategies participants used
were query ability (e.g., „me puedes poner?
[can you bring me?]), query permis-
sion (e.g., „puedo tener? [can I have?]),
and query possibility (e.g., „es posible? [is it
possible?]).
As Table 2 shows, the three groups of
participants (NS, NNS1, NNS2) preferred
to use direct strategies rather than indirect
strategies to request something to drink.
However, each group differed in several
ways in the specific strategies they used.
Among the direct strategies, NSs used
the simple interrogative most frequently
(NS: 41%), a strategy that was not used by
the NNS1 and the NNS2 groups. On the
other hand, NNS1 and NNS2 used mainly
the want statement (NNS1: 45%; NNS2:
70%), also used by the NS group but at a
much lower frequency (NS: 13%).
In terms of indirect strategies, a similar
trend occurred: NSs used different strate-
gies from NNS1s and NNS2s. NSs used the
query ability (31%), while NNS1s and
NNS2s hardly used this strategy. Instead
NNS1s used the query permission (35%), a
strategy that is not used by any Spanish NS.
As can be observed in Table 2, the use of
this strategy diminished after the SA expe-
rience (NNS2: 6%). This can be viewed as a
tentative movement toward the NS norm as
represented by the NS data in this study.
The difference of proportion tests
showed that the difference between the NS/
NNS1 groups in their choice of direct vs.
indirect strategies was not statistically sig-
nificant, while that of the NS/NNS2 groups
was significant at an alpha level of .05. (z:
.19741.96).
This reveals that the strategies used by
the NNS1 group were more similar to the
ones used by the NSs than those used by
NNS2s. This change was caused by the
learners reducing their use of the nonnative-
like indirect structure puedo tener, and their
overreliance on want statements. Therefore,
one cannot speak about a statistically signifi-
cant movement toward the NS norm as
represented by the NS data in this study.
Spring 2010
Request Strategies: Exchanging a Pair
of Shoes
Table 3 presents the main request strategies
used to request a shoe exchange in the
second service encounter scenario. The
main request strategies were subdivided
into direct strategies (DS) and indirect
strategies (IS). Among the direct strategies,
the following were included: want state-
ments (e.g., Quiero otros zapatos [I want
another pair of shoes]), need statements
(e.g., Necesito cambiar estos [I need to
exchange these]), obligation statements
(e.g., Tienes que cambiarlos [You have to
exchange them]), and explicit performa-
tives (e.g., Te pido que me cambies los zapatos
[I am asking you to exchange this pair of
shoes]). Among the indirect strategies, the
following were used: query ability (e.g.,
„Puedes cambiarlos? [Can you exchange
them?]), query permission (e.g., „Puedo
tener otros zapatos [Can I have another pair
of shoes?]), hint (e.g., No quiero estos zap-
atos [I don’t want this pair of shoes]), and
asking for suggestion (e.g. „Qué puedo ha-
cer? [What can I do?]).
As Table 3 shows, NSs preferred indirect
strategies, while NNS1s and NNS2s used
more direct ones. Moreover, within the indi-
rect strategies, NSs chose different strategies
from the ones used by the NNS1s and
NNS2s. The most frequently used strategy by
the NS group, the query ability, was not used
by NNS1s and NNS2s. NNS1s and NNS2s
used query permission and possibility as the
only indirect strategies in their data.
The NNS2 group for the most part used
want statements (53%), followed by indi-
rect strategies, such as query permission
(22%) and query possibility (13%). There
were very few changes in the strategy choice
in this scenario among nonnative speakers
after the experience abroad. Therefore, one
cannot state that there was a movement to-
ward or away from the NS norm as
represented by the NS data in this study.
The difference of proportion tests
showed that there was a statistically signifi-
cant difference at the alpha level of .01
Foreign Language Annals
vol. 43, No. 1 169

TABLE 3
Request Strategies: Exchanging a Pair of Shoes

NS NNS1 NNS2
Head Act Strategies (N 5 32) (N 5 31) (N 5 31)
Positive Politeness
strategies (PPS) Freq % Freq % Freq %
Want statement 11 33% 16 41% 17 53%
Need statement 0 0 8 21% 1 3%
Obligation statement 0 0 0 0 2 6%
Explicit performative 1 3% 0 0 0 0
PPS total 12 36% 24 62% 20 62%
Negative Politeness strategies (NPS)
Query ability 13 39% 0 0 0 0
Query permission 3 9% 8 21% 7 22%
Query possibility 4 12% 6 15% 4 13%
Hint 1 3% 0 0 1 3%
Asking for 0 0 1 3% 0 0
suggestion
NPS total 21 64% 15 38% 12 38%
Total strategies 33 100% 39 100% 32 100%

between NSs and NNS1s (z: 2.2841.96)
and at an alpha level of .05 between NSs and
NNS2s (z: 2.1841.96). This difference is a
result of the fact that NSs used indirect
strategies frequently, while NNS1s and
NNS2s overwhelmingly preferred direct
strategies. Statistically, there was no move-
ment toward the NS norm as represented by
the NS data in this study.
Taking a closer look at the data, one
notices that even within those strategies
that both NSs and NNS1s used with ap-
proximately the same frequency, the actual
formulas used by each group differed nota-
bly. In the case of want statements,
nonnative speakers used the direct and ex-
plicit formula quiero [I want], while NSs
mainly chose the mitigated and more indi-
rect form querı́a [I wanted]. The effect of
the mitigated form makes this request seem
less imposing than the unmitigated form, as
the following examples illustrate:
(12) NS: resulta e, que querı́a cambiarlos
pero es que no encuentro el ticket [and
the thing is that I wanted to exchange
them, but I don’t find the receipt].
(13) NNS1: No tengo el ticket pero quiero
comprar otros zapatos [I don’t have the
receipt but I want to buy another pair of
shoes].
Moreover, in the query permission,
learners mainly used the unmitigated form
„puedo cambiar? [can I exchange?], while
NSs mainly used the mitigated one „Podrı́a
cambiarlas? [Would I be able to exchange
them?]. This also happened with the query
possibility strategy, where learners chose
the strategy „es posible? [is it possible?], and
NSs used other formulae such as „Habrı́a
170
una posibilidad? [Would there be any possi-
bility?] or „Habrı́a algún problema? [Would
there be a problem?]. Examples (14) to (17)
show the difference in strategy choice be-
tween these groups:
(14) NNS1: . . . „Y puedo revolvar, or pue-
do volver las, los zapatos por favor? [. . .
Can I revolve, or can I go back them, the
shoes, please?]1 (query permission).
(15) NS: entonces venı́a a ver si podı́a
cambiarlos [so I came to see if I could
exchange them] (query permission).
(16) NNS1: . . . „Es posible que yo, vol-
ver, volvo, vuelvo los zapatos?, „Es
bueno? [. . . Is it possible that I, to come
back, come back, come back the shoes?
Is it good?] (query possibility).
(17) NS: Querı́a saber si hay algún modo
de devolverlo::: [I wanted to know if
there was any way to exchange them]
(query possibility).
Discussion of the Findings
The purpose of this study was to investigate
the interlanguage pragmatic development of
a group of 31 American learners of Spanish,
studying abroad in Spain for a semester (4
months). The particular focus of analysis was
the strategies used when requesting a service
in two different service encounter scenarios
in Spanish. As seen above, overall, the non-
native speakers slightly changed the
strategies they used to request a service,
moving them closer toward the NS norm as
measured by the NS data in this study; how-
ever, their use of request strategies still
differed considerably and statistically from
the NS group. In the first scenario, the
difference of proportion test NS/NNS2
showed a statistical significant difference at
an alpha level of .05. (z: .19741.96), and on
the second scenario a level of .05 between
NSs and NNS2s (z: 2.1841.96). This finding
seems to be common in studies dealing with
SA interlanguage pragmatic development.
For example, Hoffman-Hicks (1999) found
that the American learners’ compliment-giv-
ing strategies barely developed in the
Spring 2010
direction of the NS norm even after a year
abroad. Cohen et al. (2005) noted that while
the learners in their study did improve in
their rated speech-act performance from pre-
to posttests, the pragmatic strategies they
used were not necessarily more native-like
after the experience abroad.
The sections that follow present a de-
scription of the changes observed in the
request strategies used in each role-play in-
teraction.
Request Strategies
After the SA experience, nonnative speakers
changed the type of strategies they used to
request a service, reducing the use of non-
native-like strategies such as the query
permission (e.g., „Puedo tener un café? [Can
I have a coffee?]) and the need statement
(e.g., Necesito cambiar los zapatos [I need to
exchange the shoes]). However, they did
not increase their use of NSs’ most fre-
quently used strategies, the simple
interrogative and query ability.
In the first scenario, requesting some-
thing to drink, NNS2s increased their use of
direct strategies from 61 to 87%. A majority
of them, 70%, were want statements (e.g.,
Quiero un café [I want a coffee]). Peninsular
Spanish NSs also used more direct strategies
(69%); however, they differed in the main
strategies they each used. NSs’ most fre-
quently used strategy was the simple
interrogative (e.g., „Me pones un café? [Will
you bring me a coffee?]), which neither
NNS1s nor NNS2s used. There are different
reasons why nonnative speakers did not use
this strategy. As other researchers have al-
ready noted (Carduner, 1998; Mir, 1993;
Pinto, 2002), the simple interrogative is a
commonly used strategy among Peninsular
Spanish NSs; however, it may be a poten-
tially problematic structure for English
speakers learning Spanish, as they do not
have a direct equivalent in their own lan-
guage. The closest equivalent to this
structure is formed with the future tense
(e.g., „Me pone un café? [Will you bring me
a coffee?]). As a result, as both Pinto (2002)
Foreign Language Annals
vol. 43, No. 1
and Carduner (1998) stated, this strategy
was hardly used by the English NSs and L2
learners in their studies, because it appears
to be a conventionalized form to make a
request in Spanish but not in English. In
addition, according to Pinto (2002),
this strategy is not usually taught in the
language classroom, nor does it appear in
most language textbooks teaching Spanish.
In terms of indirect strategies, after the
experience abroad, the nonnative speakers
reduced the use of the query permission
(e.g., „Puedo tener una Coca-Cola? [Can I
have a Coke?]) considerably (NNS1: 35%;
NNS2: 6%); this change can be viewed as a
tentative movement toward the NS norm as
represented by the NS data in this study.
Pinto (2002) stated that the query permis-
sion is commonly used to order food or
drinks in English; however, ‘‘this does not
seem to be a conventionally used strategy to
request a drink in Spanish’’ (p. 252). As
he stated, the use of this strategy by the
nonnative speakers of Spanish may be con-
sidered an area of negative pragmatic
transfer from English to Spanish. As learn-
ers may have noticed that this form was not
used in this context, they reduced its use
and instead used others, such as want
statements. Shively (2008) also found that
the participants in her study reduced their
use of this strategy considerably. On the
other hand, learners rarely used the query
ability, an indirect strategy, which was the
NSs’ second main strategy choice (e.g., „Me
puedes poner un café con leche? [Can you
bring me a coffee with milk?]). Carduner
(1998), Mir (1993), and Pinto (2002) also
found a low frequency of use of this strategy
among the nonnative speaker participants
in their studies. Pinto stated that this strat-
egy to order something to drink does not
seem to be as conventionalized in English
as it seems to be in Spanish.
The second scenario was more impos-
ing, as participants had to request a
shoe exchange without having the receipt
for their purchase. Spanish NSs used more
indirect strategies (64%) to reduce the im-
position of the request, while nonnative
171
speakers, both before and after the experi-
ence abroad, used indirect strategies at a
much lower rate (38%). The researcher had
expected that after the experience abroad
learners would have used more indirect
strategies, but this did not occur. Other
studies dealing with L2 request develop-
ment have noted that the acquisitional
pattern of requests shows a move from
direct to indirect strategies (Cole & Ander-
son, 2001; Félix-Brasdefer, 2007; Hill,
1997; Koike, 1989; Trosborg, 1995).
Nevertheless, the only change observed
after the SA experience that approximated
the NS data in this scenario was a less fre-
quent use of need statements (NNS1: 21%;
NNS2: 3%). Unlike NSs, NNS2s continued
using mostly the want statements. The
overuse of want statements may be a result
of what Barron (2003) called ‘‘playing it
safe.’’ Nonnative speakers use a strategy that
they know is correct and underuse other
strategies that may have been more appro-
priate in this context. Hassall (1997) also
observed that the learners in his study
overused want statements as a result of
wanting to play it safe. The main change
observed in both scenarios was a reduced
use of nonnative-like strategies such as the
query permission and the need statement.
Nonetheless, in neither scenario did stu-
dents start using NSs’ more frequently used
strategies, such as the simple interrogative
and query ability.
In conclusion, learners slightly chan-
ged the strategies they used to request a
service after being immersed in the target
country for 4 months. Nonetheless, none of
these changes was statistically significant.
There are different possibilities that could
explain why learners’ request strategies did
not change much after the experience
abroad. First, the time spent abroad was ra-
ther short for pragmatic changes to take
place. Other researchers have noted that a
semester or even a year abroad may not be
enough for pragmatic changes to manifest
themselves (Barron, 2003; Cohen et al.,
2005; Hoffman-Hicks, 1999; Rodrı́guez,
2001; VonCanon, 2006). Second, learners
172
may not have become aware of the prag-
matic differences between their L1 and L2,
or they may have not wanted to adopt the
NS norm in their speech. As Kinginger and
Farrell (2004) stated, although it might ap-
pear that the SA context offers potential for
the development of pragmatic competence,
L2 learners do not perform according to
NSs’ norms. As the authors noted, ‘‘The sta-
tus of ‘learner’ or of ‘non-native’ language
user tends to convey an attitude of caution
when it comes to employing the full range
of the available second language resources’’
(p. 19). Barron (2003) also pointed out that
‘‘learners may simply prefer the L1 norm
and choose to adhere to this rather than to
adopt a foreign L2 convention’’ (p. 242).
Therefore, learners may not have wanted to
use some of the strategies that the Spanish
NSs frequently used, even though they
might have become aware of their use.
When asked about the differences they had
noted between the Spanish and English
language requesting styles, a nonnative
speaker participant of this study claimed
the following:
Once I was at a restaurant with my
Spanish conversation partner and I said
something like ‘‘„Puedo tener una cu-
chara? [Can I have a spoon?]’’ He told
me that in Spain people don’t ask [sic]
things that way, that I should say ‘‘dame
una cuchara, por favor [give me a spoon,
please],’’ that I had to be more direct.
[. . .] He said it made me sound like a
foreigner, [sic] but still, I cannot say -
una cuchara [a spoon] or - dame una
cuchara [give me a spoon], I just don’t
like it.
In this passage, the nonnative speaker
expressed her preference to keep using
nonnative-like strategies, even though she
was made aware of other strategies NSs
used in this context.
On the other hand, one could also hy-
pothesize that some of the learners may
have not become aware of some pragmatic
aspects of their L2. It is important to note
that many of them reported that they had a
Spring 2010
difficult time establishing and maintaining
contact with Peninsular Spanish NSs during
their stay abroad. Some of them suggested
that they had spent most of their time in
and outside of class with their American
colleagues and travelling together on week-
ends. As a result, this may have made it
more difficult for them to become aware of
NSs’ most frequently used strategies.
Implications
As indicated by the data from this study,
there were some pragmatic aspects of
Spanish that learners should be made aware
of in order to gain a better understanding of
the target culture and its pragmatic norms.
For example, learners should be made
aware of the variety of strategies used by
Spanish NSs when ordering at restaurants.
Strategies such as the simple interrogative
(i.e., „Me das una cola? [Will you give me a
cola?]), the use of the elliptic form (una cola
[one cola]), and the command (Dame una
cola [Give me a cola]), are appropriate for-
mulas to use in these contexts in Spain, and
they were rarely used by the American
learners in this study, as the results of this
study have shown. Other strategies that
were not present in the learner data were
strategies such as „te importarı́a . . .? [would
you mind . . .?] and „habrı́a alguna posibili-
dad? [would there be any possibility?].
These strategies could also be introduced to
expand learners’ request strategy repertoire
in higher imposition contexts.
In the last 2 decades there has been an
expansion of studies investigating the ef-
fects of teaching pragmatics to L2 learners
(Bardovi-Harlig & Mahan-Taylor, 2003;
Barron, 2000; Félix-Brasdefer, 2006; Garcı́a,
1996; Kasper & Rose, 2002; Mir, 2001;
Pearson, 2006). As Bardovi-Harlig and Mahan -
Taylor (2003) affirmed, it is important
to teach pragmatics because a pragmatic error
can hinder effective communication be-
tween speakers, as the speaker may appear
too abrupt, rude, or uncaring. Moreover, as
previous research has shown, there are
pragmatic aspects that are not acquired,
Foreign Language Annals
vol. 43, No. 1
even after a student is immersed in the tar-
get culture, unless they are taught. Félix-
Brasdefer (2006) mentioned, ‘‘Research in
L2 pragmatics has shown that instruction in
pragmatics is even more beneficial than ex-
posure for developing pragmatic
competence’’ (p. 168). Therefore, if re-
searchers’ goal is to make learners
communicatively competent in the L2, then
the teaching of pragmatics is a key element
to achieve this goal, an element that be-
comes even more essential for students who
are going to be immersed in the target cul-
ture. These students need to be
pragmatically competent in the TL in order
to gain and maintain interactions with the
NSs of the target country. Therefore, learn-
ers immersed in the target context would
benefit from pragmatic language instruction
during their stay abroad in order to be made
aware of different pragmatic features of the
TL that they may not acquire on their own.
Kasper and Rose (2001) and Bardovi-
Harlig and Mahan-Taylor (2003) presented
various methods and activities that can be
used for teaching pragmatics. Previous
studies have suggested that either an ex-
plicit teaching approach (Félix-Brasdefer,
2006; House, 1996; Kasper & Rose, 2001,
2002; Takahashi, 2001) or the use of both
implicit and explicit methods of instruction
(Usó-Juan & Martı́nez-Flor, 2008) are the
most beneficial ways to teach pragmatics.
Hence, studies investigating the effect of
pragmatics teaching during or before the SA
experience are needed, as this is a very new
field of study. Furthermore, studies that an-
alyze factors that may affect learners’
pragmatic development abroad, such as the
establishment of social networks with NSs,
would also be very beneficial in order to
learn more about the processes that learners
experience in acquiring pragmatics from
the TL.
Acknowledgments
I would like to acknowledge the late Dr. L.
Kathy Heilenman for her guidance and
support in this study. Her knowledge and
173
her dedication were not only inspirational
but also enlightening.
Note
1. The NNS1 participant used the incorrect
verb here, volver, ‘‘come back,’’ instead of
devolver, ‘‘return.’’
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