Difficulties Shared by Learners

The interview protocols revealed that both high-proficiency and low-proficiency learners encountered several difficulties when comprehending implicatures in the following three aspects: (1) implicature with little relevance, (2) literal interpretation and (3) learners’ assumption.

Implicature with little relevance. Both high-proficiency learners and low-proficiency learners were found to comprehend less well in the type of implicature with little relevance, which is titled “R-change” in the present task, as illustrated in the following example.

(21) Item 4 (Tina got her hair cut and styled and she wants to find out what Mark thinks of it.)

Tina: Do you like my new hair style?

Mark: I was thinking, I’d like to have the apartment painted.

When learners encountered the response that totally changes the topic, they still strived to find the relevance as possible. The following two extracts from a high-proficiency

learner and a low-proficiency learner demonstrated how they searched for relevance to help them interpret the implicature.

(22) H-learner 1: I heard the man said he wanted to help her repaint the apartment, so I think the man thought Tina’s hair color went wrong.

Researcher: Why do you think her hair goes wrong?

H-learner1: Um…at first, I think the man’s reply was really strange. He may think her hair color was strange so that he wanted to repaint the apartment to match her hair color.

(23) L-learner 43: Well, he probably thought the girl’s hair looked good so he planned to paint the apartment to make the apartment looked better. Um…painting the apartment could also mean the girl should have her hair restyled.

Researcher: So, you mean it could have two meanings concerning painting the apartment?

L-learner 43: What he really said was not the apartment, but her hair.

Painting the apartment was served as an analogy, which means her hair may look good or bad.

Whether learners interpreted Mark’s response as a positive or a negative comment, they failed to recognize the genuine speaker intention revealed in this type of implicature, that is, the speaker avoids giving negative response by totally neglecting the listener’s request of opinion. This result is consistent with learners’ strategy use in R-change discussed earlier (section 4.3.2.1), in which learners frequently employed logical reasoning to seek the relevance between the response and the request.

Literal interpretation. The second learners’ difficulty arose from their habitual use

of literal interpretation. Five out of the eight learners reported that they tend to match the answer with what they have literally heard in listening tests. Two learners reported that they are accustomed to employing this hear-match strategy in listening tests.

(24) Item 6 (Mr. Chen asks Mrs. Liu about a student’s term paper and Mrs. Liu responds,” I thought it was well typed.”)

H-learner 2: She only talked about his advantage (well typed), so I chose

“b”. Just like taking multiple choice tests, you don’t have to understand every option. If you hear something in the dialogue that you think is correct, then you just select the option that matches what you heard.

(25) Item 19 (Brenda asks Sam how he thinks of her new dress and Sam

responds, “Well, this year there really are a lot of women wearing that dress.”)

L-learner 43: I think there are two meanings. If it is the surface-level meaning, I will choose “c”, “He likes it, but too many women are wearing it.”

Researcher: What about the deep-level meaning?

L-learner 43: It’s like the daily questions we are asked about. For example, your friend may ask you “How do you like something?” Sometimes you may not like it very much, or you don’t have any opinions, you will just give a reply that everybody will give.

Researcher: Um… then why did you choose the surface-level meaning?

L-learner 43: When we take listening tests, we usually select the answer that we heard from the script. We won’t think so

complicatedly.

Example (24) and (25) showed that learners were inclined to interpret the implicature as literal meaning based on what they had literally heard in the context. This kind of hear-match strategy probably can explain why learners preferred to use bottom-up strategies when interpreting implicature, as one of the low proficiency learners commented, “I heard the word ‘hard’, then I saw a option with the words ‘not easy’, and I selected that option since ‘not easy’ is the synonym of ‘hard’.

Learners’ assumption. From the interview protocols, it was systematically found that learners were distracted toward the option that approximates their assumption in certain people and event. For example, learners were found to assume that “teachers” are supposed not to reveal subjective opinions toward students’

performance, as shown in the following excerpts.

(26) Item 6 (Mr. Chen asks Mrs. Liu about a student’s term paper and Mrs. Liu responds, “I thought it was well typed.”)

H-learner 4: I didn’t choose “d” (She didn’t like Mark’s term paper).

It’s too negative! When a teacher evaluates students’

assignment, the teacher will not give too many personal comments. Instead, the teacher is supposed to comment objectively, reporting the strength and weakness of the assignment, or the points that need improving. I think the teacher will not say “I like it!” or “I don’t like it!”

(27) Item 21 (May asks her teacher about her term paper and her teacher responds, “That was a very difficult assignment.”)

L-learner 57: The teacher meant “None of the students did well on the assignment, including her. That was a very difficult assignment for all students.”

Researcher: You mean her term paper was not good?

L-learner 57: Yeah. The teacher probably didn’t like it.

Researcher: Why didn’t you select option “a” (Mr. White didn’t like May’s term paper very much.)

L-learner 57: Since it was difficult, everyone didn’t do well. It was not related to the teacher’s preferences because the teacher was commenting the assignment according to general performance, not just to May alone.

Example (26) and (27) clearly demonstrated how learners’ assumption in “teachers”

influenced their interpretation of the implicature, that is, teachers’ comments on

students’ performance should be neutral and not involve personal preferences. Thus, when they faced this type of implicature, they could not capture the intended meaning behind the implicature — Your performance is far from satisfactory. Instead, they tended to interpret the utterance more like a comfort, as one of the learners (H-learner 3) noted, “She didn’t do well, but it’s not her fault since the assignment was difficult.

The teacher could understand it.”

Learners’ assumption was also demonstrated in the Relevance-evaluation context. Consider the following examples.

(28) Item 3 (Jack gave a party last week and he wants to know what Sandy thought of the party.)

Jack: Sandy, how did you enjoy yourself at my party?

Sandy: Oh, um…you know, it’s hard to give a good party.

(29) Item 10 (Nick asks Judy what she thinks of his paintings.) Nick: Judy, do you like my paintings?

Judy: Well, painting with oil is very difficult.

As discussed earlier (section 4.2.3), the responses in example (28) and (29) are nearly identical with the meaning “It is difficult to do something” except one context dealing with the evaluation towards the party, while the other towards the paintings. However, learners’ responses towards these two items were completely different. The following two excerpts were from a high-proficiency learner (H-learner 2).

(30) Item 3 (Jack asks Sandy how she thinks of the party and she responds, “It’s hard to give a good party.”)

H-learner 2: Sandy may not enjoy the party, but she didn’t want to say it directly that “The party sucks!”

(31) Item 10 (Nick asks Judy how she thinks of his paintings and she responds, “Painting with oil is very difficult.”)

H-learner 2: She said “Oil painting is difficult!”, which meant she understood his effort on it.

Researcher: Did she answer his question?

H-learner 2: Well…no. I don’t think she didn’t like his paintings.

When you appreciate someone’s paintings, it is very likely that you are not good at paintings. Since you know his effort on it, you will recognize his accomplishment.

Example (31) and (31) showed that learners perceived “party” and “painting”

differently. Learners tended to perceive “oil painting” as something difficult, which explains why they interpreted the response “Painting with oil is very difficult” as a true compliment. As one of the learners reported,

(32) L-learner 52: She said “Painting with oil is difficult”, which meant he did a good job to accomplish it. It is a positive comment.

However, when learners interpreted the implicature in the “party context”, they tended to regard the utterance “It’s hard to give a good party.” as a circumlocution for negative evaluation, as one of the high-proficiency learners noted,

(33) H-learner 1: Party is more of a “fun” thing and atmosphere is the most important part in a party. So, when you feel something goes wrong, you are not going to enjoy the party. It’s quite easy to judge a party: It’s either “fun”

or “sucks”!

Due to the fact that learners had different perceptions toward “party” and “painting”, it is not surprising to find that they had different standards towards the evaluation. As can be seen in the above examples, learners were inclined to see “oil painting” as something difficult to do; thus, no matter how well a person painted, he or she deserved the encouragement. “Holding a party”; on the contrary, was a completely different thing: A party is easier to be evaluated as “fun” or “not fun” since party per se is a “fun thing”. From this point, we can see that learner’ assumption plays an important role in their implicature comprehension.