Disagreement Strategies

The speakers’ use of the three major disagreement strategies, namely ‘no disagreement ’,

‘indirect disagreement’, and ‘direct disagreement’, are first investigated within groups and among groups. The frequency and standard deviation of these strategies are presented in Table 9 and depicted graphically in Figure 3. The subcategories under the three strategies and their occurrences are displayed in Table 10 and Figure 4.

Table 9 Mean frequency and standard deviation of disagreement strategies used by the four

No disagreement Indirect disagreement Direct disagreement

NS-C EFL-L EFL-H NS-E

Figure 3 Mean frequency of disagreement strategies used by the four groups of speakers

4.1.2.1.1 Chinese L1 vs. English L1 & Disagreement Strategies

The DCT results demonstrated that the English L1 speakers chose the strategy of direct disagreement more frequently than the Chinese L1 speakers (mean: 0.4942 > 0.3608, P=.000) and the Chinese L1 speakers chose the strategy of no disagreement more frequently than the English L1 speakers (mean: 0.5383 > 0.4192, P=.000). The situations in the questionnaire involve opinion exchange between the interactants rather than arguments for self benefits or rights and none of the situations would cause damage to the speaker’s benefits or rights, which could lead to severe or aggravated arguments or conflicts between the interlocutors. Thus, it is necessary to note that the higher frequency of direct disagreement by the English speakers implies the English speakers’ stronger willingness to speak out their contradictory opinions in

no-damage situations (a primary consideration in designing the DCT as described in Section 3.2.1). The Chinese tendency of high value on face concept in the SRQ and opt-out results is also reflected in the DCT results. The higher frequency of no disagreement by the Chinese speakers shows their reluctance to verbalize their oppositional opinions and it might be attributed to face concern for the interlocutor.

The Chinese and the Americans are regarded to belong to two contrastive social communities. While the Chinese tend to avoid interactional conflicts, the Americans are bald in expressing their opinions. As Kuo (1992) stated in her study “The Chinese have always been depicted as reticent, emotionally restrained, and harmony-oriented. In Chinese society, a submissive, obedient, and conforming individual is the model for all, and nonconformity and argumentativeness are seen as negative qualities” (p. 398). Therefore, the Chinese value silence highly and choose to refrain from uttering their true feelings or opposing opinions for the purpose of social harmony. On the other hand, Americans seem to rely on verbal expressions and are less reluctant when dealing with a face-threatening act because ‘American culture promotes explicit verbal means of correcting, refusing, or disagreeing’ (Takahashi &

Beebe, 1993: 144).

The cross-cultural differences can be looked into from a sociological theory as well.

According to Hofstede (1980), the Chinese are considered a collectivist society that emphasizes “we” concept. They could sacrifice personal interest for fulfilling group benefits.

As a result, they tend to be restrained or avoid making a disagreement, which might break social solidarity. Americans belong to the individualist end of the polar dimension. They prioritize “I” before “we”. The need for autonomy, competitiveness and self-sufficiency makes them more verbally expressive in social encounters.

4.1.2.1.2. EFL Speakers & Disagreement Strategies

The results from EFL answers in English seem to be influenced by their native language, Chinese. As Table 9 reveals, frequency of disagreement strategies for the low and EFL-high speakers lied between those for the Chinese L1 and the English L1. The EFL- EFL-high’s performance was closer to the English group’s because of a significant difference between the high and the Chinese group (P=.052) for choosing ‘no disagreement’ (English L1 ˜ EFL-high > Chinese L1). On the other hand, the EFL-low performed similarly to the Chinese group since they differed significantly from the English group (p=.030) for choosing ‘direct disagreement’ (English L1 > EFL- low ˜ Chinese L1).

4.1.2.1.3 Chinese L1 vs. English L1 & Disagreement Sub-strategies

The disagreement strategies can be divided into subcategories that present more elaborate group differences as in Table 10 and Figure 4.

Table 10 Mean frequency and standard deviation of disagreement sub-strategies used by the four groups of speakers

0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5

N-1 N-2 N-3 I-1 I-2 D-1 d-1.1 d-1.2 D-2

NS-C EFL-L EFL-H NS-E

Figure 4 Mean frequency of disagreement sub-strategies used by the four groups of speakers

The difference between the Chinese and the English speakers’ choice of ‘no disagreement’ resided mainly in the strategy of avoidance. The Chinese speakers outnumbered the English speakers significantly for the strategy of ‘avoidance’ (p=.000). As for ‘direct disagreement’, the English speakers contradicted more often than the Chinese speakers (p=.000). Among contradictory opinions, the subcategory, ‘refutation’, was a frequently used strategy for the English speakers, and its frequency significantly outnumbered the Chinese group’s (p=.001). The English speakers used another subcategory of contradiction, ‘direct refusal’, more frequently as well (p=.035).

In addition to the quantitative analysis, the qualitative analysis of the data could picture the cultural differences more clearly. The English speakers tend to show the ir variety and originality in their responses. They used more jokes as expressions of disagreement. Eight of them disagreed by jokes or ironies while none of the Chinese L1 and only one of the EFL speakers did so. For example, when a clerk was promoting a roughly made gift to the speaker, an English speaker said, “Yes, the rough edges are the most finely crafted I’ve ever seen”.

When the Chinese speakers and EFL speakers were criticizing the product to the clerk, they went straight to the point without ironies or sarcasms, for example, ‘這東西明明就很爛 ’ (‘The stuff sucks!’) (NS-C), ‘Please be honest. Ok? It looks like an outcast. Could you please

show me something really “delicate and generous”?’ (EFL). In a situation in which the speaker tried to show opposite attitude toward a class, the English speakers usually expressed their opinions in a funny tone, for example, “I would rather watch paint dry” “I thought that class was really boring, but at least it was a good chance to catch up on my sleep” while the Chinese and EFL speakers used several modifiers to strengthen their opinions, such as ‘拜託 耶…超 bo 的好不好? 真是受不了!’ (‘Come on! It’s so boring. Unbelievably boring!’) (NS-C), ‘Are you mad? That is the most boring class I have ever attended’ (EFL).

4.1.2.1.4 EFL Speakers & Disagreement Sub-strategies

Frequency of most strategies used by the two EFL groups was located between those by the Chinese group and the English group except that the EFL- low speakers used the indirect disagreement strategies most frequently, however without significant difference, and the EFL-high speakers used the ‘challenge to the interlocutor’ most frequently.

The DCT results showed pragmatic transfer of the EFL speakers in several strategies.

The EFL- high speakers displayed no transfer for most disagreement strategies. However, the EFL- low speakers showed strong pragmatic transfer (English L1 > EFL- low ˜ Chinese L1) for

‘avoidance’ (p=.062 for EFL- low & English L1), ‘contradiction’ (p=.046 for EFL- low &

English L1), and subcategory of contradiction ‘refutation’ (p=.029 for EFL- low & English L1).

Their similar language behaviors to the Chinese group’s might be resulted from their lack of sufficient foreign language proficiency for them to achieve communication goals. Therefore, they chose to avoid more and contradict less, like the Chinese group did. On the other hand, the EFL-high speakers overused the strategy ‘challenge to the interlocutor’ much more frequently than the other three groups (p=.005 for EFL-high & NS-C, p=.012 for EFL-high &

EFL- low, p=.015 for EFL-high & NS-E). ‘Challenge to the interlocutor’ contains components that challenge the interlocutor’s beliefs and values, criticize the interlocutor’s opinions or

behaviors, or complain to the interlocutor. The disagreement strategy might enhance or strengthen the level of face-threat to the interlocutor. The EF L-high group’s deviation from Chinese strong emphasis on face and politeness might be attributed to their attempt to display their foreign language proficiency through overperforming this strategy. Challenging the interlocutor seems to be an easier strategy for them to acquire in English since they only have to add an element that questions the interlocutor’s beliefs and values to the main oppositional statement, such as ‘Are you mad? That is the most boring class I have ever attended’, ‘Are you kidding me ? This class sucks!’, ‘I can’t believe you think the teacher is interesting’.

4.1.2.2 Positive Remarks

The speakers use various devices to soften their face-threatening act, among which positive remarks are commonly used as adjuncts to preface face-threatening acts, such as disagreement :

“Thank you for your concern and efforts to… , but… ” before criticizing the interlocutor’s proposal (Beebe & Takahashi, 1989a, b); refusal: “Oh, I wish I could, but… ” to express positive feeling about the interlocutor’s offer or invitation (Beebe et al., 1990); correction:

“That was very good, but I believe … ” before correcting the interlocutor’s factual errors about a specific historical event (Takahashi & Beebe, 1993). The results of the present study shown in Table 11 are consistent with the commonly accepted fact that the Americans usually preface the upcoming face-threatening act with a softening adjunct (Beebe & Takahashi, 1989a, b;

Beebe et al., 1990; Takahashi & Beebe, 1993).

Table 11 Occurrence and distribution of positive remarks used by the four groups of speakers

remarks N. Occurrence/

disagreement N.

1. These figures exclude the expressions that occur in ‘no disagreement’ strategies (opt-out, agreement and avoidance) since positive remarks occur only in indirect and direct disagreements to soften the main semantic body of disagreement. (agreement and appreciation that occur alone without performance of disagreement are not regarded as positive remarks).

2. %= occurrence number of the positive remark/total occurrence number of all indirect and direct disagreement strategies

Figure 5 Mean frequency of positive remarks

0

Figure 6 Mean frequency of positive remarks by categories

In general (see Figure 5), among the four groups of participants, the English L1 group displayed much higher frequency of positive remarks (24%) when disagreeing with the interlocutor, than the EFL-high (19%), EFL-low (13%) and the Chinese L1 groups did (10%) (English L1 > EFL-high > EFL- low > Chinese L1). The high frequency of positive remarks used by the English native speakers supports the claim that positive remark is a very important politeness strategy for Americans. According to Takahashi & Beebe (1993), American culture promotes explicit verbal expressions and thus also ‘encourages explicit verbal means of undoing the threat to face that the explicit correction, refusal, or disagreement poses’ (p. 143).

As a result, more positive remarks are required as a ‘ritualized use’ to mitigate their explicit verbal expressions.

Among the positive remarks, ‘partial agreement’ was the most frequently used and

‘apology’ was the least frequently used for the four groups of speakers. The English group outnumbered the other three groups in four positive remarks, namely ‘partial agreement’,

‘gratitude’, ‘empathy’, and ‘consideration’, but underperformed ‘apology’, which suggests that

‘apology’ is not a frequently used adjunct to disagreement for the English L1 speakers. On the other hand, the EFL- high speakers overperformed ‘apology’ to soften the upcoming disagreement act (EFL- high > Chinese L1 > EFL-low ˜ English L1: 5% > 2% > 1% = 1%).

An EFL- high speaker seemed fossilized in using ‘apology’ for five times before disagreeing, which contributed much to the high frequency. Qualitatively, the speakers used ‘apology’

before complaining to the salesperson, disagreeing to the interlocutor’s opinion, or refusing a product promotion. In comparison, one English speaker used apology before refusing a product promotion while six Chinese and five EFL speakers did so. The EFL speakers’ use of apology might be the effect of language transfer from Chinese.

Studies have shown that the Americans are various and original in verbal expressions to demonstrate their sincere feelings (Condon, 1984; Goldstein & Tamura, 1975). They are high

in “volition”, that is, free choice of interactional strategies (Ide, 1989) and various in softeners (Takahashi & Beebe, 1993). In the present study, the English L1 displayed their originality in using positive remarks as well, e.g. ‘Sure, but it also… ’, ‘That may work for some students but others… ’, ‘You may be right, but… ’, ‘I guess in some ways it’s a good policy but… ’, ‘I guess so, but...’. In comparison, the Chinese L1 speakers were low in frequency and variety in positive remarks, e.g. ‘我贊成你的看法，可是… ’ ‘I agree with you, but’, ‘這樣說是沒錯 啦！可是… ’ ‘You’re right, but… ’, ‘他的球技算是相當的不錯，可是… ’ ‘His skills are not bad, but… ’. Although the EFL learners were higher than the Chinese counterparts in frequency of most of the positive remark categories, they still preferred certain expressions, especially the elements of ‘might’, ‘maybe’, ‘may be’, which imply uncertainty, e.g. ‘Maybe you are right, but… ’, ‘Of course he's handsome, but… ’, ‘Well, I admit that he has a great skill.

But… ’, ‘The book might be interesting, but… ’.

Previous studies focus on ‘partial agreement’ in disagreement (Beebe & Takahashi, 1989a, b; Takahashi & Beebe, 1993; Dogancay-Aktuna & Kamisli, 1996) and another interesting softening adjunct ‘empathy’ has been overlooked. As defined in the present study,

‘empathy’ is used to recognize or show understanding for the hearer’s point of view at the moment when the speaker feel the need for verbalizing their opinions. It can be presented in various forms preceding the disagreement unit, such as, ‘I understand that this is a serious crime, but I… ’, ‘Maybe it’s just me, but I don’t feel like the professor is a very dynamic speaker’. It can also follow the disagreement unit, e.g. ‘I do not agree with you. I have learned two other languages and my most successful methods have been… .. However, I do realize other people learn differently’. The English speakers used the adjunct much more frequently than the other three groups to show respect for the interlocutor’s statements when proposing their own views. The high frequency of this adjunct implies the English speakers’

concern of their own and the hearer’s equal rights to opinions as the y often suggested in the opt-out reasons ‘everyone is entitled to their opinion’.

4.1.3 Summary

The overall results from the SRQ and DCT showed many inter-group differences in both perception of disagreement and pragmatic strategies. The perception data from the SRQ and opt-out reasons seem to be connected to the speakers’ choice of pragmatic strategies in several ways. First, the SRQ and opt-out reasons provided abundant evidence that the Chinese speakers value highly the concept of face, either the speaker’s face or the interlocutor’s face.

They seem to display the social value in verbal expressions in that they avoided disagreement much more frequently than the English speakers while the English speakers contradicted more often. The American culture’s promotion of verbal expression have yielded more various and original markers of positive remarks, which finds its best support by the present study.

According to the sociological theory polarizing the North American and East Asian cultures into individualistic society and collectivistic society, the American culture emphasizes on

‘self’ and ‘autonomy’ and hence promotes verbal expressions. In order to demonstrate politeness, their bald and explicit linguistic expressions are fully characterized by original softening devices. In contrast, the Chinese tend to act in accordance with group harmo ny and solidarity, and usually choose to keep silent or avoid in conflicts or face-threatening encounters. Their use of positive remarks thus lacks variety and is low in frequency.

The EFL learners, as shown in the opt-out and DCT results, seemed unable yet to acquire the essentials in using target- like disagreement strategies and positive remarks in English. The EFL-low speakers, especially, demonstrated strong pragmatic transfer in several strategies. The EFL- high speakers overused ‘challenge to the interlocutor’ strategy to exhibit their foreign language proficiency.