Resumen de The Acquisition of Pragmatically Appropriate Requests by Second Language Learners of Spanish Using an Input-Based Virtual Environment
This study explores the types of input-oriented instruction that best promote pragmatic development in a virtual environment (VE). VEs provide immersive environments containing contextual support and provide feedback responses where learners experience the results of their pragmatic choices immediately and meaningfully, factors found to be essential for developing pragmatic competence. Third-year university learners of Spanish explored a VE by approaching avatars and requesting objects or favors essential to solving a task. Results show that both treatment groups benefited, and that structured input seems to help learners process input most appropriately, especially with respect to incorporating a second language perspective and using the appropriate tense and impersonal forms of address—both of which seem to contribute to the overall acceptability of learners’ production of requests.
