Resumen de L2 irony comprehension and the role of L2 proficiency and use

Weiyi Li, Jookyoung Jung

• English

  The present study investigated how Cantonese speakers learning English as a second language (L2) would comprehend English irony and whether their L2 proficiency and use would moderate their irony processing. Thirty Cantonese speakers with differing English proficiency (intermediate vs advanced) were asked to complete an irony comprehension task in which they had to determine if given comments in literal or ironic situations were positive or negative. The irony comprehension task was immediately followed by a stimulated recall session to further explore the participants’ thought processes while responding to the irony comprehension items. The results revealed that the participants were faster and more accurate when processing positively-valenced comments (literal praise, ironic criticism), compared to negatively-valenced ones (literal criticism, ironic praise). The findings suggest that learners had greater difficulty identifying ironic praises than ironic criticisms, underscoring the role of valence in second language irony inferencing. The stimulated recall data suggested that the anticipation of irony may accelerate the identification of ironic criticisms. While proficiency facilitated the speed of irony comprehension, the duration of L2 use, especially in speaking, emerged as an important factor in moderating the accuracy of irony comprehension.

• 中文

  本研究調查廣東話(粵語)為母語的英語第二語言學習者如何理解英語的反諷, 以及他們的第二語言熟練程度和使用情況是否會影響他們對反諷的理解。三十位不同英語熟練程度(中級和高級)的廣東話使用者完成了一項反諷理解任務。他們需要判斷在字面意義或反諷情境下給出的評論是積極的還是消極。反諷理解任務後, 參與者立即進行刺激回憶環節, 以進一步探索他們在反諷理解任務時的思維過程。結果顯示, 相較於消極效價的評論(字面批評, 反諷稱贊), 參與者在處理積極效價的評論(字面稱贊, 反諷批評)時反應更快, 準確率也更高。這些結果表明, 學習者在識別反諷稱贊時的困難大於識別反諷批評。這顯示情感效價在第二語言反諷理解中的作用。刺激回憶的數據表明, 預期反諷可能會加速對反諷批評的識別。儘管第二語言熟練程度有助提高反諷理解速度, 但第二語言的使用時長, 特別是口語的使用, 爲影響反諷理解準確率的重要因素。