Economidou-Kogetsidis and the Development of E-Mail Literacy - Term Paper Example

Economidou-Kogetsidis and the Development of E-Mail Literacy Introduction Pragmatics is the study of how enunciation, body language and facial expressions influence how a particular message is conveyed and received. To this end, e-mail communication poses a particular challenge, as the usual contextual cues of how a message is received are missing. Economidou-Kogetsidis posits that non-native speakers might have even more difficulty in this regard. This is because the conventions of the native language are largely unknown to these speakers, so they might have even more of a challenge in conveying politeness in an e-mail. Economidou-Kogetsidis states that such aspects of e-mail message as directness, the lack of greetings, and improper usage of titles and names are all aspects of an e-mail which convey to the recipient the perception of impoliteness. Imperatives are especially tricky in this regard, as the recipients invariably see imperatives, without modifiers, to be rude, even when accompanied with the word “please.” The way to modify imperatives, however, are to acknowledge the burden on the professors’ time. Such an example of this would be to say, instead of, “please give me the notes for the class I missed,” to say “if it is not a bother, and not too time-consuming, could you please send me the notes for the class that I missed.” Moreover, students used grounders most often as a way of modifying the message, and grounders are reasons why a student has to make the request (“I need notes for Thursday, as I had to take my sick grandmother to the hospital that day”). Although Economidou-Kogetsidis states that there are alternative explanations for the students’ overall directness in composing the e-mails and lack of greetings, including the fact that Greek is different from English, that is most likely a function of young people to be direct and brief, and that the students are using avoidance strategies, Economidou-Kogetsidis states that the students should still learn the proper modes of e-mail communication to avoid pragmatic failure in the future. How this piece of research fits in with the larger research context This piece of research fits into the larger research context in that it deals with pragmatics, and the field of pragmatics is the rubric under which this research falls. In particular, the study of pragmatics is the study of how a linguistic content of a statement and the context of its enunciation affect reasoner's inferences and interpretation of what is said (Oaksford & Chater, 2010, p.. 233). A person may make pragmatic inferences based on lexical inferences, and lexical inferences are “the process by which a word’s meaning is extracted from its phonological or orthographic code” (Kolodner, & Riesbeck, 1986, p. 229). Thus, pragmatic reasoning is context-dependent (Garnham & Oakhill, 1994, p. 139). The connotations of what is written can be considered to be a pragmatic aspect of the writing or the argument, in that the meaning might be something slightly different than what is conveyed, and it also might be different than what the author intended. Nevertheless, a connoted meaning is something that is latent or implied – such as a statement that says $100 reduction on all computers has the denoted meaning that computers are reduced by $100, and a connoted meaning that the computers are a bargain (Cottrell, 2005, p. 95). In this case, the research contributes to the field of pragmatics in that it adds e-mail communications into this field. It is well-known that e-mail is notorious for giving off wrong meanings, simply because aspects, such as a person’s tone of voice or facial expressions, cannot be conveyed in this way. Enunciation is crucial in understanding the meaning of a sentence, so e-mail makes pragmatic communication difficult. Therefore, the communication might have connotations which are not intended by the speaker, yet are interpreted by the receiver. Thus, a simple statement like “why are you doing that?” might come off as an accusation, when this is not what is intended, simply because the context, the enunciation and facial and bodily expressions cannot be seen or known. While pragmatics is the broad field of research to which this particular piece of research contributes, in the more narrow sense, the research also contributes to the field of e-politeness. This is an important field of research, due to the ubiquity of the Internet and e-mail, and the general complaint that students do not basic rules about politeness when it comes to e-mail (Chen, 2006, p. 35). As Chen (2006) notes, parts of the message, such as inflection, body language and facial expressions are metamessages which help the receiver interpret the message. Without these cues, the messages are subject to interpretation simply by reading the words on the page, and how they are organized (Chen, 2006, p. 36). E-politeness is important, as students are often required to compose messages to authority figures, and they need to know the proper way to do this. This is not only important in school, but also important in life, as this is something that they will be required to do when they get a job as well. It is therefore not appropriate to send a message to a Professor that says “Hey prof, how RU?” Whether or not students understand this is another matter, but the field of e-politeness contributes to the dialogue. This research is thus another piece of the e-politeness puzzle. The particular research aims, goals and objectives One of the aims is to understand NNS student-faculty interactions, and to investigate student’s e-mail requests. Another aim is to contribute to the body of knowledge regarding e-politeness, with regards to student-faculty interactions. Also, since the forms of address between student and faculty are understudied, this research aims to contribute to this question as well. Thus, the fields of e-politeness, NNS student-faculty interactions and the forms of address between student and faculty are all understudied, this research aims to contribute to the body of knowledge regarding all of these field. More specifically, the research also aims to examine the e-mail messages sent from Greek-Cypriot students to their faculty, and to investigate what kind of linguistic mistakes might be made which would make the messages status-incongruent, and, therefore, inappropriate. The researchers attack this question from both sides, as they study not only the messages sent from the Greek-Cypriot students, but also the professors who receive the message. The professors who receive the message are a part of the study, because their perceptions of the message contents is important as well. The perception study aims is to determine the extent to which a direct or unsolicited e-mail might be seen as lacking in politeness, thereby causing pragmatic failure (Economidou-Kogetsidis, 2011, p. 3194). Which method was employed The researcher in this case employed a naturalistic method, in which the e-mails sent by Greek-Cypriot students to their faculty members are examined. Since the researcher is also interested in the perceptions of the faculty members who receive the e-mails, the researcher also used a combination of quantitative and qualitative methods to gauge this part of the research question. The data gathered are thus authentic interactions between the students and faculty, and the researcher may analyze the interactions. This is the best way to conduct the research, according to Economidou-Kogetsidis, in that the possible bias of the research may be mitigated by the naturalistic method of the study. As for the faculty, Economidou-Kogetsidis presented a questionnaire for the faculty to peruse and fill out. This questionnaire focused upon the perception of the faculty, as far as the degree of impoliteness found in the messages, as well as the possible abruptness of the e-mails received. As for the data, the researcher focused upon 200 e-mails sent from students to faculty over a period of 18 months. These e-mails were written in English by Greek-Cypriot students to faculty at an English-speaking university located in Cyprus. The students were both undergraduate and post-graduate. Some knew the faculty member to whom they were writing (such as those who were already taking a course from the faculty member), while others were contacting the faculty member for the first time (eg those students who were contacting professors asking for permission to join their course). The students were generally between the ages of 18 to 25, although the researcher was not entirely sure of the ages of the participants, and they had levels of proficiency in the English language ranging from lower intermediate to advanced. As for the professors, there were 11 professors, 9 females and 2 males, between the ages of 35 and 45 years old. They were all doctorate holders, and all employed full-time by the university. Their communication styles with their students were described as “friendly formal” (Economidou-Kogetsidis, 2011, p. 3198). By this, it was meant that they were not on a first-name basis, and the contact that these professors had with the students was only during class and during office hours. The e-mails themselves were both requests for action and requests for information. These e-mails thus took the form of requests for appointment, feedback on work, requests for course material (such as lecture notes and handouts), confirmation of submitted work and information about grades and academic matters. Other requests were requests for extension of time to hand in an assignment, and confrontational requests, such as requests to review one’s grade for a change or revision. The researcher then coded the e-mails. The way that she did this was that she reviewed the request head act contained within each e-mail message. Each of the requests were analyzed and coded, with a focus upon the degree of directness in the message, the degree of internal modification in the message, the degree of external modification in the message and the form of address that is used. The internal modifications may be either downgraders, which means that these modifiers attempt to soften the request, or upgraders, which means that these modifiers attempt to make the request more coercive. External modifications serve to either soften or make more coercive the e-mail as a whole. As for directness, the researcher was looking for e-mails that might have a greeting in the salutation (Hi Dr. Paul), incorrect usage of titles (Mr. or Mrs. instead of Dr.), the presence of absence of the word “Dear,” the unacceptable usage of the title plus first name (Dr. David), zero forms of address (no salutation), and formal and less formal constructions (Dear David as opposed to Dear Dr. Griffin). As for the professors, the perception questionnaires were administered online. They were to offer their perception of the politeness or the appropriateness of six e-mails which were presented to them by the researcher. They were to imagine that these e-mails were from a student in one of their classes. They were to evaluate the e-mails on a 5 point Likert scale regarding abruptness verses politeness, then to qualitatively explain their choice by making reference to the specific linguistic features of the message. What evidence supports the research question What is the degree of directness and the internal and external modification used by Greek-Cypriotic students in their interaction with faculty? The evidence that supports this question is that, in e-mails for both requests for information and requests for action, the students were direct in their e-mails. Specifically, the requests for information featured this much more prominently than did the requests for action. The students were direct on 91.46% of the e-mails to professors regarding requests for information, while, with regards to the requests for action, students were direct in 50.58% of these. A typical example of directness, according to the researcher is an e-mail that starts out Mr. LN…Did you talk to Dr. A? What did she tell you? Can I take the class? (Economidou-Kogetsidis, 2011, p. 3200). The researcher also found out that the students used direct strategies in their requests for information, significantly higher than in their requests for action. The researcher also found that the students used indirect strategies in a significantly higher ratio when dealing with requests for action, when compared to requests for information. The researcher also found that the students did not use modifiers to downgrade the message, as 40.2% of the messages did not have any kind of downgrade marking, while 31.5% of the e-mails featured a downgrade marker of the word “please.” What forms of address do Greek-Cypriotic students use in their e-mails to faculty? The researcher found that 31% of the e-mails sent omitted the word “Dear.” She also found that 13% of the messages used an incorrect academic title plus a last name (Mrs. Jones); 7% used an incorrect academic title plus a first name (Mrs. Lisa); 3% used a correct academic title plus a first name (Dr. David). To what extent to British native speaker-lecturers perceive unmodified and direct e-mails from students are abrupt and impolite? A number of professors found the imperatives in the e-mails to be impolite, and that imperatives always sound impolite, even when the word “please” is added. They also said that imperatives always irritate, even when the word please is added, and that imperatives are more appropriate for a supervisor or a manager than for a student. How the findings are interpreted (why carried out, how done, what found, what it means) The researcher found that the students employed direct strategies in their e-mails to faculty, as a norm. The researcher also found that professors perceive such directness as being impolite, as it does not give the professor a choice in answering the request. With imperatives, the researcher found this particularly problematic because the degree of power is improperly assigned to the professor in this instance. Further, as stated above, professors, by and large, found imperatives to be annoying and impolite, even if the word please is added to it. Professors also stated that imperatives in e-mail communication sounds more like a demand, instruction or order, and carries with it the assumption that the professor would comply. The researcher concludes that imperatives, in particular, are interpreted harshly, and they undermine the status relationships between the student and faculty. This is because the imperatives sound like a demand, and students are not in a position to demand any action from a professor. Therefore, imperatives command a high level of mitigation that is not often used by students in practice. That said, not all imperatives are negatively received, but, rather, only those that do not acknowledge the imposition on the faculty member’s time. The researcher, however, found that the vast majority of the e-mails studied did not acknowledge this aspect, which led the researcher to conclude that the students both misinterpreted their own rights, plus misinterpreted the obligation of the faculty member. For instance, the e-mail that was seen as the most impolite was an e-mail that simply asked the professor to tell the student what changes need to be made to an attachment that the student sent. This is impolite, as the student is not acknowledging the time constraints that the professor might have, and is not asking for the professor to respond in a time convenient for that professor. Moreover, this e-mail did not include a “thank you” for the professor’s time, and this lack of acknowledgement was further seen as evidence of rudeness. The way that the message starts straightaway with the request, as opposed to acknowledging the burden on the professor or the time that the professor must put into the request, is another reason why this e-mail was seen as rude. The researcher also found a dearth of lexical modifiers. These lexical modifiers are crucial in downgrading the nature of the request, as to prevent the request from sounding coercive. The words “please” and “thank you” would be lexical modifiers, as would apologies and explanations for why certain requests are made. Other words which would soften the phrase would be “would you mind” and “if it’s not too much trouble.” Some of the e-mails even contained an upgrader, which only increases the coercive nature of the message – such an upgrader is exemplified in an e-mail that contains the message that the speaker desired the action “as soon as possible” (Economidou-Kogetsidis, 2011, p. 3207). Grounders were found by the researcher to be the most preferred student method of mitigating e-mail messages. Such grounders include reasons why the student needs to make the request, such as “I was sick on Thursday.” Economidou-Kogetsidis states that the students used grounders in anticipation that the faculty member would see the messages as being more polite, since the students explain why they needed the information or action. Although the term “Thank you in advance” can be seen to be polite, it may also be taken as impolite, according to Economidou-Kogetsidis, as it implies that the faculty member has no choice but to comply with the request. This phrase is an example of a pre-closing, and Economidou-Kogetsidis states that the pre-closing may or may not have the desired effect of making the requester sound polite. Economidou-Kogetsidis did state that grounders and pre-closings were used in most of the e-mails, even if greetings and closings were not. Economidou-Kogetsidis states that using grounding and pre-closings, without greetings and closings has the tendency to make the e-mails sound even more direct and even more like a command or an order. Therefore, such e-mails may be considered to be status incongruent. The greetings are used as a positive politeness strategy, one that is overlooked by the students in this study who tended to skip the small talk and get right into the heart of the matter. Alternative interpretations and implications for future research Economidou-Kogetsidis states that there are alternative interpretations for what was observed in these e-mails. One of the alternative interpretations is that what was observed was not just for non-native speakers, but for native speakers as well. She states that it is possible that the explanation for the directness of the students’ e-mails is not necessarily a function of culture, but, rather, a result of young people growing up in a world where brevity is imposed upon them in their e-mail communications to one another. According to her, the instant message culture values brevity and speed, so the students who were studied in this research may just be reacting to the overall zeitgeist of the young when it comes to electronic communication. To this end, Economidou-Kogetsidis states that further research is needed to ascertain if the directness is a part of the non-native speaker culture or just the overall culture of the young. Moreover, Economidou-Kogetsidis notes that a number of the e-mails were syntactically modified with a conditional clause. Such a conditional clause is, for example, “if you have it, is it possible to tell me my grade?” According to Economidou-Kogetsidis, this kind of syntactic modification was beyond the scope of the present study, but is worthy of future studies. She states that, although the vast majority of the e-mails were direct and did not have a greeting, the overall level of politeness might have been mitigated by the use of syntactic modifications, and this is another area that is worthy of study. Economidou-Kogetsidis also found that another alternative explanation was that the students simply did not know the proper mode of addressing their faculty members. Specifically, she states that a previous study on British English found that the students practiced avoidance strategies. These avoidance strategies might have caused the students to not know the proper mode of address for the faculty members. To this end, Economidou-Kogetsidis suggested that a further mode of study might use retrospective interviews with the students who composed the e-mails in this study, to find out why the composed the messages in the manner they did. Economidou-Kogetsidis also pointed out that some of the e-mails used a heading that is unacceptable in polite English, yet acceptable in Greek. That is the use of the title plus the first name (Dr. David). To this end, as these students are Greek and are living outside the L1 culture, the hypothesis is that these students are unaware that this particular mode of addressing faculty is considered to be impolite to English speakers. Another explanation for the students who used the improper “Mr./Mrs.” instead of “Dr.” is that there is not a Greek equivalent word for the word “Dr.” Therefore, as with the use of the title plus first name, this particular error might be because the students’ L1 language caused the miscommunication. This error might be the result of an improper translation from Greek. Economidou-Kogetsidis also stated that, according to the perception questionnaires, that the professors did not necessarily find the title plus first name to be offensive, and that they are respectful, due to the use of the word “Dr.” in the title. Because of this, Economidou-Kogetsidis states that title plus first name might not be the cause of pragmatic failures, although follow-up research is needed on this point as well. Conclusion Economidou-Kogetsidis’ study shows the need to train students in the right way to communicate with professors. In particular, if a student is in an L2 culture, therefore does not know the vagaries of the politeness of the particular culture, that student will most likely have problems with the composition of e-mails. Economidou-Kogetsidis states that it is important that students acknowledge that there is a power imbalance between themselves and their faculty members, and, as such, they need to be respectful in their requests. The best way to be respectful, according to this study, would be to use the title correctly, use the word “Dear” in their initial greeting to the professor, and to acknowledge that the professor is taking time to both read the e-mail and to respond to it accordingly. A professor no doubt received hundreds of e-mails to which he or she must respond, therefore even sending an e-mail is burdensome to the professor, and the student must acknowledge this. They also must be sure that their message does not sound like a command, demand or an order. To this end, students in general, but, especially, non-native speaking students, must be careful about how they compose their e-mails, and Economidou-Kogetsidis proposes that these students receive specific training just for this. Bibliography Chen, C. (2006) “The development of e-mail literacy,” Language Learning and Technology, vol. 10, no. 2, pp. 35-55. Cottrell, S. (2005) Critical Thinking Skills. New York: Palgrave MacMillan. Garnham, A. & Oakhill, J. (1994) Thinking and Reasoning. Cambridge: Basil Blackwell, Inc. Hardman, D. & Macchi, L. (2003) Thinking: Psychological perspectives on reasoning, judgment and decision making. West Sussex: John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Kolodner, J. & Riesbeck, C. (1986) Experience, Memory and Reasoning. London: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc. Oaksford, M. & Chater, N. (2010) Cognition and Conditioning. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Read More