The effect of instruction on the acquisition of Japanese discourse marker ndesu
type: CreativeWork
description: The present study investigated the effects of explicit pragmatic instruction on the acquisition of the Japanese discourse marker ndesu by second language (L2) learners enrolled in third- and fourth-year Japanese courses at the university level. The research was based on a quasi-experimental, pretest-posttest, and delayed posttest design using an experimental group (pragmatically-oriented) and a control group (textbook-based). The present study was specifically designed to examine the effect of a pragmatically-oriented intervention introducing a unified concept of ndesu in which the pragmatic aspect was emphasized (e.g., specific context, speaker’s intention) by comparing it to a textbook-based approach offering several representative functions of ndesu with no mention of how each function is related to each other. The study aimed not only to determine how much the pedagogical intervention facilitated learners’ ability to apply the unified concept of ndesu to the functions they had learned, but also to access their ability to understand the functions not yet introduced. Furthermore, this study explored whether certain critical demographic factors (e.g., course level, duration of stay in Japan, hours of exposure to Japanese culture, and contact hours with native speakers) affected students’ knowledge of ndesu. To investigate the effect and applicability of a pedagogical intervention of ndesu, and the relationship between various factors and knowledge relating to ndesu, two groups were compared to examine the effect of the pedagogical intervention providing a unified concept of ndesu. The pragmatically-oriented group received instruction providing a unified concept of ndesu, whereas the textbook-based group was instructed by following the textbook Nakama (Hatasa, Hatasa, & Makino, 2009) that provided an explanation of each ndesu function. The results showed that both groups had a positive, immediate effect for learning ndesu, that is, explicit ndesu instruction was eff…
abstract: The present study investigated the effects of explicit pragmatic instruction on the acquisition of the Japanese discourse marker ndesu by second language (L2) learners enrolled in third- and fourth-year Japanese courses at the university level. The research was based on a quasi-experimental, pretest-posttest, and delayed posttest design using an experimental group (pragmatically-oriented) and a control group (textbook-based). The present study was specifically designed to examine the effect of a pragmatically-oriented intervention introducing a unified concept of ndesu in which the pragmatic aspect was emphasized (e.g., specific context, speaker’s intention) by comparing it to a textbook-based approach offering several representative functions of ndesu with no mention of how each function is related to each other. The study aimed not only to determine how much the pedagogical intervention facilitated learners’ ability to apply the unified concept of ndesu to the functions they had learned, but also to access their ability to understand the functions not yet introduced. Furthermore, this study explored whether certain critical demographic factors (e.g., course level, duration of stay in Japan, hours of exposure to Japanese culture, and contact hours with native speakers) affected students’ knowledge of ndesu. To investigate the effect and applicability of a pedagogical intervention of ndesu, and the relationship between various factors and knowledge relating to ndesu, two groups were compared to examine the effect of the pedagogical intervention providing a unified concept of ndesu. The pragmatically-oriented group received instruction providing a unified concept of ndesu, whereas the textbook-based group was instructed by following the textbook Nakama (Hatasa, Hatasa, & Makino, 2009) that provided an explanation of each ndesu function. The results showed that both groups had a positive, immediate effect for learning ndesu, that is, explicit ndesu instruction was eff…
author: Kim, Jung Sun
language: en
keywords: pragmatically-oriented approach, Japanese pedagogy, Japanese discourse marker, ndesu, noda
date published: 2017-03-01T15:49:09Z
date modified: 2026-07-22T22:26:37Z
provider: University of Illinois - Urbana-Champaign
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

PropertyValue
property ID: Handle
value: http://hdl.handle.net/2142/95349