SPEECH ACTS AND QUESTIONNAIRES - THE EFFECT OF HEARER RESPONSE

Although speech acts are of central importance in the study of languag e use, little empirical work has been done which examines speech acts across cultures. A notable exception to this is the Cross Cultural Spe ech Act Realization Project (CCSARP). The CCSARP methodology raises is sues which should be addressed to further develop speech act research. One of these issues is the construction of questionnaires, or discour se-completion tests (DCTs). This paper reports the results of a study in which two forms of a DCT were administered to native speakers of Am erican English. One form included hearer response (HR DCT), while the other form did not (NoHR DCT). The two forms were identical in all oth er respects. The results showed that although responses on the NoHR DC T tended to be slightly longer and use slightly more supportive moves and downgraders, inclusion of hearer response did not have a significa nt effect on requests elicited.