Pragmatic competence plays a key role in intercultural communication, particularly for students studying in a target community. This book investigates the effect of study abroad on second language learners’ productive and receptive pragmatic competences, as well as their cognitive processes during speech act production. It employs a variety of research instruments, both quantitative and qualitative, to explore learners’ pragmatic development over one year. The inclusion of a control group is a methodological strength of the longitudinal study, many such studies often not including a control group. In addition, the study longitudinally examines learners’ cognitive processes during study abroad with innovative and insightful analyses. The book makes an important contribution to second language pragmatics with regard to developmental changes in both speech act production and perception during such processes.

Wei Ren is Professor of Applied Linguistics and a Yunshan Young Scholar at the National Key Research Center for Linguistics and Applied Linguistics at Guangdong University of Foreign Studies, China. His research interests include Cross-Cultural and Interlanguage Pragmatics,Pragmatic variation, and English as a Lingua Franca Communication.