A Dissertation by GRACE HUI-CHIN LIN Submitted to the Office of ...

proficiency English learners. Sung Ru perceived the abandonment strategy had a
wondrous function of keeping her from losing face. Sung Ru revealed that she was
allowed that she did not have to explain a challenging word, which might compel her
interlocutors to laugh at her because the word would be incredibly unproblematic for
them. Sung Ru said that she perceived her classmates and teacher might doubt why
she did not know how to say this simple word. Sung Ru worried that if she explained
what a difficult word was for her and an easy word for her discussion partners or her
teacher, she might be failed or graded as a lower-level student in her course. Hence,
Sung Ru appreciated the opportunity to learn the message abandonment strategy,
which saved her from losing face many times.
The third significant theme of the second research question was that the key
word could not be abandoned easily because it might make the whole communication
lose its focus. In the interviews, Jain Guo, Pei Pei, and Jiun Sheng all perceived in
the same way and argued that no matter which words were abandoned, the key words
had to be explained clearly by resorting to the other strategies.
As you can see in Figure 5.2., overall, themes emerged from the second
research question were mainly associated with the themes of “time-saving,”
“face-saving,” and “key word.” Besides, some students (Sung Ru, Cheng Chih, and
Jiun Sheng) were free when using the abandonment strategy because their doubts
were clear, and they would be able to continue to talk.
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