Communicative Strategies in Swedish Upper-Secondary: Study of English L2 Learners, Study notes of English Philology

Download Communicative Strategies in Swedish Upper-Secondary: Study of English L2 Learners and more Study notes English Philology in PDF only on Docsity! 1 A study of communicative strategies in upper- secondary school Nina Begovic 2011 Uppsats, kandidatnivå, 15 hp Engelska med ämnesdidaktisk inriktning Engelska C Lärarprogrammet Handledare: Dr. Tore Nilsson Examinator: Dr. Alan Shima 2 Abstract The present study investigates communicative strategies used by a group of four upper-secondary L2 learners of English. To be able to reach this goal, I have recorded and transcribed a conversation between these students in order to detect natural communication. The communicative strategies I have looked for were: pauses and hesitations, questions, code-switching and message abandonment. Previous research on communicative strategies is divided into two different fields. These two approaches define and classify communication strategies as either interactional or psycholinguistic. The definition and classification of communicate strategies depends viz. on what kind of approach is used. Keywords: Communicative strategies, code-switching, message abandonment, pause hesitation, questions, compensatory strategies, L1, L2, inter-language, target language, taxonomy 5 The aim of this essay is to identify and investigate the use of specific communicative strategies used by four upper secondary Swedish L2 learners of English in interaction with other students in order to keep the conversation going. 1.2 The interactional approach The first study on the use of CSs was made by Tomas Váradi (1973), who raised the question of empirical work in CS research and claimed that learners needed to be put into interaction with native speakers in order for researchers to detect the effect of CSs (Færch & Kasper 1983:94). Tarone (1977), among others, has adopted the interactional approach and defines CSs as an attempt of two speakers to come to an understanding in a situation where the they do not share the necessary meaning (Ellis 1994:396 ).“mutual attempts of two interlocutors to agree on a meaning in situations where requisite meaning structures do not seem to be shared” (Tarone, 1980:420 in Cook 1988:120). In this approach learners are mutually trying to keep the conversation going, and this is sometimes called a co-operative strategy. The interactional approach acknowledges both reduction strategies and achievement strategies, which is typically shown in the taxonomy favored by these researchers. When things go wrong in the conversation, both participants try to come up with an appropriate CS to get out of the difficulty. Tarone (1980) claims that CSs involves both speaker and listener, and when these two participants stumble upon a problem in understanding each other they fall back on three main types of CSs: avoidance, paraphrase and transfer. Avoidance deals with the notion of not wanting to talk about things you know are difficult to express in a second language situation, which can be either whole topics or individual words. Paraphrase is used by the learners to compensate for a target language word that is not known, and transfer occurs when learners fall back on their first language. Appeal for assistance and mime are also mentioned as CSs by Tarone, appeal for assistance occurs when learners ask for help, for example by asking ‘What is this?’ and mime occurs in situations where learners use other explanations than verbal, for example by miming ‘blowing out candles’ when singing ‘Happy birthday’. However these strategies will not be consulted in this study. Below is a list of Tarone’s taxonomy (1977) consulted from Cook (1988:120) with modifications. Avoidance is divided into: Topic avoidance: Not saying what he or she originally had in mind. Message abandonment: Giving up speaking in mid-stream. Paraphrase is divided into: Paraphrase strategies rely on the speaker to solve the problem through the second language, whereas transfer strategies rely on the knowledge of the first language. Approximation: This happens when a learner is searching for a word he or she does not know, and falls back on using a word that has a close meaning with the intended word, such as ‘animal’ for ‘horse’. Word coinage: Another form of paraphrase that is used to make up a word to substitute for the word that is not known, such as ‘airball’ for ‘balloon’. Circumlocution: When L2 learners talk round the word ‘when you make a container’ for ‘pottery’. 6 Transfer is divided into: Literal translation: This occurs when learners use a word-for-word translation from a language other than the L2. An example of this is when a speaker of Swedish ‘bus stop place’ for the Swedish word ‘busshållsplats’ (Palmberg 1979:59). Language switch: In the case of language switch (frequently called code-switching today) speakers can use a native word of expression, un-translated into the IL utterance. For example a Swedish L2 learner of English can say ‘in the mitten’ for ‘in the middle’ (Palmberg 1979:59). Aston (1993) is also a researcher that is concerned with understanding what happens between the speakers. He focuses on conversational situations in which speakers create support, meaning ‘shared attitudes to an experience which the participants have in common, typically expressed through routines of agreement’ and solidarity, meaning ‘shared attitudes to an experience that is specific to only one participant, which is communicated through routines of affiliation, compliments and apologies ’(Aston 1993:232). He uses the term comity strategies, which speakers use when sharing feeling and attitudes, rather than knowledge and ideas. A study by Bialystok (1990), similar to Tarone’s (1977) about social strategies, showed the distribution of CSs used by young girls. She collected 324 utterances from 18 nine-year-old English speaking girls learning French. The subjects were instructed to identify geometrical shapes described by another. Poulisse’s (1990:77) study showed that the frequency of avoidance strategy was indeed surprisingly low, with only 4 per cent compared to 92 per cent for paraphrase. The most frequent type of paraphrase used was circumlocution, occurring as much as 80 per cent. Cook (2008:107) suggests that CSs are important for the teacher who wants to teach some sort of social skills to the students, and if students are to become successful in communicating with other people in their L2 they need to practice and learn ways of dealing with conversations where they can encounter problems in understanding. However, Rampton (1997:281) argues that social interaction is not relevant when it comes to CSs, and that CSs in the L2 are the same as in the L1, and therefore should not be a part of any language teaching curriculum. 1.3 The Psycholinguistic approach The properties of the psycholinguistic approach deal with the cognitive processes that are occurring within the learner, and hold the belief that learners are either aware or not aware of the fact that they have a plan when it comes to solving a problem in order to make themselves understood. The work of Færch and Kasper (1983:34) presents a model of two different phases for speech production: a planning phase and an execution phase. The aim of these phases is to help the learners to develop speech which can be executed and allow the speaker to reach his communicative goal (Ellis 1994:398). CSs are seen as a part of this planning and therefore the goals that are mentioned are related to the activity of communication (Færch and Kasper 1983:24). When learners are confronted with a problem in communication they can either choose to apply an avoidance strategy, which means that the learners can change their original communicative goal using a reduction strategy or they can apply an achievement strategy and try to go through with their original goal and create some sort of an achievement strategy. Færch and Kasper (1983) argue that the choices of strategies learners use are not only based on the type of strategy they apply, they also depend on the kind of problem they are facing (Færch & Kasper 1983:37). 7 Reduction strategies are further divided into formal and functional: Formal reduction strategies dealing with avoidance of particular L2 linguistic forms whether in pronunciation, in syntax or in morphemes, and functional reduction strategy dealing with avoidance of specific types of function such as speech acts, topics and some modality markers (Ellis 1994:398). When learners use achievement strategies they attempt to solve communication problems by expanding their communicative resources (Coder 1983:16) instead of using reduction in order to avoid the intended communicative goal. Achievement strategies are further divided into cooperative strategies and non- cooperative strategies. Below is an explanation of the achievement strategies used in Færch and Kasper (1984) adapted from Cook (2008:108). Code-switching: When learners rely on another language than the target language – ‘Do you want to have some ah Zinzen?’ (The German word for ‘interest’). Foreignerization: Using an L1 expression in the L2 with minimal adaptation. For example: when a Swede uses the word ‘green things’ for ‘vegetables’. Also called direct translation. Substitution: Speaker substitutes one word for another, saying ‘if’ for ‘whether’ if the cannot remember whether ‘whether’ has an ‘h’. Generalization: L2 speakers use a more general word rather than a more particular one, such as ‘animal’ for ‘rabbit’ that is, shifting up from the basic level of vocabulary to the superordinate. Description: Speakers cannot remember the word for ‘kettle’ and so describe it as ‘the thing to cook water in’. Exemplification: Speakers give an example rather than the general term, such as ‘cars’ for ‘transport’, that is, shift down a level. Word coining: That is, making up a word when a speaker does not know it, such as inventing an imaginary French word ‘heurot’ for ‘watch’. Restructuring: The speaker has another attempt at the same sentence, as in a learner struggling to find the rare English word ‘sibling’: ‘I have two- er- one sister and one brother’. Avoidance strategies are divided into Formal reduction strategies and Functional reduction strategies. When the learner avoids a linguistic form or has difficulty with one of the three linguistic levels phonology, morphology and grammar, a formal reduction strategy is applied, which means that the learner can use his or her IL system to reach the communicative goal. If the learner encounters problems in the planning phase or in the execution phase they can adopt a functional reduction strategy and reduce his communicative goal in order to avoid the problem (Færch and Kasper 1983:43). 2. Previous research As mentioned before, there has been extensive research on CSs but researchers have not been able to establish a universal definition of CSs. Most of the studies focus on defining CSs, and developing taxonomies that could be used to classify them. Research has mainly focused on lexical problems such as insufficient vocabulary and fluency rather than other levels of language; therefore we know little about the strategies learners apply to overcome grammatical problems in interaction with others. 10 word using proper endings, such as ‘ironise’ for ‘ironing’. The second subcategory of the linguistic archistrategy is L1 transfer, which is the same as code-switching, meaning that learners use knowledge from their L1 in their L2. It can be argued that the disadvantage of using the psycholinguistic approach is that we can never know what is going on inside a learner in spontaneous situations. 2.2 Communication strategies It is possible to see a number of strategies at work, and although this list of strategies is not intended to be a full list of all existing CSs, it is intended to clarify the meaning of strategies used by the students in my study. These strategies can be viewed as an attempt by the learners to get their meanings across, keep the conversation going and in some situations when there is lack in the target language. The taxonomy presented by Tarone (Tarone in Færch and Kasper 1983:62) with a few modifications will be consulted for this essay. 2.2.1 Pauses and hesitations In situations where the students do not know how to proceed in the conversation while speaking, they can use pauses and hesitations in order to get their meaning across. Pauses and hesitations are good tools for speakers to plan what they want to say next, and how to do so. Færch and Kasper (1983:214), who are among the psycholingustically oriented researchers, claim that certain performance features such as pauses and hesitations can be used as evidence of how planning and execution take place. Færch and Kasper (1983) distinguish between four different types of pausing: articulatory pauses which may be because of stop consonants, pauses for breathing, conventional pauses, which are necessary for interpreting an utterance, and last hesitation pauses. Hesitation pauses are the only pauses which indicate underlying speech planning. A distinction is often made between unfilled (silent) pauses and filled pauses involving non-lexical activity such as er, erm, oh or turn-based starters such as well, I mean, you know, I don’t know. Pauses and hesitations are not strategies used by Tarone, however her definition of Appeal for assistance has some similarities with unfilled pauses, since using the phrases ‘you know what I mean’, ‘you know what I’m trying to say is’ is an indicator for the speaker to use his listeners for help to get his meaning across. However it is not always the case that a speaker uses pauses and hesitations with the intention of signaling for help. 2.2.2 Questions Asking questions is a natural part of our conversations with other people. It is a way for us to start a conversation, keep it interesting and sometimes to change the topic. Asking questions signals that we want to retrieve some kind of information and by using this interrogative structure we preform what is called a direct speech act (Yule 2010:134). Using questions is a good way for us to link our conversations together and keep them. 2.2.3 Code-switching Code-switching occurs when a speaker knows more than one language that is why the study of code-switching can be seen as a part of the study on bilingualism (Romaine 1989). Code switching is certainly a CS, but it is also the case that code-switching is a category of its own, outside the study of communicative strategies. Code-switching is 11 then used as a specific L2 feature used by bilingual learners. Investigators of code- switching have focused on identifying in what kind of situations L1 influences the L2. “It occurs when a speaker changes from one variety or language to another variety or language in accordance with situational o purely personal factors” (Ellis 1994:696). According to Milroy and Muysken (1995:7) code-switching can occur between different turns in the conversation, and sometimes between utterances within a single turn, or with a single utterance. Situational factors that can influence learners to code-switch are depending on what kind of topic is used, how well the participants know each other and what kind of setting is used. Code-switching can be used by the speakers to fill linguistic gaps, express ethnicity, and to achieve some specific discourse aims. According to Gardner (2009:98) code-switching belongs primarily to the study of sociolinguistics, which can be used as an approach to detect code-switching. It can be argued that only through a sociolinguistic perspective can we observe language and language use in relation to the speaker’s social identity. When a speaker starts a sentence in one language and ends the sentence in another without mixing the languages is sometimes called classic code-switching, or alternational code-switching (Muysken 2000). Muysken (2000:96) says that alteration is a very common strategy used when code-switching. In addition to alternation Muysken (2000) employs that there are two other distinct types of code-switching, viz. insertion and congruent lexicalization. Insertion is what happens when speakers chose to involve a word or a phrase, in the L2 structure. As shown in example (1). (1) Persian – Swedish xob pas falsk-an pesa-aˆ well then false-cop3pl boy-pl “Well then boys are false.” (Naseh Lotfabbadi 2002:101, cited in Bullock & Toribio 2009:3) Another commonly used way of insertional code-switching is called tag-switching and this phenomenon is used primarily as a pragmatic effect, when tags and interjections from the L1 are mixed into the target language (Bullock & Toribio 2009:4). Example shown in (2) (2) English – Swedish If you look at your log OXXXX XXXXXXXX likes blabla och så ba. ‘and I was like’ (Example from this study - 2011 11/4) Congruent lexicalization occurs when two languages share some parts of a grammatical structure which can lead speakers to share lexical elements in either language. The definitions of code-switching used by Muysken (2000) differs from those proposed in Tarones (1977) taxonomy on code-switching in the sense that Tarone’s research is primarily based on CSs, where switching is seen as a part of CSs available for learners in interaction with each other, whereas as in Muysken (2000) code-switching is referred to situations where all cases of lexical features and grammatical items from two languages appear in one sentence. 12 2.2.4 Message abandonment In Tarone’s (1977) taxonomy, message abandonment is a subcategory of avoidance. There are two types of avoidance strategies, the first, topic avoidance which occurs when learners avoid talking about certain topics because the target language structure such as vocabulary is not known (Bialystok 1990:80). The second avoidance strategy, message abandonment, which is said to occur when a learner begins to talk about something, but is unable to continue and stops in mid-utterance and therefore begins a new sentence or chooses not to begin a new sentence at all. Færch and Kasper (1983) share another view on message abandonment, which is based on the idea that learners who use message abandonment as a CS do not abandon anything at all, what they do is they start over in order to get the meaning across (Færch and Kasper 1983:41). Færch and Kasper (1983) do not use the term message abandonment in their classification of Avoidance; however they divide avoidance into two different reduction strategies instead. They claim that the reason for learners to use formal reduction strategies is because they want to avoid making errors or because they want to increase their own fluency by applying this strategy. 3. Method The reason why I chose to study spoken language in order to detect CSs was based in the idea that studying speech helps us to get closer to real communication, based on the assumption that speech is more spontaneous than writing. In this study I have tape- recorded a conversation of four upper secondary students. These students attend their first year at upper secondary school, and are at an intermediate level of English; however, what needs to be kept in mind is that the students were not at the same proficiency level. The students were given a topic to talk about and the topic was Facebook. The reason I chose Facebook as a topic was in order to keep the conversation as natural and genuine as possible. Facebook is something the students are well acquainted with, and Facebook plays a huge part in their way of communicating and interacting online. All of the students that were in my study had a Facebook account and were familiar with the features of Facebook, which made them comfortable enough to speak about it, while being recorded. I was in the same room as the students, however I did not take active part in their conversation. I told the students that I was going to listen to them communicate with each other, but I did not tell them that I was listening for CSs. The group consisted of students in the ages of 16 to 18. The parents of the students that were under-aged signed a form of consent (see Appendix 2). The conversation recorded was 12 minutes. I transcribed the recording and looked for situations where the students used communicative strategies to help each other and to keep the conversations going. There are a total of 237 utterances in the transcription, and I have given each utterance a number, followed by a letter in order to separate the subjects from each other. 4. Result and discussion The result below is based on a conversation between four upper-secondary school students, recording was made on 11/4-2011 with the purpose of finding out how the subjects solve communicative problems, help each other and keep the conversation going. The result is followed by a discussion of the findings. 15 both in speaking and in writing, mostly on the internet. The expression comes from a Swedish television program for children called Hipp Hipp 4 . ‘O’ uses ‘snäll häst’ as a tag, there is no specific or particular meaning to the utterance, except that it is only used as an expression. The reason ‘O’ uses ‘snäll häst’ in utterance (48) is most likely because there is no linguistic equivalent to this in English, and if ‘O’ was to say this in English it would not have the same meaning. Utterance (202) has the same function as utterance (48) ‘och så bah’ is a Swedish expression resembling ‘and I was like’ in English. Both utterance (48) and (202) are examples of tag-switching. In utterance (230), ‘T’ starts the sentence with a single Swedish word, ‘där’ which means ‘there’ in English. ‘T’ corrects herself quickly, after pronouncing ‘där’ and continues the sentence in English. Examples of code-switching in whole sentences: 224.J: So I think we are done here [Laughter] 225.J: Tror inte du ska röra den där då måste vi göra om allt 226.T: Så, bah nu rör vi allt 227.O: Should we pause it or something 228.T: Yeah 229.J: Den lyser [Laughter] 230.T: Där, there right. Or there, perhaps [Pause] 231.M: Everything is gone 232.T: Så! 233.T: No! 234.O: No! 235.O: Still ticking still ticking 237.T: Still ticking These are the last 12 utterances in the recording and the conversation in this part of the recording is about turning off the recording device. We can observe how the students throughout this part of the conversation switch back and forth from the target language to their L1 while trying to figure out how to turn off the recording device without deleting the whole recording. In utterance (224) ‘J’ is starting by speaking in his L2 and claiming that he thinks they are done with the recording, whereby he code-switches and starts the new utterance (225) in Swedish, as if he is no longer being recorded. Following the conversation, we can observe how ‘T’ applies switching naturally without disturbing the fluency. If ‘T’ is aware, or not aware of what she is doing is not easy to tell, however one can claim that the code-switching used during the end of the recording was simply because the students felt comfortable enough to switch to Swedish and stepping out of the ‘world of being recorded’. 4 <http://svt.se/2.145320/hipp_hipp> [Accessed on 27 may 2011] 16 4.4 Message Abandonment The avoidance strategy presented in this study indicates that the students prefer to use message abandonment rather than topic avoidance. Message abandonment is shown in those utterances where the students begin speaking but end their utterance half way without any further explanation. In utterance (46), ‘O’ is trying to explain something he usually writes on Facebook, but ‘O’ never gets to the point of explaining what he actually is writing. A reason for this can be that ‘O’ usually writes in Swedish on his Facebook, therefore the explanation in English would not have been the same. 46.O: Well I write something on Facebook its.. 47.M: You do it on others Facebook [Laughter] 47.O: Yeah face rape! ‘O’ leaves the intended meaning, which is followed by utterance (47) where ‘M’ says that ‘O’ writes on others Facebook, whereby in utterance (47) ‘O’ has left his previous utterance unanswered, and replies on ‘M’ statement. There is a similar situation in utterance (58) as in utterance (46). ‘O’ is trying to explain the reason for being on Facebook during class, and stops before he finishes his sentence, then in utterance (59) ‘M’ jumps in and guesses what ‘O’ was trying to say, ‘M’ is doing this because of their mutual knowledge about Facebook. In utterance (60), ‘O’ continues where he left off, agreeing with what ‘M’ says and finishes off by saying that when something is boring during a lesson there is no reason for listening so you might as well log onto Facebook. 58.O: Perhaps but often when you’re logged into Facebook your class then you 59.M: You have nothing to do 60.O: Exact it’s something that is you know [Pause] so boring that you can’t even hear it anyway you know In utterances (78) and (95), ‘T’ ends both of these utterances with ‘like’, as if she is about to explain something but does not actually do it. In utterance (78), ‘T’ says that it is not important having a relationship showing on Facebook, and then she tries to compare that with something by ending the sentence with ‘it’s not like’, but she never finishes. 78.T: No, but I don’t think it’s important it’s not like.. A similar situation can be seen in utterances (95-98), where we have two utterances with message abandonment (95 and 96), both ending in ‘like’, without any further explanation or information added. The mutual knowledge they share allows them to understand each other without having to give any further explanation. Even if ‘M’ only says ‘and then people take it like’, ‘T’ understands what she is trying to say is that people can take it the wrong way if you don’t want to show your relationship status on Facebook. 95.T: Cause you write something you don’t really mean it’s like 96.O: [??] 97.M: And then people take it like 17 98.T: Yeah In utterance (200), ‘O’ uses message abandonment and ends the sentence in mid- utterance, however in this case ‘O’ comes back to his message and finishes after ‘T’s utterance in (201). This could support the idea from Færch and Kasper (1983), that avoidance does not have to be interpreted as only abandonment; it could also be seen as a way for speakers to simply change their communicative goal in order to get the meaning across. 200.O: So you know ‘oh my god you have to see this”! Klick and then if you look at your.. 201.T: And? 202.O: If you look at your log <Oxxxx xxxxx> likes blabla och så bah. In utterance (211) ‘J’ asks the others how they think they are perceived on Facebook, whereby ‘T’ in utterance (212) does not understand the word ‘perceived’ and that is when ‘O’ in utterance (213) tries to describe the word to ‘T’. ‘O’ starts the sentence with ‘yeah Facebook’ and then leaves that trail of thought and start over again by explaining what ‘perceived means’. Here we have another case of not just abandoning but rethinking an utterance instead. 211.J: How do you think you are perceived on Facebook? [Pronounced several times] 212.T: Perceived? 213.O: Yeah Facebook . . .to what people think of you on Facebook I think. 20 Váradi, T. (1983), Strategies of target language learner communication. Oxford: Blackwell. Wardhaugh, R. (2006). An introduction to Sociolinguistics. (Fourth ed.), Oxford: Blackwell. Yule, G. 2010. The Study of Language, (fourth ed.), Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 21 APPENDIX 1 - Transcription Code-Switching Questions Message abandonment Pauses/Hesitation 1.J: Do you guys use Facebook? 2.T, M: Yes 3.O: Yes I do 4.T: Yeah, why do you use it? 5.J: I don’t 6.[Laughter] 7.J: Right, some friends talked me into getting.. 8.T: Aha okay 9.O: So, how often are you logged in to the Facebook? 10.J: Once every two week [Laughter] 11.O: Okay, that’s alright, and you two? 12.T: Er [Pause ] what I use Facebook? Why? 13.O: How often 14.T: How, how often? Er I don’t know 15.M: Always when you are boring 16.T: Yeah, always yeah, cause I’m logged In on my phone so it would “pling” when something’s happening [Laughter] 17.T: Yeah so always. You? 18.M: Er sometimes, when I have boring 19.T: Yeah 20.M: Most of the time when you are home 21.T: Yeah and in school you too 22.M: And you think OH 23.M: It can’t have happened something on Facebook 24.T: Yeah and you see 25.M: Oh 26.T: And you’re like refreshing 22 [Laughter] 27.M: Yeah 28.T: Yeah [Pause] 29.J: Do you share private information on Facebook? 30.T: Yeah, I do, oh no maybe not 31.J: Like what? 32.M: Not so much 33.T: No, no not so much but 34.M: But 35.O: More like [??] 36.T: Maybe like relationships and such 37.M: But not like 38.T: I do 39.M: Some people do like er I gonna go to the store now and do dinner after that 40.T: No, no, not 41.M: I don’t 42.M: Write what they’ve done 43.T: I don’t write anything so 44.M: Not me either I just look [Laughter] 45.M: What other people do 46.O: Well I write something on Facebook its 47.M: You do it on others Facebook [Laughter] 47.O: Yeah face rape! [Laughter] 48.O: And you know when I’m really bored you know then it’s can be like [??] snäll häst that pops up so 49.T: Yeah but not on your own Facebook? 50.O: No, no it’s much more doing it on others Facebook. See all the comment and reactions on [??] 51.J: How much time do you spend on Facebook? We already answered that 52.T: Yeah 53.O: Sort of 25 109.T: Yeah 110.O: Indeed 111.T: Indeed 112.O: Yes indeed 113.T: You’re proud of it 114.O: Indeed 115.O: Yeah well for an example I have deny my sister 116.M: No! 117.T: Why? 118.O: Because I don’t want her to find out everything I’m doing on Facebook and what’s going on and so on 119.T: But you do with your mother Facebook so she don’t know 120.T: So you want some privacy? 121.O: Yeah 122.T: That she doesn’t know about [Pause] 123.O: Yes. Yes she can be 124.M: Mean 125.O: Mean yeah 126.M: Say it to parents 127.O: Pain in the ass 128.O: Yeah they know 129.T: But I hate when random people send requests 130.M: Yeah 131.T: But I just deny it when 132.M: You get angry after them because you don’t know them and then them don’t know you and 133.T: Yeah 134.M: Hello 135.T: And sometimes it’s like people at school that you have seen 136.M: Yeah but you never see say hello to you 137.T: No never and you don’t even know their friends or anything 138.M: And they just “Do you wanna be friends with me”? 139.O: Yeah 26 140.T: So you don’t really want to deny it but still you don’t want to be invited their friend on Facebook 141.M: You can mean when you 142.T: Why why should you? 143.T: But so if you deny it they could think that 144.O: Why do you deny me? 145.M: Bitch 146.O: Yeah but I got eh a friends neighbor [Pause] he trying to be my friend on Facebook but thou he’s about ten 147.M: No! 148.O: You know so I just no, no 149.M: No that’s horrible 150.O: That’s you know I don’t actually press the button deny [??] 151.T: No 152.O: Just so they won’t get sad 153.T: So you still have it there 154.O: Yeah 155.T: Yeah but it’s if you deny it it’s the same as if you just ignore clicking 156.M: I have friend with my mother’s cousin’s child on Facebook and always when he is with his friends he is write to me “hi beauty what are you doing”? And just ‘OH GO AWAY ‘! 157.O: Go away go away 158.M: Get off me 159.O: Yeah oh well interesting thing I [Pause] all my friends on Facebook its always them who send me the friends request. I have never send a friend request to anyone because it’s you know Im thinking [Pause]if it is some people who that I don’t know that really well then you know thinking maybe then they hmm think well what a fucking pain in the ass this guy so I don’t actually 160.M: You send one to me 161.O: Did I? 162.M: Dah, yeah 163.J: Uuuuuuh 164.T: Uuuuh [??] 165.O: Uuh 166.M: Uuuh 27 167.O: Uuh [Laughter] 168.O: Good English [Laughter] [Pause] 169.M: Little liar [Laughter] 170.J: Have you ever posted something you have regretted later? [Pause] 180.T: I don’t know 181.O: Er maybe 182.T: Probably maybe sometimes 183.M: But you have forget it 184.O: Er perhaps commentary or something like that [Pause] but I don’t think I ever posted something wrong 185.T: Oh once there was like a girl who had a boyfriend for like a year or something and she broke up or they broke up and she was really sad and everyone was commenting like horrors and everything 186.M: No! 187.T: I accidently pushed like, and I was like NOOOOO! [Laughter] 188.O: DISLIKE DISLIKE! 189.T: So I had to, cause if I dislike it she would still get notice 190.O: Yeah So 191.T: And I wrote comment like 192.O: TXXX likes, TXXX dislikes 193.T: I wrote her a message 194.J: Yeah 195.M: No 196.O: Well that’s kind of sucks too [Pause]when often when there are people who are posting you know like links and as quick as you press the link to see what it is you suddenly like it on Facebook you know it does it that automatically 197.M: That you say think 198.T: Does it? 199.O: Yeah