Abstract
This is a preliminary study aiming to develop and validate an elicited imitation test (EIT) to measure Japanese English language learners’ pragmatic routine knowledge (Pragmatic Routine Elicited Imitation Test: PREI Test). Over the past few decades, EIT has been widely used to measure second language learners’ implicit grammatical knowledge and oral proficiency. A lot of tests have been developed to measure learners’ knowledge and proficiency in the field of second language acquisition to date. There are, however, few EIT tests to measure pragmatic knowledge of L2 learners. In this study, two pragmatic linguistic knowledge tests: the PREI Test developed by the author of this study and the pragmalinguistic (pragmatic routine) knowledge test developed by Roever (2012) were conducted to 13 Japanese university students for the purpose of examining the reliability and validity of the PREI Test. The results of equivalent-forms reliability showed that there was a satisfactory correlation (rs = .69) between the two tests, and it was indicated that the PREI Test can be used as a measurement to assess learners’ knowledge of pragmatic routines. The results also revealed some limitations of the preliminary version of PREI Test, such as rating methods and the number of items in the PREI Test, which should be further investigated in the future.
