Abstract
The purpose of this study is to find out the preferred semantic formulas and the preferred sequences of them in refusal of suggestions corresponding to variations of Power and Cause by Japanese and Chinese EFL learners. For data collection, 37 Japanese and 36 Chinese college-level EFL learners and 22 native speakers of English completed a questionnaire with Discourse Completion Test. It was found that firstly, most participants of the 3 groups tended to utilize the provided external causes, rather than the internal ones for refusal. Secondly, the Japanese revealed a need for more semantic formulas for refusal. Thirdly, the use of the semantic formula Positive Evaluation or Agreement was affected by factors of Power and Cause. Finally, the sequence of semantic formulas Cause and Disagreement shared by the most Japanese and Chinese EFL learners was the reversed pattern preferred by the most native speakers of English.
