Ideal L2 Self, Ought-to L2 Self, and EFL Learners’ L2 Functional Use

Despite the well-established importance and effectiveness of pragmatic instruction in expediting ESL and EFL learners’ pragmatic development as frequently corroborated by many scholars, the cognitive and psychological dimensions of learners in pragmatic learning and the way those might impact their pragmatic learning has so far received insufficient attention.  Therefore, the present study has made every possible effort to delve into the possible impact of ideal L2 self, and ought-to L2 self on EFL Learners’ L2 functional use. Fifty-two Iranian English students took part in this research project. First, the two questionnaires (i.e. ideal L2 self and ought-to L2 self) adopted from Dörnyei and Taguchi (2010) were distributed among the participants. Moreover, the participants went through a six-week instructional period and received pragmatic instruction at the end of their regular class hour for thirty minutes. Finally, all the participants were required to complete two discourse completion tests containing eight scenarios borrowed from both Schauer’s (2009), and Jalilifar’s (2009) as pretest and posttest. This would enable the researchers to assess the participants’ pre- and post-instructional pragmatic knowledge. Descriptive statistics and independent samples t-tests were run to analyze the data. The findings indicate that high ideal L2 self group significantly outperformed the high ought-to L2 self group with regard to their pragmatic performances on discourse completion tests. The study further implies that factors such as the individuals’ ideal L2 self can be regarded as determining and pivotal when it comes to the amount of learning that takes place in learners with either high ideal L2 self or those with high ought-to L2 self.