Study Program as the participants is it is assumed that the students do not have significant problem on their linguistic competence, which means the result of the
study will not be affected by the linguistic competence of the participants. So the result of the study can portray merely the sociolinguistic competence, in this case
the students’ pragmatic competence in implicature in English language
E. Objective of the Study
Since this present study focuses on the students’ pragmatic competence of implicature in Spoken English, therefore the main objective of this study is to find
out the pattern of the development of the students’ pragmatic competence of implicature in spoken English.
F. Benefits of the Study
For the theoretical benefit, the result of the study will show the pattern of the development of the students’ pragmatic competence in the notion of
implicature for the scientific report that can be used as a review in the second language acquisition. It is already stated above that the study in the students’
pragmatic competence in implicature rarely done on Indonesian students, the researcher believes that this present study can more or less give a review on this
case. In practical, the result of the study can be a meaningful input for the
schools, in particular the English Language Education Study Program of Sanata Dharma University, to evaluate the content of the syllabus whether it has covered
both the linguistic and sociolinguistic competence equally. If the result does not show any significant development of the students’ pragmatic competence in
implicature between the different semesters, it implicates that the content of the syllabus needs to add more attention on the sociolinguistic competence in such a
way that improves the students’ pragmatic competence from one semester level to the higher semester level.
G. Definition of Terms
This part will give brief definition of terms used and discussed in the present study. The terms are:
1. Development Development is a notion of good change Chambers, 2004: iii, 2-3. So,
development involves ‘change’ in a variety of aspects of the human condition. Development is also a process as Thomas 2004 refers to this meaning of
development as ‘a process of historical change’, which means that development can be a long term process of structural societal transformation or a short-to-
medium term outcome of desirable target. Papalia mentions that there are two
kinds of developmental change: quantitative and qualitative, “Quantitative change
is a change in number or amount, such as growth in height, weight,
vocabulary, …..or frequency of communication. Qualitative change is a change
in kind, structure, or organization,” Papalia, 2003: 9. In the present study, the term development will be more on a good change as a result of short-to-medium
term outcome of desirable target. The good change will be shown in a quantitative change which is a change in the statistical number.
2. Pragmatic competence Celce-Murcia and Olshtain 2000:20 propose pragmatic competence as “a
set of internalized rules of how to use language in socioculturally appropriate ways, taking into account the participants in a communicative interaction and
features of the context within which the interaction takes place”. Rod Ellis 2009 emphasizes the distinction between linguistic competence and pragmatic
competence as follow: “Pragmatic competence is normally distinguished from Linguistic competence. Both are seen as relating to ‘knowledge’ and are therefore
distinct from actual performance”. In short, pragmatic competence is more the knowledge of appropriate production and comprehension of language which is
performed in communication. The present study will see the pragmatic competence as the knowledge of appropriate production and comprehension of
language which is performed in communication. However, since the present study only uses a Multiple-choice Test, the pragmatic competence will be discussed is
more on the knowledge of appropriate comprehension of language in communication which is written in a Multiple-choice Test.
3. Implicature The word implicature was firstly introduced by Grice: “Implicature is the
conveyed meaning of the speaker” Grice, 1975: 43. Grice distinguishes between “what is said” and “what is meant”. Yule 1996: 35 states, “Implicature is an
additional conveyed meaning, that something must be more than just what the
