Compliment Responses: A Comparative Study of Native English Speakers and Iranian L2 Speakers

Abstract

Responding to compliments is intellectually demanding on the part of the receiver since a balance should be made in order for not rejecting the addressor's compliment and not praising one's self. In this study an attempt has been made to shed light on compliment responses produced by Iranian EFL speakers as well as by the native speakers of American English in oral communicative contexts through naturalistic role-play tasks and retrospective interviews. The results revealed that the L2 participants differed from native speakers in different aspects. In addition to the shortage of cultural background, the lack of knowledge on linguistic forms could be regarded as the factors impacting the way the participants responded to compliments.