2. Overview
Impact & Motivation
Studies
Implications
Suggestions for Future Research
Q&A
2
3. Impact & Motivation
Successful requests save face.
Successful requests help reach your goal.
Emails are widely used.
Knowledge about requests helps make
better requests.
Knowledge about requests helps teach how
to construct requests.
3
4. 4
Study Data Sender Recipient Rater
Biesenbach-
Lucas (2005)
authentic 382 NSs &
151 NNSs
female faculty
member
researcher
Iimuro
(2006)
authentic 4 NNSs professor researcher
Stephens,
et al. (2009)
elicited 1 NSs -> 4
modified
emails
faculty
member
152 NS
instructors;
183 NS students
Hendriks
(2010)
elicited NNSs employer 110 NSs;
158 NSs
Knupsky,
Nagy-Bell
(2011)
elicited 66 NSs peers and
professors
2 NSs
Merrison, et
al. (2012)
authentic 190 NSs female faculty
member
researchers
5. Implications: Status
Consider difference in status when you
make email requests (Hendriks, 2010;
Knupsky & Nagy-Bell, 2011)
e.g., student to student vs. student to
professor
5
6. Implications: Imposition
Consider how imposing your request is
(Biesenbach-Lucas, 2010)
e.g., requesting an appointment during
office hours vs. requesting feedback vs.
requesting an extension
6
7. Ways to Make Your Request
More Polite
Use proper grammar and punctuation
(Stephens et al., 2009)
No text language (Stephens et al., 2009)
e.g., R U free?
Regardless of age
Use embedded constructions
I was wondering if (e.g., Hendriks, 2010;
Biesenbach-Lucas, 2007)
7
8. Language That May Not
Affect Politeness
Using Could may not be more polite than
using Can (Hendriks, 2010)
Insertion of Please may not make your
request more polite (Biesenbach-Lucas,
2007)
Insertion of Possibly may not make your
request more polite (Hendriks, 2010)
8
9. Implications: Culture
Consider in which culture your students
will be using English
Reasons (e.g., employment, health)
Greetings (e.g., Hi, Dear Dr. X)
Hedging (e.g., just, might)
(Merrison et al., 2012)
9
10. Structure
Subject line
Term of address used
to refer to teacher
Self-identification
Account
Request
Sign off
(Based on
Iimuro, 2006;
Merrison et al., 2012)
10
11. Suggestions for
Future Research
Examining the difference in perception of
email requests between professors from
different disciplines
Comparing of constructions and judgments
of email requests in different cultures
11
12. Thank you!
Q&A
or email us with your requests:
Abigail Reynolds – ap2265@nau.edu
Tatiana Shulyateva – tds245@nau.edu
Editor's Notes
Abby
Abby
Tania
I wanted to learn more about email requests because Emails are between written and spoken genres.
Abby
Tania
Writer in low power distance was judged as more competent, agreeable, and reasonable (H, 2010); more polite (K-N, 2011)
Tania
Abby
I was wondering if - Sender’s agreeableness (but not power and competence)
I was wondering – Iimuro classified as a politeness marker
I was wondering – Merrrison – both Brits and Aussies use it
In high imposition requests NSs used embedded (I was wondering if) constructions and NNSs did not (Could I) - Biesenbach-Lucas (2007)
You can tell your students that there’s research that shows that it’s not appropriate
Abby
Tania
Abby
Tania
Qualify: to our best knowledge, these may be the gaps in research
Look at how email requests are viewed by professors from different disciplines- Is there a common thread in one discipline or another, or just random per individual choice?