The use of Backchannels and other Very Short Utterances by Italian Learners of German

Abstract

Backchannels (BCs) positively contribute to fluency in social interactions. However, their realisation is language-specific, which can cause miscommunication in intercultural contexts. Nevertheless, backchanneling is not formally taught in most classroom settings. To find out whether L2 learners still manage to acquire a target-like BC behaviour, we carried out an exploratory study on Italian learners of L2 German. We recorded Map Task dialogues performed by 6 dyads speaking L1 Italian and L2 German at different proficiency levels and 5 dyads speaking L1 German. We extracted BCs, defined as acknowledgment tokens, and other very short utterances (VSUs) with the same lexical realisation as BCs, but different functions. We analysed their frequency, length and lexical type according to their function. Preliminary results suggest that dyad-specific patterns play a larger role than L2 proficiency when predicting BC frequency and length. As for lexical choice of BC types, L2 learners prefer items shared with their L1 Italian. Specifically German types are only used by advanced learners, indicating a role of proficiency in this aspect of BC production.