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The Korean Association for the Study of English Language and Linguistics
[ Article ]
Korea Journal of English Language and Linguistics - Vol. 26, No. 0, pp.726-752
ISSN: 1598-1398 (Print) 2586-7474 (Online)
Print publication date 30 Jun 2026
Received 30 Jan 2026 Revised 04 Mar 2026 Accepted 20 May 2026
DOI: https://doi.org/10.15738/kjell.26..202606.726

A Methodological Synthesis of L2 Pragmatic Instruction Research for Korean EFL Learners

Hye Bin Seo ; Sooyeon Kang ; Tae Hyung Kim
(First author) M.A. in Foreign Language Education, Department of English Education Seoul National University hyebinseo@snu.ac.kr
(Corresponding author) Lecturer, Department of English Education Seoul National University 1 Gwanak-ro, Gwanak-gu, Seoul, Tel: +82-2-880-7670 englishsk329@naver.com
(Third author) Ph.D. Candidate, Department of English Education Seoul National University tae.kim@snu.ac.kr


© 2026 KASELL All rights reserved
This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons License, which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Abstract

This paper presents a methodological synthesis of L2 pragmatic instruction studies conducted with Korean EFL learners, focusing on studies that conceptualize pragmatic competence as the ability to understand and perform contextually appropriate utterances. Guided by three research questions, this study examines (1) the characteristics of research designs, (2) the instructional features adopted in pragmatic instruction, and (3) statistical analyses and their reporting in previous studies. Through a comprehensive literature search of articles published between 1998 and 2025 in KCI-, SSCI-, SCOPUS-, and ESCI-indexed journals, a total of 36 empirical studies were identified and analyzed. The findings revealed that (1) research designs were often experimental designs without control/comparison groups and delayed post-tests, (2) instructional features often involved teaching speech acts through explicit instruction for a short duration, and (3) there was limited reporting of reliability measurements, assumptions of statistical tests, and effect sizes. This review outlines the current L2 pragmatic instruction in Korean EFL context, presents several methodological gaps, and offers suggestions for improving research designs and reporting practices in future studies.

Keywords:

L2 pragmatic instruction, methodological synthesis, EFL context, Korean EFL learners

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