investigating the effects of call and mall on iranian efl learners’ interlanguage pragmatic comprehension: a mixed-methods inquiry

The primary focus of the previous studies on the effectiveness of call and mall has been on language skills and language components. however, the effects of call and mall on improving efl learners’ interlanguage pragmatic comprehension (ilpc) have received scant attention. in response to this long-lasting gap, the present study explored the effects of call and mall on improving upper-intermediate efl learners’ ilpc in iran. for this purpose, three upper-intermediate classes were selected at iran language institute and randomly assigned to call group (n=18), mall group (n=17), and a control group (n=19). the participants’ ilpc before and after the interventions (lasting 16 seventy-minute sessions held two times a week) was measured through the ilpc test, designed and validated by tajedin and malmir (2014). after the interventions, nine participants received call- and mall-based instructions were invited to a focus group interview to express their experiences with the interventions. a one-way anova and a content analysis approach were used to analyze the collected data. results indicated that there were statistically significant differences among the experimental groups and the control group regarding the gains of ilpc. additionally, the findings disclosed that there was not statistical significance difference between the call group and the mall group concerning the gains of ilpc. further, the qualitative results uncovered that the participants expressed positive attitudes toward the call- and mall-based instructions. the study ends with presenting some implications for different stakeholders.