Pragmatic Competence in Requests: A Case Study with
Thai English Teachers
Suratchawadee Pinyo1, Asst. Prof. Dr. Patama Aksornjarung2, Asst. Prof. Dr. Chonlada Laohawiriyanon3
1. M.A. in Teaching English as an International Language, Department of Languages and Linguistics, Faculty
of Liberal Arts, Prince of Songkla University
2. Department of Languages and Linguistics, Faculty of Liberal Arts, Prince of Songkla University
3. Department of Languages and Linguistics, Faculty of Liberal Arts, Prince of Songkla University
ABSTRACT
Successful communication in cross-cultural situations requires two crucial abilities:
speakers linguistic competence and pragmatic competence--the ability to use language
appropriately according to context which is often overlooked despite its significance. This
study investigated the pragmatic competence of 30 Thai English teachers in three aspects of
requests: making, accepting, and declining requests. The study focused on speech acts
regarding requests because they are regarded as one of the most face-threatening and
frequently-occurring areas. Data were collected through an oral discourse completion test
(ODCT) consisting of 27 situations. The teachers were requested to produce an oral response
in English to the given prompt. Five English native speakers rated the data according to score
criteria adapted from the Cohen and Olshtain Communicative Ability Scales. It was found
that the mean score for the pragmatic competence of the Thai English teachers in the three
aspects of requests was 36.5 out of 54 (68%). These results indicated that the pragmatic
competence of the teachers was at a moderate level; the level was just adequate for
communication in the given contexts. Three potential causes for the teachers lack of great
success in pragmatic competence were identified: a lack of pragmatic knowledge, transfer
from L1, and linguistic deficiency.
Key word: Pragmatic competence, Pragmatic failure, Oral discourse completion test, Thai
English teachers
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INTRODUCTION
English is widely accepted as a dominant tool for global communication. The
language is used to various degrees by people all over the world. On a small scale, people
speaking different mother tongues use English for different purposes: to access advanced
academic publications, to facilitate study abroad, and to better their career opportunities. On a
larger scale, English is considered a prominent language in numerous fields, including
international
trade,
banking,
manufacturing,
diplomacy,
science
and
technology,
entertainment, and education (Crystal, 1997; Smith, 1988). Given such worldwide
importance, an individuals English ability needs to be at least at a comprehensible level.
To use English successfully in international communication, people who have
different linguistic and cultural backgrounds truly need communicative competence: the
ability to use grammatically-correct sentences in appropriate contexts (Bachman, 1990;
Canale and Swain, 1980; Hymes, 1971). Communicative competence subsumes linguistic
competence and pragmatic competence. While the former refers to the ability to recognize
language rules in order to form grammatically-correct sentences, the latter is the ability to use
language appropriately in various contexts.
Thomas (1983) subdivided pragmatic competence into two parts: pragma-linguistic
competence (the ability to use grammar rules to form sentences correctly), and sociopragmatic competence (the ability to communicate properly according to the social rules of a
language). Lack of either may lead to cross-cultural communication mistakes or pragmatic
failure.
Thomas (1983) defines pragmatic failure as the inability in using an appropriate
language form to express a particular meaning in a particular context, and understanding a
speakers intention when that person makes an utterance. It is divided into two segments:
pragma-linguistic failure and socio-pragmatic failure. The first deals mainly with the
linguistic problems that occur when inappropriate language forms are used to perform
actions. The other is caused by misunderstandings which arise from the different perceptions
that affect linguistic choices during cross-cultural exchanges. Pragmatic failure is more
serious than linguistic failure (Thomas, 1983). A person might sound rude or disrespectful
when he or she commits a pragmatic error, which could lead to breakdowns in
communication.
Over the past few decades, great attention has been given to the investigation of the
causes of pragmatic failure. Thomas (1983), on one hand, argues that cultural differences and
negative transfer from learners L1 to L2 are two important causes. Kasper (1997), on the
The 2nd International Conference on Humanities and Social Sciences
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other hand, claims that inadequate pragmatic knowledge can also cause pragmatic failure. Yet
another researcher, Mei-Xiao (2008) proposes three potential sources of pragmatic failure:
differences between a speakers culture and the target culture, pragmatic transfer (the
influence from a speakers native language and culture on his or her pragmatic knowledge
and performance (Kasper & Blum-Kulka, 1993), and a lack of pragmatic knowledge.
Numerous studies on pragmatic failure were conducted in order to examine the
potential of the three abovementioned sources, Cedar (2005), Kelly (2003), and Prachanant
(2006), for instance. Using interviews, Cedar (2005) investigated Thai and American
responses to English compliments and found differences in the responses from the two
groups. From this, she suggested that English should be taught together with instruction on
the cultures of English-speaking peoples. In another study, Kelly (2003) investigated the
realization of requests made by 70 Japanese EFL students through a discourse completion
task. It was found that Japanese students were perceived as being rude by native speakers. It
was concluded that limited knowledge of the target language was the main source of their
pragmatic failure. In a similar study, Prachanant (2006) investigated and compared the
occurrences of pragmatic strategies and pragmatic transfer in complaint responses given by
Thai EFL learners in the hotel business and by native English-speaking hotel employees. The
findings revealed that the strategies utilized by the two groups had both similarities and
differences. In particular, pragmatic transfer occurred in the responses given by the Thai EFL
learners.
The results of these studies provide evidence that EFL learners encounter
difficulties in their cross-cultural communication as a result of the three sources of pragmatic
failure reviewed above.
Thus, to help EFL learners avoid making such mistakes, it is necessary to teach them
the social rules of the target language, demonstrate to them what pragmatic transfer is, and
provide them with pragmatic knowledge. Scholars (Olshtain & Cohen, 1990; Kasper, 1997;
Bardovi-Harlig, 1999) suggested that the EFL classroom environment is a good place for
EFL learners to acquire pragmatic knowledge. Findings from studies (Kondo, 2002; EslamiRasekh, 2004; Edwards & Csizer, 2004; and Safont Jorda, 2004) confirmed the effectiveness
of teaching pragmatics in an EFL classroom.
To achieve the goal of developing pragmatic competence of EFL learners, there is
strong evidence that well-trained teachers play a key role. A teacher who gives pragmatic
instruction to EFL learners must be equipped with a good command of pragmatic knowledge
(Dong, 2006; Vasquez & Sharpless, 2009). Nevertheless, this issue has not attracted the
attention it deserves. Instead, the majority of studies have concentrated on investigating the
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pragmatic failure of EFL learners rather than on the supportive role that teachers can play in
learners pragmatic acquisition. A study by Dong (2006) did focus on the pragmatic
competence of teachers. Using a 48-item, multiple-choice discourse completion test, Dong
surveyed the pragmatic competence of 120 Chinese English teachers in remote areas of
China. Results showed that the pragmatic competence of these teachers was at a relatively
low level evidently due to their lack of pragmatic knowledge. It was recommended that more
research be conducted to investigate the pragmatic competence of EFL teachers.
In response to Dongs recommendation, the present study is aimed at providing the
answer for the research question, to what extent do Thai English teachers have pragmatic
competence in making, accepting, and declining requests? An oral discourse completion test
was employed in data collection. The study, in particular, focused on request speech acts,
which are regarded as one of the most frequently-occurring and face-threatening areas (MeiChen, 1996; Kasper & Rose, 2002).
METHOD
Participants
The participants were thirty Thai teachers of English (7 males and 23 females) who
were enrolled in the Master of Arts program in Teaching English as an International
Language at the Faculty of Liberal Arts, Prince of Songkla University, Hat Yai campus in the
2009 academic year. Their age range was from 23 to 50 years old. Among these bachelors
degree holders, 24 majored in English and the other 6 in different subjects. Ten of the
teachers taught at the primary level. Three taught at the lower secondary level, and another
three taught at the upper secondary level. Four of them taught at both the lower and upper
secondary levels. Five teachers taught at the vocational level. The final five taught at the
university level. All of the teachers used the Thai language as the communication medium in
their English teaching.
Instruments
Oral Discourse Completion Test (ODCT) is one of the tests used to assess L2
learners pragmatic knowledge (Liu, 2006). The objective of using an ODCT (see Appendix
A) is to elicit natural answers from the participants in order to measure their true pragmatic
ability. The ODCT employed in the current research contained 27 situations for the speech
act of requests: nine each for the sub-acts of making, accepting and, declining requests. Each
test item was designed with social status and social distance indicated. A description of each
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situation was written in Thai in order to ensure that the intended meaning would be conveyed
to the participants.
Data collection
The ODCT was administered to the participants in a language laboratory. After a
thorough explanation of the test procedure, they were allowed to try speaking in five
situations in order to get them familiar with the process before a real test administration. In
addition, the actual test contained a Thai description of each situation in which the
participants were required to say in English what they would say in each situation. Varying
time slots of 10, 15 or 20 seconds were given for reading each test prompt depending on the
length of the prompt. The participants, then, responded to each prompt within 15 seconds by
speaking into a tape recorder.
Data analysis
In order to ascertain the overall pragmatic competence in the three aspects of requests,
the participants utterances from the oral discourse completion test were scored by five native
speakers of English, according to the score criteria adapted from the Cohen and Olshtain
Communicative Ability Scales, as follows:
0 = No answer
Wrong answers
Answers irrelevant to the given situation
Answers which do not convey a speaker's intention at all or change a speaker's
intention
1 = Acceptable answers which contain one or more of the following characteristics,
but can still convey the speaker's correct meaning and intention
- Too much or too little information
- Grammatical or lexical errors impairing but not preventing the
interlocutor understanding the meaning or intention of the utterance
- Too polite or rude linguistic expression
2 = Appropriate answers which fully convey a speaker's correct meaning and
intention and contain the following characteristics
- Proper amount of information
- Grammatical and lexical correctness or minor errors which do not affect the
interlocutor's ability to understand the meaning or intention of the utterance
- Polite linguistic expression
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The scores from each examiner were then totaled up and divided by five to obtain the
mean score and the percentage representing the pragmatic competence of the Thai English
teachers. A one-way analysis of variance was performed to further investigate whether there
was a difference in the teachers performance among the three aspects of requests.
FINDINGS
The pragmatic competence in making, accepting and declining requests of Thai English
teachers
An ODCT was administered to measure the pragmatic competence in making,
accepting and declining requests of the English teachers. A calculation and an analysis of the
raw data elicited were made to identify the percentage and the mean score.
Table 1: Mean score of the English teachers pragmatic competence in making,
accepting and declining requests
N
30
Full score
54
Min
Max
Mean
S.D.
Score
Score
Score
16
30
47
87
36.5
68
7.295
Table 1 shows that out of a possible total of 54, the lowest score was 16 (30%), while
the highest score was 47 (87%), and the mean score of the English teachers was 36.5 or 68%.
The mean scores and the percentages of each aspect were computed, as presented
below in order to further determine whether there was a difference among the English
teachers pragmatic competence in the three aspects of requests: making, accepting and
declining requests.
Table 2: Three aspects of the pragmatic competence
Aspects of request
Full score
Min
Max
Mean
Score
Score
Score
S.D.
Making a request
18
22
17
94
11.37
64
2.785
Accepting a request
18
28
17
94
12.57
69
2.609
Declining a request
18
22
16
89
12.20
67
2.759
Table 2 shows a slight difference between means of scores of making, accepting and
declining requests. The mean scores of each aspect were 11.37 (64%), 12.57 (69%) and 12.20
(67%), respectively. The findings indicate that the Thai English teachers pragmatic
competence in making, accepting and declining requests differs slightly.
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In addition, a one-way analysis of variance was carried out to capture a clearer
picture. The results as illustrated in Table 3 shows no differences between means of the three
aspects of requests: making, accepting and declining, F (2, 87) = 1.535, p<0.05. It, thus,
confirms that the pragmatic ability of the Thai English teachers in the three aspects of
requests was virtually at the equivalent level.
Table 3: Results of the Test of Difference between Means
Tested Means
Sum of Squares
df
Mean square
Sig.
Between group
22.689
11.344
1.535
.221
Within group
643.133
87
7.392
Total
665.822
89
DISCUSSION
Pragmatic competence of Thai English teachers in making, accepting, and declining
requests
The results obtained from the ODCT indicate that the overall pragmatic competence
of the Thai English teachers in making, accepting and declining requests was average with a
test result of 36.50 (68%). The mean scores for each aspect were 11.37 (64%), 12.57 (69%),
and 12.20 (67%), respectively. According to the five English native-speaking raters, this
figure indicated that the group had a moderate level of pragmatic competence in the three
aspects of requests. This finding is, to a certain degree, consistent with Dongs (2006) study
which reported that the pragmatic competence of the Chinese English teachers was relatively
low due to their lack of pragmatic knowledge.
In further examining the participants utterances, three major problems were
recognized as possible causes for their lack of strength in pragmatic competence. First, most
of their utterances were overly polite in the informal situations, and some utterances sounded
rude in the formal situations. This problem was also encountered in other studies which
explored the pragmatic competence of EFL/ESL learners. For example, in an investigation of
pragmatic transfer in refusal by Thai EFL learners, Wannaruk (2005) found that the
participants tried to be more polite when communicating in English.
contrastive
study
of
request
strategies
between
Thai
and
Similarly, in a
American
students,
Luksaneeyanawin (2005) found that the Thai EFL learners used indirect strategies to try to
make their requests more polite. In contrast, Mei-Xiao (2008) found that Chinese EFL
learners were perceived as being rude by native speakers of English because of their
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unawareness of the cultural differences between English and Chinese. Below examples of the
utterances produced by the participants in the present study illustrate this first problem.
Example 1
Situation: You are having dinner with your close foreign friend. What do you say to
get your friend to pass you the sugar?
In this situation, the participants were required to make a request of a friend. This
context was considered informal as this friend was explained to be of equal status and close
social distance.
Participant 4: Excuse me. Could you please give me a favor? I need some sugar.
Participant 3: Pass me some sugar.
The utterance produced by Participant 4 was overly polite. He said, Could you please
give me a favor?, which is normally used only in very formal situations. This utterance was
considered too formal for the context according to native speakers norms. Moreover, it was
incorrect. The accurate one is Could you please do me a favor?
In contrast, the utterance made by Participant 3 sounded slightly rude because it was a
command. Even though the addressee in this context was a close friend, the speaker would be
better off to speak in a moderately polite way when asking a favor. Three of the raters
suggested that a politeness marker, such as please or a tag, such as will you?, would help
soften the expression.
The second problem was that some of the participants utterances contained improper
amount of information. They either contained inadequate information, when they failed to
convey the speakers real intention; or were overly verbose, where too much information was
given. This finding was consistent with the finding of Blum-Kulka & Oshtain (1986), who
suggested that deviation from native norms of utterance length can cause pragmatic failure in
several ways. It was also supported by Prachanant (2006), who observed excessive
productions from Thai university students in his contrastive study of complaint responses
between Thai and American learners. More clarification can be seen in Example 2 below.
Example 2
Situation: At work, you want a subordinate to copy a document for you. What would
you say?
Participant 4: Excuse me, sir. Could you please give me a favor? I really need a copy
of this paper. Youre so close with a copy machine.
Situation: Today you need to take a half-day leave to go to your friends wedding
party. What would you say to your big boss?
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Participant 25: Sir, Id like to leave the office.
The sentence, Youre so close with a copy machine, produced by Participant 4 was
considered excessive for the situation by most of the raters. In contrast, Participant 25s
utterance was considered too short to fully convey the speakers intended meaning.
Furthermore, this utterance sounded strange because it did not contain a request expression,
and it did not furnish necessary details. This might be due to the speakers lack of English
vocabulary and fixed expressions.
Given the information seen in Example 2, it may be concluded that the participants
over-production of utterances was due to their lack of pragmatic knowledge which led to
transfer from L1, while linguistic deficiency, i.e. a lack of appropriate expressions, is
responsible for situations when insufficient information was given by the participants.
The last problem found with the participants utterances was related to grammar.
While certain participants produced minor grammatical errors, others made serious ones
potentially leading to communication breakdown. This finding was consistent with previous
studies (Kelly, 2003; Kwai, 2008; Mei-Xiao, 2008) in which learners deficiency in linguistic
knowledge of a target language caused misunderstanding in cross-cultural communication.
The linguistic deficiency sometimes motivated speakers to resort to their mother tongue
leading to L1 transfer. In this case, when lacking linguistic formulae to utilize in given
situations, speakers translated linguistic form in Thai to what they assumed equivalent to
English. This lends support to a study by Kelly (2003) who found that Japanese EFL learners
were judged as rude because when they made a concerted effort to communicate in English,
they translated a Japanese linguistic form to English equivalent. These translated sentences
sounded awkward to native speakers. Example 3 below demonstrates this problem.
Example 3
Situation: Emmy, your niece is listening to music. The music is very loud and is
disturbing you. What would you say to Emmy to get her to turn down the volume?
Participant 20: Emmy, reduce the radio, please.
The utterance produced by Participant 20 was incorrect; she used the word reduce
instead of turn down. This example demonstrates the participants inability to use correct
vocabulary to convey the intended meaning.
In addition to these three problems, it was found that 33.3% of the participants (10
teachers) did not respond at all in some situations. Two reasons were made for the lack of
response. First, it was due to the participants limited linguistic knowledge. If that is the case,
linguistic competence is clearly a dominant factor in pragmatic competence. The other was
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that the participants were too anxious to be able to produce utterances in the given situations,
imposed by the time constraints.
In conclusion, this group of Thai English teachers was seen to have encountered the
same problems as EFL speakers in previous studies. The problems these teachers struggled
with can be categorized into three major types. These were a lack of pragmatic knowledge,
transfer from L1, and linguistic deficiency. This confirms that both pragmatic competence
and linguistic competence are vital factors for successful and effective international
communication. Accordingly, the results from this group of Thai English teachers
demonstrates that Thai English teachers in general should develop their pragmatic and
linguistic ability, as they may be the only available source English students can rely on for
pragmatic development.
Strategies employed by the Thai English teachers to perform the three aspects of
requests
In addition to their overall pragmatic competence in making, accepting, and declining
requests, the present study investigated differences in the participants pragmatic ability
among the three request aspects. Even though the results from an ANOVA test showed no
significant differences, it was noticeable that among the three request aspects, the participants
gained the highest score in the accepting requests category. This may be because words used
in accepting requests are usually short and uncomplicated, e.g., yes, okay (Allwood, Nivre,
and Ahlsen, 1993). These short utterances are considered appropriate and effective to convey
intended meanings in certain situations. Nevertheless, a deeper look into the participants
utterances revealed that apart from saying yes or okay, they usually gave more
explanation or details to completely express their acceptance, as illustrated by the following
example.
Example 4
Situation: Emmy, your niece, asks you to help her with her homework. You are free
and want to help. What do you say?
Participant 2: Yes. Im free to teach the homework to you.
Participant 7: Sure. I will teach your homework for you.
The first part of the utterances, Yes and Sure, was acceptable, as they accurately
conveyed the speakers intentions. However, the second part of the utterances containing the
word teach sounded unusual to the English raters; the participants literally translated it to
English from the Thai word /sorn/. Linguistically, the word teach in English means to
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show someone how to do something so that they will then be able to do it themselves. The
meaning of this word is hence not accurate in this situation. Help you with your homework
is more appropriate.
While short utterances can be used to accept requests, i.e., the single word no can
be used to decline a request. However, only saying no as a refusal is not an easy task
because speakers may risk offending their counterparts (Wannaruk, 2005). As a result, other
strategies: for instance, expressing an apology, giving reasons for a refusal, giving an
alternative to the person are employed as Supportive Moves (Wannaruk, 2005;
Luksaneeyanawin, 2005). The participants in the present study managed to employ these
strategies. Due to their linguistic deficiency or their lack of pragmatic knowledge, however,
their elaborations sometimes resulted in communication difficulties as illustrated by Example
5 below.
Example 5
Situation: Your classmate, who has just begun studying in your college today, asks
you to tutor her in biology, but you are in a hurry to get to work. What would you say
to decline her request?
Participant 6: Sorry. Now Im hurry up to go outside.
Participant 21: Oh! Sorry. I cant tu the knowledge for you.
Both of the utterances successfully conveyed the speakers negative intention, but the
statement might sound confusing for the listeners. The speakers used making an apology as a
refusal strategy in the first part of the utterances. However, the followed elaborations
expressing reasons for refusal sounded awkward to the five native speakers. In English, the
phrase, hurry up in the first sentence means to do something quickly, but this speaker used
it with the meaning that he was in a hurry. The word /tu/ in the utterance made by Participant
21 is a Thai word meaning tutor in English. These two examples demonstrated a transfer
from the speakers L1 to English, resulting in misunderstandings in their cross-cultural
communication efforts.
Phrases utilized to make requests, on the other hand, are generally longer and more
complex than those used to accept or decline requests. This is because such utterances may
consist of an expression for making a request (Head Act) and expressions providing reasons
for that request or other supporting expressions, other supporting information, or politeness
markers (Supportive Moves) (Blum-Kulka & Olshtain, 1984). The participants in the study
employed this principal when making their requests, as demonstrated by the following
examples.
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Example 6
Situation: Today you need to take a half-day leave to go to your friends wedding
party. What would you say to your boss?
Participant 15: Boss. I must go to wedding party, so I need to free in the afternoon.
Supportive move + Supportive Move + Head Act
The sentence, I need to free in the afternoon, is ungrammatical and sounds highly
unusual according to the raters. Boss, May I have a half day off today so I can go to my
friends wedding party? is an appropriate answer for this situation as suggested by one of the
raters.
As illustrated by the previous examples, in searching for words to get their meanings
across, the participants overlooked the language forms which were appropriate for the given
contexts. Moreover, as the situations were designed for the participants to assess their
relationships with the interlocutors when producing utterances for making, accepting, and
declining requests, they encountered additional difficulties. Kelly (2003) posits that
attempting to take into consideration both meanings and forms is a big challenge for EFL
learners. These reasons, together with their insufficient linguistic ability caused the
participants in the present study to experience even more difficulties in producing appropriate
and effective utterances in the three aspects of requests. Therefore, this may be the reason
why no significant differences were found between the types of requests.
CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR FURTHER STUDY
This study investigated the pragmatic competence of the Thai English teachers in
making, accepting, declining requests. The findings showed that the teachers pragmatic
competence in the three aspects of requests was at a moderate level (68%). Three major
reasons for this moderate adequacy were found: lack of linguistic and pragmatic knowledge,
and L1 influence. It was also found that each participants ability in making, accepting, and
declining requests was rather similar. The findings suggest that teachers need to receive more
extensive and intensive training on linguistic and pragmatic knowledge in order that their
ability in the language use improves.
The following suggestions made based on the present study should be considered for
future research. First, further research should explore the pragmatic competence of other
groups of Thai English teachers in other regions of the country, or should focus on different
types of participants, e.g., EFL students, people who mainly use English in workplaces, etc.
Secondly, since the current research focused only on the speech act of requests, future
The 2nd International Conference on Humanities and Social Sciences
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research should aim to investigate the pragmatic competence of Thai English teachers in
other speech acts, such as apologies and complaints. Third, investigating the pragmatic usage
of English in the textbooks used in Thai educational institutions would be interesting and
beneficial to overall English education since textbooks are one of the vital tools for EFL
learners pragmatic acquisition. Lastly, research using other data collection methods, such as
role-play or spontaneous face-to-face interaction should be conducted since these methods
may provide more real-life settings for the participants, and thus, more accurate data.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I gratefully thank Asst. Prof. Dr. Patama Aksornjarong and Asst. Prof. Dr. Chonlada
Laohawiriyanon for their enthusiastic and consistent supervision, the anonymous readers, and
the participants in the study.
THE AUTHOR
Suratchawadee Pinyo is pursuing her Masters Degree in Teaching English as An
International Language, at Prince of Songkla University. Before returning to school, she
worked for an international corporation.
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