The Speech Act of Apology for Saudi EFL Students

This research will find out the nonverbal communication tools used by the students with Arabic background which they use while talking in English to their counter parts. The research will use the techniques designed by Cohen, Olshtain & Rosenstein (1986) commonly known as Discourse Completion Test (DCT) and the Apology Introspection Questionnaire (AIQ), which was first introduced by Ismail (1998). The research was conducted on various techniques used by the students to apologize when they were alone or when they were in groups. The aim of this research was to investigate the effectiveness of English teaching techniques used by the student whose mother tongue was Arabic. This research was particularly focused to find out the apology technique learned by such students. There are issues in speech acts (Blum-Kulka & Olshtain, 1984; Cohen, et al., 1986) which are an integral part of the culture and these cultural aspects ultimately result in misleading differences in the way student convey their thoughts and apologies in English. The language skills were tested along with discourse completion test (DCT) and the apology introspection questionnaire (AIQ), this was accompanied by the type of misconduct, relationship of two parties and the way apology was offered. The findings in this respect revealed that the direct apology was effectively used in Arabic and English languages. However, there were some situations where indirect apologies were found effective in both languages as well as a mix of direct and indirect apologies was also used. The study proved that grammar, syntax, and spelling were not the only tools to articulate an apology.


INTRODUCTION
conducted a study to inquire about the behavior of Saudi students of English and how they used English and Arabic languages for this purpose. The main point that the study revealed was the fact that second language which was a result of training and teaching techniques, was not able to construct apology in true cultural manner. More importantly, it was learned through this research that apology in its essence stems from the cultural setting of the language learner and it really depends on the social conduct of the learner. It is important to consider the fact Ismail's research was focused on female Saudi students and it is yet to be decided whether or not the results of this research can be applied to male Saudi students or not in a cross-cultural setting where male students are learning in English cultural settings. It must be noted that an apology is a social act which must be used to establish healthy relationships between two humans working in a particular society (Alfattah, 2010). Apologies are an important and integral part of the social discourse which leads to social appropriateness and knowledge of a language. It is important because "face-saving maxims are believed to lie at the heart of face-to-face interaction and the social recognition of an individual's face is very important" (Trosborg, 1987, p. 147). Any apology may be articulated through two main ways; one is defensive stance which means that the apologizer faces minimum embarrassment and the other is protective stance which is supposed to protect the rights of the person who is offered an apology. However, in today's world where multi-cultural social settings are more common, an apology is a more intricate issue. Trosborg (1987) proclaims while discussing these intricate heterogeneous cultural environments in this global town that linguistic accuracy and knowledge may not be able to articulate apologize for foreign students as they usually lack cultural adequacy to aptly convey their message. Therefore, the effectiveness is more important for foreign students while conveying the apologetic message as compared to linguistic accuracy. This research will focus foreign language as a mean to communicate effectively and purposefully in foreign social settings and thus strives to bridge gaps between understanding cause due to linguistic issues. The research can be considered a continuation of Ismail (1998) research which she suggested herself.

AIMS OF THE STUDY
The aim of the study is to determine the strategies of the speech act of apology used, the patterns and how they operate in a situational context in the Saudi males' apologetic speech and behavior in Arabic or in English, or both. It also aims to investigate the differences and similarities between male and female apology strategies.

LITERATURE REVIEW
Apology is a huge area of study but there are three main ideas around which the theory of apology revolves around. These three theories include, theory of interaction e.g. Goffman (1967), theory of politeness e.g. Leech (1983) and theory of speech act, e.g. Austin (1962). In his theory of interaction Goffman (1959 and1967) talks about how social aspects mixed with linguistic aspects to convey the apologies in certain situations. In most of the cases apologies involve two parties or individual who are somehow related to each other and there is an error or mistake on part of one party or individual. Goffman describes the interaction of two individuals in such apology situation like a drama or performance where each party try to show best out on its part or what Goffman (1959: 55) "front" to the people witnessing the performance. Goffman suggests that such a situation between two parties can be addressed through social interaction. He also suggests that apology is of two kinds one is full apology and there is also a shorter version of apology that is the word "sorry" or any other similar expression which may be used dilute the situation or the happening. The full apology consists of "expression of embarrassment and chagrin; clarification that one knows what conduct had been expected and sympathizes with the application of negative sanction; verbal rejection, repudiation, and disavowal of the wrong way of behaving along with vilification of the self that so behaved; performance of penance and the volunteering of restitution." (Goffman, 1971: 113).
On the other hand, Leech's theory of politeness aims at "Politeness Principles" (Leech, 1983) and he describes the situation like a commercial transaction where one party "owe" an apology, thanks or some other similar express to other party. Grice, has also presented the situation in similar fashion but he used the analogy of "co-operation" instead of politeness for the two parties where both have trying to achieve same objective. He postulated a "co-operative principle" and four "maxims" (Grice, 1975).
Above mentioned two theories are designed to look at apology speaker or the performer of any other expression like thank or promise and receiver who receives this and see the actions of the apologizer. There appears a unanimity of ideas in the two theories that both tackle apology as a commercial transaction which saves the expressions of guilt on the part of apologizer that may happened to occurred in normal circumstances. The study of Owen (1983) however specify apology as a more sincere act which is straight forward and contain impressions which help to make it more simple and clear. Instead of a transactional apology Own presented a four part apology situation these four parts include "Prepositional Content Condition"; "Preparatory Condition"; "Sincerity Condition" and "Essential Condition" (Owen, 1983: 124). Owen actually reduced the apology to some limited phrases like as "I am sorry" or "I apologize" or "I am afraid". But as a matter of fact this reduced the essence of apology and it lacks the intension of apology. So some people may use the phrases accurately but without intent. Fasold (1990: 154) elaborates the situation with an example where he says the "I am sorry" is good enough if someone is died as the sorrow is obvious but this phrase may not be enough to admit a mistake. Owen knows the shortcoming in her theory and admits it clearly, "we should have cast the net wider still to include such expressions as "excuse me" or "forgive me" since these clearly…. have remedial effect".
The Theory of speech act by Austin states that apologies are taken as part of speech act by Austin (1962). The methodology states apology as "performatives" and these speech acts also delivers an opposite meaning. However, performatives are meant to do some act. As Austin methodology considers the acts important so this falls under the category of "attitudes and social behavior" (Austin, 1962: 151). Although, Austin contributions are important but her insistence on the use of peculiar phrases cannot be justified as it can be applicable only in few conditions and can bring the desired results. Theoretically, her work has distinct interest and the use of performatives is useful to a great extent. The theory helps to analytically assess the act of apologies and other authors can build their ideas on this methodology. Olshtain (1983), played a very important role in research of apologies, although he, like his predecessor, used verbs which were uttered with apology in order to classify the apology, these were considered explicit apologies.
Observational studies conducted in New Zealand and Australia showed over the nonverbal speech majority of the people tried to escape the apology as they belong to "negative politeness" which has a direct impact on facial expression of the speaker. Holmes (1990) research as focused on behavioral difference based on the genders but in one of her research she explained the very evident differences witnessed between New Zealand English culture and other cultures that may pertain to American or British as far as apologies were concerned. The use of words was distinct in each of these cultures particularly when people frame their apology. Trosborg (1987) research on Danish and British people explored very interesting results when they use words to formulate their long and sincere apology along with cultural and lingual aspects: "… beyond a certain degree of severity, a routinized formula used on its own is not an adequate response to a complaint … Other strategies are needed, such as explanations and offer of repair" (Trosberg, 1987: 164.). In these cases, the difference in apology may be due to differences in the culture. Scandinavian culture prefers distant relationships while in the orthodox British culture people prefer verbal softness to ensure social interactions. Deutschmann (2003) is yet another researcher who conducted a study on the behavioral differences between Scandinavian and British English. Deutschmann observed that the young generation and people belonging to middle class use a specific form of the apology, "the commonly accepted words and statements in which the apology is couched, what they had originally intended by their actions, and what they wish to seek from the person they offended in regard to forgiveness." (Deutschmann, 2003). The most important observation was the difference which social classes use to formulate their polite apology, particularly the middle class. The use of apology strategies by Catalan learners of English in their L2 was investigated by Dalmau and Gotor (2007). The scholars classified the participants proficiency levels through the DCT. Findings of the study noted that British speakers tended to not use IFIDs a lot like Catalan speakers.
The apology strategies of Jordanian Arabic language speakers and Americans English language speakers has been studied by Bataineh & Bataineh (2008). Not only was the study examining the apology strategies of the two groups, it also investigated the differences in genders. The participants of the study were 200. A division of 100 for each group. Results of the study were interesting as they showed that Jordanian male and female participants tended to have more differences than American male and female English speakers. It also revealed that Jordanian Arabic speakers tended to use more than one strategy at the same time.
In another study the apology strategies of British English and Persian Speakers were examined by Chmani & Zareipur (2010). The results of the study revealed that similar strategies were shared. On the other hand, there were differences between these two languages in terms of how apologies are manifested. Only one of the illocutionary force indication devices was used in a lot of situations. The study also showed that Persian speakers used other strategies together with the explicit apology.
The apology strategies of Turkish speakers, American English and advanced non-native speakers of English in Turkey were investigated by Aydin (2013). The study focused on identifying and comparing these strategies of these three groups. The researcher used the DCT method. Results of the study showed that there were similarities in the general strategies of apologies of advanced nonnative speakers. For the modification of strategies results showed that they used the forms of their native language.

SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY
This research has an academic value as well as practical. The focus was on the use of apology by male Saudi students in universities when talking in Arabic and English. Very interesting facts and learnings were gathered while comparing and focusing the behavioral aspects and differences in both languages, it was interesting to see how the apology was framed. This constitute a very knowledgeable and informative literature which focuses on the differences of two languages.
The practical applications of the research were discussed. The research will show how instructions for the formulation of apology in case of male university students can be enhanced. Also, how to make it appropriate for practical interaction with foreign cultures.

STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM
This research was focused to find out apology methods, techniques and the contextual differences in which various apologies can be effective, in the speech and behavior of the person making an apology in English or in Arabic, or both. It may also conform to Apology Strategies of Trosborg (1987), and Olshtain and Cohen (1983) constituted on male students. Inability to communicate correctly as per the requirements of the target language can bring unexpected results especially for those who are learning a language. For example, the inability to formulate apology at right instance, in a correct way can leave a very bad impression of being sick at mind or deliberate behavioral roughness. So, it is very important to understand the behavioral principals interact in different cultures and especially a foreign language practitioner has to deal with such confusing situations.

QUESTIONS OF THE STUDY
Keeping in mind the above stated principal objectives, the research will have some related research questions. As this study is a continuation of Ismail's (1998) research, the research questions may have some similarities. 1. What basic apology strategies were used dominantly in English and in Arabic? 2. What patterns of basic apology strategies are commonly used in both English and Arabic? 3. Is there significant variation in the use of apology strategies and modification of strategies in English and Arabic? 4. Based on the context of the apology situation, how is apology behavior affected in both English and Arabic? 5. Did the method used show direct or indirect application of apology? 6. How do the findings of this study of Saudi men's apology behaviors compare with those of Ismail 1998's findings with regard to Saudi women's apology behaviors?

Participants
The participants of the research were male level 7 students in Imam Mohammed bin Saud University. These students were studying last year of their Bachelor degree. This level is selected as it is the state where most of the students face pragmatic problems. The selected students have decent expertise in written and spoken English. They have good knowledge of linguistic concepts and social theories as well as cultures which enables them to preform an apology easily and with different forms. The age of these students varies from 21 years to 25 years. The select sample size is 50 individuals. All students in this research have contributed voluntarily. It was also made clear to the students that their participation in the research will have no impact on their results and anonymity will be ensured as far as their personal identities and responses are concerned.

Instruments
Two distinct research instruments were selected for English and Arabic languages. These instruments were Discourse Completion Test (DCT) and an Apology Introspection Questionnaire (AIQ). The DCT is a widely used instrument in linguistic researches. The objective of using this instrument is to place it realistically, in circumstances where an apology is necessary, and then collect the data on apologies from students to perform a practically valid analysis on the data. The research has been setup to collect data about three relations which are deemed to be more effective to analyze the data on the formation of the apology. These three classifications are friend (F), teacher (T) and stranger (S) and these relationships provide the targeted differentiation in the collected data. For every question of the DCT instrument, the students were posed with a special situation in which they were meeting with an individual. The content of the DCT is based on the work of Ismail (1998) and Cohen, Olshtain, and Rosenstein (1986). However, the questions adopted were slightly adjusted to ensure that the region difference have been addressed to suit the culture and context of Saudi males e.g. from cafeteria to coffee shop (sit. 1), from a report presentation to a presentation on Shakespeare (sit.2), from a blouse to a car (sit. 4), from clothes shop to a car dealer (sit.5), from library to a university (sit, 6), from an airplane to a wedding (sit, 9), specify the place where met to a mosque (sit, 16), mother dying to father (sit, 17) and form cashing a check to cafeteria line (sit, 22). Situations number 21, 10, 8, 7, 3 and 18 are reformatted from Ismail (1998) DCT. Situations number 11,12,13,14,15,19 and 20 were of the researcher's own contribution. A total of twenty situations were presented to respondents and most of these situations were related to apology while some of them were distractors e.g. instructions, thankfulness etc. The instructions and the distracter situations are based on Cohen, Olshtain and Rosenstein (1986) while the central apology situations and some other two distracter situations are based on Ismail (1998), despite of the fact most of the situations in her research were setup for male gender not for the females.
Respondents of the questionnaire were initially asked to respond using English language questionnaire and then a week gap was administered after which the same questionnaire was presented to the exactly same group of respondents in Arabic. Therefore, English language responses were gathered using English language questionnaire while Arabic language questionnaire was used to gather Arabic responses for the same situations and from the same participants. The Apology Introspection Questionnaire was to identify the response of the respondents at the time of apology and if the intended to apologies they were supposed to check the "Yes" box. This was presented once the DCT questionnaire responses were already collected. This questionnaire was first introduced by Ismail (1998). It was designed by her to study apology behavior of female students. The objective of this questionnaire was to identify intend of the respondents at the time of apology and if the intend was there they were supposed to check the "Yes" box. The purpose of the questionnaire was to know whether the respondents prefer the use of and explicit apology or an indirect implicit apology. Five fundamental strategies were explored using the questionnaire; an explicit expression of apology, an explanation, an acknowledgement of responsibility, an offer of repair and a promise of forbearance. The objective of these strategies was to find out whether respondents find these helpful instead of direct apology. The results will thus clarify whether or not these indirect strategies were considered better than direct and explicit expressions of an apology. These questionnaires were presented to respondents in two languages English and Arabic.
As to the reliability and validity of the data gathering instruments, verification of test items for the validity and accuracy is an important aspect of the research. The researcher has ensured that the questionnaires were verified for the validity the contents, composition and formulation. As far as the reliability of the questionnaire is concerned, the assurance of reliability of the DCT is provided by the AIQ. In the AIQ, the respondents were explicitly asked to comment whether or not they find their responses in DCT as apologies. The presented table shows the classifications of apology situations in accordance to the offence committed, participants relationship, apology trigger, and the dimensions as illustrated above. This classification was used by scholars like Ismail (1998).

Identification and Rationale for the use of Distracter Situations
The distracters act as control elements to ensure reliability of the responses in the questionnaires. If the subject reply in his AIQ that he meant an apology by his response, then that shows that there is a possibility that this participant is not familiar with what an apology is. There was a total of three distractors used in the DCT for the purpose of this research. These distracters were situations 2,4, and 17. Situation 2 and 4 were scenarios that required compliments, while situation 17 required an act of sympathy or condolence.

Method of Data Evaluation and Analysis
The DCT responses were categorized according to the model by Cohen, et al. (1986), for both English and Arabic. After sequencing and ordering of data the SPSS, a statistical software was used to analyze it. The frequency and percentage were used to show the aggregate responses in English and Arabic. The Chi-square was used to ascertain how the apology behavior of the respondents was affected in English and Arabic. The observed value is the frequency of each strategy in either language, while the sum of English and Arabic frequencies was divided by two to explore the expect averages.

LIMITATION
The first limitation in this academic research, is the fact that it is impossible to list all relationships between addressor and the addressee that may exist in social settings. Therefore, only three different types of addressee relationships are identified and explored in this research so as to distinctly identify different types of social interactions. These are Stranger, Friend, and Professor-Student. These three relationships are those that were considered most relevant to the sample respondents within the scope of this research. Another, aspect of limitation is the long questionnaires, bearing in mind the length of the questions and the fact the respondent has to respond to such questionnaires might get them to lose their interest in the survey. This type of survey might not be the best survey to be used for the selected research. Instead, a recording of actual apology situations may have surfaced the results more accurately.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
The following sections will present the findings of the study and discussions according to basic apology strategies, incidences of modifications of basic strategies and absence of apology strategy. It will then be followed by presenting the intentions of the respondents in their responses based on the questionnaire that they answered (AIQ).

Usage of the Basic Apology Strategies
According to Cohen et al (1986), the basic apology strategies can be divided into five categories that are explicit expression of apology, explanation, acknowledgment of responsibility, offer of repair, and promise of forbearance.

Explicit expression of apology in English
The table 2 indicates that the performative expression "sorry" is used most with the percentage 78 %. Along with "sorry", other performative expressions are also used but sorry is used the most.
The table also shows that other performative expressions such as "Excuse", "Forgive", "Apologize" and "Pardon" are used less in contrast to "Sorry". However, they perform the same purpose as "sorry" and have the same meaning. We can also find repetition of performative expressions and most common is "sorry". In case of a remorseful situation, the performative expressions are used frequently and with continuous repetitions. According to the authors, Austin (1962), Leech (1983) and others, "Sorry" is a more frequently and excessively used by the people in generic situations to convey humbleness instead of using it for a formal request of forgiveness. Table number 3 is further elaborative in terms of explaining the usage of performative expressions repeatedly and a combination of these expressions to apology to emphasize a situation or state of apologizing. The column containing heading, "number of times used" is for informing about the number of apologizing performative expressions in response to any one or multiple situations. The number of times used explains whether the performative expressions are used once, twice, thrice or more times. It is not necessary that only performative expression is used for a situation.
A combination of two or several performative expressions can be used. For understanding this, situation 5 can be noticed in which, student no 14 has used two performative expressions as he has said, "I'm sorry, Forgive me" which points towards the inclination of the subjects to use the word sorry as a general expression expressing remorse. Cohen described this strategy as a "safe strategy".
The respondents also try to use sorry more as compared to other performative expressions without considering the suitability of the word. This can be noticed for situation 15 in which, student number13 opted to choose "sorry" in place of "excuse me". According to the situation, "excuse me" was a better option. Situation number 6 and 22 also fall in this category. People tend to make use of "sorry" because of their being acknowledgeable that the word "excuse" is used for minor contravention. Table 4 elaborates that the word "(sorry)‫سفآ‬ " is used multiple times and that are (excuse)‫,اعذر‬ (forgive)‫,سامح‬ (pardon) ‫عفوا‬ are not used as frequently as sorry itself. "(Sorry)‫آسف‬ " is used continuously and again and again. Whether English is used or Arabic, the frequency of apologetic expressions remains the same. Table no 5 shows elaborative data about tendency of using the apology performative expression repeatedly to indicate the intensity of the situation. The Arabic students when tried to give their responses in English were more concerned towards highlighting their apology and remorsefulness, which made use of repetitive performative expressions. Elaborations of the situations make the speaker to make use of apologetic expressions more or in intensified tone (Brown, 1980). Like English, students made use of performative expressions similar to English usage with intensified apology and with repetitions. The participants of the research made use of performative expressions additionally and repeatedly for example, for situation no 1, student number 46 made use of (pardon) ‫.عفوا‬ (sorry) ‫.آسف‬ (sorry) ‫.معليش‬ Repetition and extensive usage of performative expression can be seen when the situations are more severe and require the people to respond accordingly.

Explicit expression of an apology in Arabic
In the tables above Arabic as well as in English expression of apology is somewhat the same and students make use of expressions of apology that are commonly accepted or used frequently by everyone such as "sorry". The expressions used are customary and formulaic. There can be situations where someone used these apparently clear expressions like "I'm sorry" without there being any intention of apology at all! (Owen, 1983). This means that the person saying sorry or using an expression of apology is always not remorseful but he or she uses the expression as a sign of modesty.

Use of explanation for apologizing
The use of explanation is the attempt of the person apologizing to maintain an open channel of communication with the offended party, while seeking to minimize his fault with a reason or excuse. This is evident in the following.
The responses that are collected from the respondents or subjects have two types of explanations for example as situation 15 shows by the help of student number 4. The apologizer makes use of ‫ضروريه‬ ‫الشغله‬ ‫و‬ ‫مستعجل‬ ‫بس‬ ‫وهللا‬ ‫آسف‬ (sorry but I am in a hurry and it important). This appears to confirm the findings of Holmes (1990), that occasionally speakers tend to employ the same apology strategy more than once in their response. Goffman (1967) states that recognition of responsibility is usually avoided in social setup and individuals tend to protect their image and personality. In order to achieve this objective, direct and explicit apology is avoided even if the responsibility is admitted or they try to find ways to annul the breach that was committed.  The questionnaire presented to respondent does not insist on the acceptance or acknowledgement of the mistake or guilt that be associated with them and other forms of apologizing were employed by the respondents that were not in need of any acceptance from the offender's side as evidenced by the 27.9% incidence in English and 37.7% in Arabic. Even then, most who acknowledged responsibility only admitted lack of planning and self-insufficiency. This is opposite to the findings of Olshtain and Cohen (1983) which claimed acknowledgment of responsibility is a generally accepted strategy of apology behavior. This deviation from the results can be attributed to culture, where acknowledgement of guilt is not much frequent in every culture and this factor heavily dependent on cultural traditions. For example: Sit. 12 (21): (I had situations to deal with)‫ظروف‬ ‫لي‬ ‫صارت‬ ‫ياخي‬ (lack of intent). ‫ما‬ ‫‪(I‬قدرت‬ couldn't) (lack of intent). Sit. 5 (18): I'm sorry, I forgot (self-deficiency) that is my fault (self-blame).

An offer of repair
In an offer of repair, the offender attempts to placate the offended party by proposing, either explicitly or implicitly, to make up for the damage by repairing the situation.
Generally, the respondents disfavored resorting to implicit or vague offers of repair, but tend to make specific offers to compensate for the offence. This finding confirms that of Cohen et al. (1986); the preference for specific repair as an apology strategy conveys a sincere desire by the offender to make up for his shortcoming. Austin (1962) expresses in his work that the offender who makes use of acceptance and apologizes for a situation is able to make promises that such situation will not occur again. Table 9 indicate that the respondents are equally disposed to issue a promise of forbearance in English and in Arabic. Overall, however, the strategy is not popularly resorted to (only 1.4% and 1.3%) because of the natural human aversion to guaranteeing something in the future that is beyond human control. Austin (1962) makes sure that promising for a situation that is worsened is essential to make this situation better. Cohen et al. (1986) pointed out six enhancements which are enlisted below.

Intensity of an apology
The use of intensifiers is at times with performative expressions, with the purpose of adding emphasis or intensity to an apology.
Subjects much favoured the use of so by a wide margin, in comparison to really, very, and terribly in descending order of frequency. Deeply occurred only once, and awfully did not at all occur among the responses.

Intensifiers in English
According to Trosberg (1987), intensifiers are required at more severe situations.
In this study intensifiers were employed frequently and in combination in order to make the apology intensified e.g. Situation 9 (30): I'm very sorry. I really apologize. Situation 17 (17): I am so sorry!
Intensifiers were likewise used in Arabic as in English e.g.: Situation 20 (39): ‫اسف‬ ‫(جدا‬very sorry) Situation 7 (29): ‫طاحت‬ ‫اللي‬ ‫اغراضك‬ ‫معك‬ ‫اجمع‬ ‫لي‬ ‫تسمح‬ ‫جدا,‬ ‫‪(I‬اسف‬ am very sorry would you allow me to help you gather your things). Olshtain found that the severity of the offence had an influence on the choice of apology formation in all of the languages analyzed, which consists of the commonly accepted words and statements in which the apology is couched (Deutschmann, 2003).

Minimizing Responsibility
Taking responsibility of the offence done is essential for apologizing in a troublesome situation. There can be situations in which, the offender is not ready to take the full blame of an offence. Although the strategy implicitly admits of some responsibility, the offender falls short of acknowledging that he is fully responsible, thus minimizing his participation in the offence. The speakers tended to acknowledge responsibility more frequently in Arabic than in English under the basic apology strategies. That trend carries through in minimizing responsibility, more often in Arabic (7.3%) than English (5%), shown in Table 13.

Denial of responsibility
At times, there are situations when the offender totally rejects his or her involvement in the offence. There are two ways by which responsibility is rejected. The first is by outright denial by the offender of any fault, and the second is by casting blame on the offended party himself, which means that the offence is not accepted at all and the offender rejects to take any blame. It is evident from Table 13 that the respondents tended more to deny responsibility by blaming the hearer, both in English and Arabic.
According to Jaworski (1994), sometimes the offenders tend to prefer non-formulaic expressions of apology and he further informs how in some situations an apology can turn into an accusation when the person who has caused the offence tries to put the blame back on to the person who has been offended. For example: Situation 20 (7): (I didn't do anything) ‫شي‬ ‫سويت‬ ‫(ما‬denial of fault), ‫عيونك‬ ‫تفتح‬ ‫ما‬ ‫ورا‬ ‫(انت‬why don't you open your eyes) (blaming hearer).

Emotionals
Sometimes occasional outbursts, in the form of interjections, invocations, or invectives (curses) that signify the offender sentiments towards the infraction can be called emotional.   According to Austin (1962), words are meaningful and while speaking, the speaker is concerned to make clear what the intention and emotional commitment behind the words actually is, and that the saying of the words changes the situation in some way and commits the speaker to a changed position. Among the responses, interjections accounted for the highest incidence in both languages, at 86 (9.6%) for English, and 40 (4.4%) for Arabic. On the other hand, invocations occurred slightly more often in Arabic (2.0%) than they did in English (1.8%). For Example: Situation 14 (32): Oh, my God, I'm so so sorry. Situation 8 (37): ‫وهللا‬ ‫نسيتك‬ ‫‪(Oh‬أوه‬ I swear I forgot about you).

Minimizing offence
According to Brown and Levinson (1987), apologies are required in order to restore the face images and values of a person in a society. This is the reason as to why minimizing offence is essential.
We can see the frequencies and percentages of the usage of strategies of minimizing offences in both Arabic and English. Most importantly, we can notice that the ratio of minimizing offence strategies employed in Arabic is twice than in English. In Arabic, it is 14.9 % while in English, it is 6.8 %. Sometimes, it can be noticed that the subject makes use of the same strategy twice for the same situation or incident. It appears that the subject does so in order to emphasize his position or point. Situation 22 can be noticed as an example of this point, where we can see that the offence that was cutting through the line was often disparaged by the wrongdoer. In Arabic, the best example is Situation 19 (21): (sorry I have a lecture) ‫عندي.محاضره‬ ‫لكن‬ ‫تسمح‬ ‫اذا‬ ‫.معليش‬

Comments
The utilization of comments ensures that the person who offends gives some feedback, which directly confirms that the surprise catches the offender at an unintentional crime. According to Austin (1962), words keep an impact and they are usually used to deliver emotions due to which, while apologizing, the words should be used with much care.
If responses are considered, the offenders were little blaming themselves or making any remarks about them-selves both in Arabic or English as compared to remarking and commenting the environment.

Absence of Apology Strategy
The main cause that is offender is unable to understand his mistake and make an apology for his mistake is the lack of the speaker's responsibility to make the offender realize the matter. It could be possible that the offender is unable to understand that there is a need of his apology.
In addition, people are able to understand but do not want to apologize as they consider it a shame or weakness due to which, they avoid to apologize (Goffman, 1967). In table 18, the respondents showed the frequencies and percentages of no apology strategy.

Intentions with regard to apology behaviour
The AIQ or Apology Introspection Questionnaire was structured for the purpose of evaluating the intentions of the respondents with regard to apologizing behaviours by the support of their given responses. The purpose of the evaluation is to search out whether the subjects accept performative expressions as apologies and other basic strategies not as apologies. There can be situations where someone used these apparently clear expressions like "I'm sorry" without there being any intention of apology at all! (Owen, 1983).

Intentions to apologize, in English
The information given in table 18 is pointing towards the figures that 63.4% of the speech acts encompassing the full number of apology situations were categorized under strat-  egy A and were anticipated as an apology, adjacent to only 9.2% of speech acts that were categorized under strategy A that were not anticipated as apologies. Strategy B was employed alone as an admission of guilt in 4.3% of all apology situations, in opposition to only 2% as non-apologies. In grouping, Strategy B (in BC, BCD, BD) reports for 3.5% as apologies and 1.2% as non-apologies. Strategy C unaccompanied traced 1.1% as apologies and 0.6% as non-apologies; for Strategy E, the compute is 0.1% as apologies adjacent to 0% as non-apologies. The only strategy that is transformed is Strategy D, for which only 4% were anticipated as apologies and 4.6% were not due to which, it was considered to a smaller amount as an apology than as a non-apology. Whilst D was pooled with other strategies, apologies still go beyond non-apologies, except for the grouping CDE where non-apologies (0.1%) somewhat surpassed apologies (0%). Nevertheless, it can be noticed that the sample size and range are restricted, these presumptions extracted from the less recurrent strategies and combinations cannot be convincingly generalized.

Intentions to apologize, in Arabic
The case of Arabic in terms of understanding speech acts is different as employment of Strategy A combined with other strategies considerably were anticipated as apologies (60%) contrasted to the incidences they were not (4.5%). Table 19 is indicative of the information in all other strategies and combinations that are employed by the respondents, the percentage of occurrences of the speech acts was anticipated as an apology going beyond those occurrences when they were not employed, except for the combination CD in which, there were 0.6% non-apologies against 0.5% apologies and CDE in which, there were 0.1% non-apologies against 0% apologies.

CONCLUSION
Apologies that are used most commonly in English and in Arabic languages, can be broadly categorized in five funda-       (5) promise of forbearance. Holmes (1990) proclaims that an explicit expression of an apology is the most common strategy by itself and the same is supported by the results which show that the per-formative expression of sorry was mostly used at 78% in English. Although, in Arabic the equivalent to sorry‫اسف‬ was not used that much frequently but it frequency is still quite high with 40%. Offer of explanation is considered the second most frequently used apology strategy. Its frequency in Arabic language was recorded at 51% and in English the frequency is recognized at 44%. Each of these strategies was recorded with respect to various apology behaviors in both English and Arabic, in this context the explicit expression of apology is considered highly favored among the student-subjects. Offer of repair being the third highest expression of apology was recorded in Arabic and English at almost same frequency of 27%. Promise of forbearance was recorded at the lowest frequency which results in a commitment that the respondent were probably not prepared to make. The frequency of this strategy was 1% for both Arabic and English language. The reason offers of repair being recorded second highest is its politeness and sincerity that it offers and because it presents a higher sense of regret. The direct or explicit expression of apology was recorded with a predefined set of expressions. In English the respondent expressed explicit apology by either: sorry, forgive, excuse, pardon and apologize. In Arabic, the respondent can express explicit apology using a set of expressions and they are: (forgive) ‫سامح‬ (pardon)‫اعذر‬ ‫اسف,‬ (sorry) and (excuse me) ‫.عفوا‬ The English apology expression sorry and the its equivalent in Arabic (sorry)‫اسف‬ were used most frequently by the respondents and this confirms Cohen (1986) theory of "safe strategy". Respondent mostly used this expression to show that there was not deliberate intend of offense caused to the person requested for pardon. Some of the students used acknowledgement of responsibility, the frequency of use in Arabic was recorded as 37% while in English it was 27%. The findings presented met the aim of the research by determining the strategies of the speech act of apology used. Eliciting the apology behavior is often employed to dilute the situation being addressed. Respondent response in Arabic and English languages show that this expression can be used with all basic patterns of apology. Earlier findings by Holmes (1990) supported the same results and it was confirmed that the strategy that is the most frequently resorted to involve the explicit expression of apology along with the use of formulaic expressions of regret. Moreover, in most of the cases respondents intensified this expression to show intend and sincerity. The results met the goals of the study by presenting the apology behavior and patterns used in both languages.
One very evident variation that was recognized in English and Arabic apology strategies which was the use of explicit expression. In English it accounts for 21.8% while in Arabic it was 17.8%. This was a significant difference between two language apology responses. However, use of explanation in Arabic was recognized to be 9.0% quite above the percentage with which it was resorted to by English language respondents, its percentage was recognized as only 5.8%. Similarly, an offer of repair was more frequent in the Arabic language i.e. 6.6% while in English it was recorded as 4.2%, while an acknowledgment of responsibility was practically that same in both languages Arabic (1.6%) and English (1.7%). A promise of forbearance was not featured in respondents' apology behavior in Arabic, while it was employed once in the respondents' apology behavior in English. It is important to note that the for each apology expression the result are variable for each language i.e. explanation, acknowledgment of responsibility, minimizing responsibility, and intensity of apology, minimizing offence and the use of comments while apologizing in Arabic. Similarly, explicit expression of apology and frequent use of elicited emotion in English language. However, variations in modification of apology behavior strategies were determined equally in English as oppose to Arabic. Following five modification strategies were determined: intensity of an apology, minimizing responsibility, use of emotions, minimizing offence, and comments.
In this study, evidence of the five basic apology strategies were studied separately from each apology situation that is examined. Explicit apology was generously used in both languages and in almost every situation. However, as the explicit apology is the direct method of apology, so the results conforms to Olshtain (1984) and Cohen (1986) who observed and stated that "this method of apology is formulaic, easily identified as an apology, context-independent, and generally accepted for all situations in all languages." At the same time, it must be noted that not all the respondents opted acknowledgment of responsibility rather some of them preferred to minimize the offence or avoid direct responsibility. The results show that the frequency of an apology strategy that was highest in both Arabic and English was evident in the situation 5 (96%) and 9 (94%) with the explicit expression of apology. However, the results of the acknowledgement of responsibility as per records in the situations were 9 (8%), 19 (8.5%), 21 (7.5%) and 12 (7%) for these situations. In the offer of repair, the highest frequency was noted for situation 6 and 20 (37%). Results presented here met the aims of the study of finding the behavior and patterns of apology in both languages.
Although there are not major differences in the use of apology strategies and patterns however, frequency of occurrences in certain situations suggested there of modification of apology behavior and minor differences in strategies. Each language has its own merits and demerits e.g. expression of lack of intent is more than one-third more frequent in Arabic than in English. Similarly, acknowledgement of responsibility and self-deficiency about half as often in Arabic than in English. Respondent accepted the responsibility easily in minor and common offences, such as being late for a meeting. The last strategy of the promise of forbearance was not used frequently and only 12% opted for it in situation 12 that was in fact related to the unpunctuality in formal setting.
In both English and Arabic languages, the use of direct apology (through performative expressions in the explicit expression of apology strategy) was frequent, generally applied in almost all contexts. Apology Inspection Questionnaire was used to measure apology strategies used or employed directly or indirectly as well as the intentions of respondents. The questionnaire required respondent to determine themselves whether they consider expression or response as apology or not. The results states that 63.4% of acts were considered direct or intentional whereas the rest of 9.2% expressions were believed to be indirect or unintentional. The employment of indirect apology strategies was also a variable and relatively lesser then direct strategies, while other strategies like explanation, acknowledgment of responsibility and offer of repair displayed relative occurrences. However, the only scarcely used apology was promise of forbearance. It is also evident from the results that the explicit apologies were employed mostly with any intention of apology rather these were mostly used as systematic responses and generally pushed by social value system. So as a matter of fact, these explicit apologies functions as traditions of a society. Again, these finding are in conformity with Goffmann (1971), Fraser (1981) and Owen (1983). This resulted in overwhelming employment of explicit apologies and as such there is no real numerical comparison between direct and indirect apologies. Similarly, the use of formative apology "sorry" mostly lack intent and hardly stands for an apology in most of the situations as in situation 18 in which the response was 'Sorry, I have another appointment'.
There are multiple similarities and contrast in the results of this research if compared to finding of Ismail's study (1998). It was seen that in both the studies, participants have used the explicit expression of sorry much more frequently than the other expressions. However, in her study, people used this explicit expression more often (58%) than those in this study (40%). On the other hand, while discussing the results of the apology strategy of use of explanation, this study got more percentages (44% & 51%) in English and Arabic language than the Ismail's in which English and Arabic scores were 31% and 35% respectively. The use of third apology strategy of acknowledgement of responsibility in both the studies suggest the infrequent use of this strategy as compared to others as depicted in their results in which for English and Arabic, participants scored 27% and 37% in this study and 24% and 32% in Ismail's study (1998). While using the basic apology strategy of offer of repair in this study participants scored 27.1% in English and 27.7 in Arabic that were almost same whereas the Ismail's study got the percentages of 32% and 31.6% in the use of English and Arabic language. Lastly, the promise of forbearance was quite infrequent in both the studies as seen by the percentages of 1.4 and 1.3 in this study and 1.6 and 1.8 percent in that of Ismail's in English and Arabic language. The comparison of results and findings of both studies suggest that not many variations occur in the use of apology strategies in Saudi men and women's apology behaviors.
The more detailed comparison of Ismail's study on the exploration of apology behaviors of males with this study in which the female apology behaviors have been investigated suggest various aspects that have not been previously discussed in detail. The findings of this study suggest that the participants of this study reacted in a spontaneous and natural manner instead of giving fake responses. Their responses cannot be considered artificial based on the results we have got in the situation 14(29), 16(22), 21(8) and 20(5). This was the same for Ismail's study in which the respondents behave in a natural manner that included closing and opening moves. These things were evident in situation 133(1), 5(11), 16(6) and 11(40) in Ismail's study. Another important finding that this study got was related to the variations in the use of strategies for Arabic and English language. It was seen that the responses of participants differed slightly in their use of apology strategies in both these languages especially explicit expression of apology, acceptance of responsibility and explanation the most. However, Ismail, in her study showed the slight differences in the use of basic and modification strategies in English and Arabic. These strategies include acknowledgement of responsibility and emotional modification strategy, comments and minimizing offense. The difference in comparison between this study's findings and those of Ismail's suggest that there exist differences in the respondent's use of apology strategies in both studies. Lastly, another feature representative of the comparison of these two studies' findings is the indirect or direct use of apology strategies which was evident in both study results. These findings met one of the aims of the study which was finding the similarities and differences in the male and female apology strategies.