Protecting Face in the L2 Corrective Moment: Positive Teacher Interpersonal Behaviors and the Reconfiguration of Credibility

Abstract

This study investigates how positive teacher interpersonal communication behaviors operate when learner error places face at risk in real-time L2 classroom interaction. It reframes error correction as a relational event rather than a purely linguistic or cognitive one, examining the conditions under which correction can be handled without threatening learner dignity, participation, or continued engagement. The study draws on data from culturally diverse English language teachers working with multicultural learner groups in Ireland. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with a small purposive sample: nine teachers (from Ireland, Türkiye, Brazil, and South Korea), each with professional experience in at least two countries. Interviews lasted between 45 and 121 minutes and were transcribed verbatim. Segments in the focus of this study were analyzed through an interpretive re-reading, using Xie & Derakhshan’s (2021) model of seven positive teacher interpersonal communication behaviors—care, clarity, credibility, rapport, stroke, immediacy, and confirmation—as the interpretive lens and face-work theory (Brown & Levinson, 1987; Goffman, 1967) as the interactional frame. The analysis yielded three distinct strands.. First, care, stroke, and confirmation intensified in the corrective moment, functioning as rapport-building practices through which teachers softened, delayed, redirected, or shared the burden of correction. Second, credibility was reconfigured away from infallibility: participants acknowledged their own errors, integrated learner corrections into their practice, and reported learning from learners’ mistakes. Third, a contrastive case demonstrated that surface-level mistake tolerance can remain organized around teacher-centered authority, retraining the face-threatening dynamics it appears to mitigate. L2 corrective feedback cannot be adequately understood through corrective form alone; its effectiveness depends on the relational architecture through which error is made visible without threatening learner dignity or participation. Positive teacher interpersonal behaviors—particularly care, stroke, confirmation, and a reconfigured credibility—constitute the relational conditions under which correction becomes a protected site for learning rather than a moment of public exposure. Corresponding author: Ebru Boynueğri E-mail: boynuegri.ebru@gmail.com Cite this article as: Boynueğri, E., & Alagözlü, N. (2026). Protecting face in the L2 corrective moment: positive teacher interpersonal behaviors and the reconfiguration of credibility. HAYEF: Journal of Education, 23, 0057, doi: 10.5152/hayef.2026.26057.