Discourse production and comprehension

The present paper reports on an experiment which was set up to examine whether we can make a speaker either accent or de-accent particular words by systematically varying the objective probability that a particular referent will be mentioned (and therewith the referent’s predictability for speaker and listener). In the experiment each of 24 speakers was asked to watch a visual display, showing a very simple configuration of letter symbols, and to describe orally each change in the current configuration to a listener. By manipulating the letter configurations shown on the display, the objective probability that the speaker would mention a particular letter could be controlled. Letters could either move around on the screen (moving letters) or remain fixed and serve as spatial reference points (fixed letters). Objective probabilities were 0.5 and 1 for both moving letters and fixed letters. The main findings were the following: (1) When a referent is fully predictable to speaker and listener there is a high proportion of ellipsis, particularly for the moving letter, which was always referred to from subject position. (2) The probability that a word referring to a letter will be accented appears not to be immediately controlled by the predictability of the referent. The controlling factor is rather the preceding linguistic context. More specifically, the probability of accenting, being close to 1 the first time a specific referent is mentioned, sharply decreases when the same referent is mentioned for the second time in a row, and decreases again when this same referent is mentioned three or more times in a row. However, as soon as the competing referent is mentioned once, in the same role (moving or fixed letter), the probability of accenting jumps up again. (3) The probability of accenting is systematically lower for the moving letters in subject position (average 0.32) than for the fixed letters in predicate position (average 0.52). In view of these findings, de-accenting, defined as conspicuously omitting an accent on a word that, for grammatical reasons, otherwise would have been accented, is interpreted as a device which can be used by a cooperative speaker for helping the listener to find the intended referent as easily and quickly as possible. It is supposed that speakers not using this device systematically give their listeners a harder time.

/pdf/what-makes-speakers-omit-pitch-accents-an-experiment-28alojqj48.pdf

What Makes Speakers Omit Pitch Accents? An Experiment

/pdf/out-of-style-reanimating-stylistic-study-in-composition-and-23lstbdq4m.pdf

Out of Style: Reanimating Stylistic Study in Composition and Rhetoric

Recent research on human cognition has involved characterization of the processes, strategies, and knowledge that contribute to competent performance, and identification of the ways these change as competence develops. Such work is contributing not only to a better understanding of what learning involves, but also to a theoretical base for the measurement of what has been learned. In this paper, we will analyze the implications that knowledge of human learning and performance can have for the design of achievement tests, concentrating on one particular area of academic testing: achievement in reading. This subject is of special interest since, in addition to the questions often raised about what standardized tests should and actually do measure when they test "reading comprehension" (e.g., Johnston, 1981; Pyrczak, 1972; Tuinman, 1974), there has been a great deal of recent theoretical and empirical activity surrounding the reading process. Psychologists and educators frequently find it convenient to think about the reading process in terms of stages through which comprehension of a text evolves. An example of such a model is one used to interpret the results of the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). It contains the following four steps or stages: (a) initial comprehension, (b) preliminary interpretations, (c) reexamination of the text in light of these interpretations, and (d) extended and documented interpretation (NAEP, 1981). Using this model has resulted in two major conclusions about achievement in reading. First, although the majority of students were successful in their initial comprehension and preliminary interpretations of a text, only 5 to 10 percent seemed able to move beyond the second level of processing. Second, based on students' ability to complete the processing required at the first two stages of the model, it was concluded that improvement at later stages would entail the design of instructional programs that could provide both the necessary procedures and motivation for performing at higher levels. This interpretation of the NAEP results suggests that both reading instruction and achievement testing, although adequately addressing lower level reading requirements, may be doing so at the expense of an emphasis on higher levels. Recent theory and research, on the other hand, indicate that in many cases the degree of success at one level of processing is a function of individuals' skill in processing at other levels. If this is so, an alternative view of reading instruction and testing is needed in which (a) the skills involved in reading are assumed to be more interrelated than in a stage model, and (b) revisions are made in the way that teaching and testing take into account interactions among components of reading. Perfetti and Lesgold (1979) illustrate this point in the following way:

Reading theory and the assessment of reading achievement

A great deal of current research in language acquisition and in ESL classroom practice is coalescing into a method for second language instruction called Communicative Language Teaching (CLT). Although there is agreement about some of its characteristics, other aspects of this method lack consensus or even clear definition. One reason for this may be because CLT has moved away from the metaphors commonly used to describe language teaching but has not as yet fastened onto one of its own. This article discusses some characteristics of what such a new metaphor might be and reviews a few of the ways in which CLT guides classroom practice, aligns ESL teaching with current theory in other fields, and offers directions for future research.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdfplus/3586711.pdf

Communicative Language Teaching: A New Metaphor

Communication using symbols (such as words) structured with grammar

Language and Memory.

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Citations

Discourse production and comprehension

What Makes Speakers Omit Pitch Accents? An Experiment

Out of Style: Reanimating Stylistic Study in Composition and Rhetoric

Reading theory and the assessment of reading achievement

Communicative Language Teaching: A New Metaphor

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