How extra-linguistic goals affect common ground formation

Sanders, Kate

Permalink

https://hdl.handle.net/2142/72868 Copy

Description

Title

How extra-linguistic goals affect common ground formation

Author(s)

Sanders, Kate

Issue Date

2015-01-21

Director of Research (if dissertation) or Advisor (if thesis)

Brown-Schmidt, Sarah

Department of Study

Psychology

Discipline

Psychology

Degree Granting Institution

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Degree Name

M.A.

Degree Level

Thesis

Keyword(s)

• common ground
• conversation
• extra-linguistic
• Goals
• reference production
• informativity
• goal habituation

Abstract

The formation of common ground between interlocutors relies on their linguistic cooperation, manifesting as shortened references produced during a given conversation. However, people have goals for their conversations, and these extra-linguistic goals can influence a variety of linguistic choices. If extra-linguistic goals do affect the formation of common ground, then reference production length may vary with speaker cooperativeness. The present research addresses in three experiments: 1) the effect of extra-linguistic goals on reference productions, 2) the relationship between informativity of the reference productions and their length, and 3) how goal habituation affects references produced under different goal states. Consistent effects of condition on the reference production lengths are not observed, however, across Experiments 1a and 2, and the effects of goal habituation are inconsistent. Experiment1b demonstrates that the length of reference productions is not related to informativity within the dialogue. However, consistent effects of round and instance are observed, as would be expected if the interlocutors were sharing conceptual pacts.

Graduation Semester

2014-12

Permalink

http://hdl.handle.net/2142/72868

Copyright and License Information

Copyright 2014 Kate Sanders

Owning Collections