Speech affordances: A structural take on how much we can do with our words

Individuals can do a broad variety of things with their words and enjoy different degrees of this capacity. What moderates this capacity? And in cases in which this capacity is unjustly disrupted, what is a good explanation for it? These are the questions I address here. I propose that speech capacity, understood as the capacity to do things with your words, is a structural property importantly dependent on individuals' position in a social structure. My account facilitates a non‐individualistic explanation of cases in which speech capacity is undermined due to speaker's perceived social identity, e.g. episodes of silencing. Instead of appealing to interlocutors' implicit bias against speaker's identity, a structural approach refers to the positions interlocutors occupy in the social structure and the discursive conventions operating upon those positions. I articulate my proposal drawing on the notion of affordances. Each position within a social structure is associated with its own range of speech affordances. Thus, speech capacity is a function of the probability distribution of speech affordances across positions in the structure.     

Knowledge, Equilibrium and Convention

There are two general classes of social conventions: conventions of coordination, and conventions of partial conflict. In coordination problems, the interests of the agents coincide, while in partial conflict problems, some agents stand to gain only if other agents unilaterally make certain sacrifices. Lewis' (1969) pathbreaking analysis of convention in terms of game theory focuses on coordination problems, and cannot accommodate partial conflict problems. In this paper, I propose a new game-theoretic definition of convention which generalizes previous game-theoretic definitions (Lewis 1969, Vanderschraaf 1995), and which can be used to characterize norms of justice in partial conflict situations. I argue that the key structural property necessary for a social arrangement to be a convention is that it be conditionally self-enforcing, in the sense that: (i) each agent has a decisive reason to follow her end of the arrangement given that she expects all to do likewise, (ii) given a different set of expectations, some agents would have had a decisive reason to deviate, and (iii) these facts are common knowledge. This leads to a definition of convention as a strict correlated equilibrium (Aumann 1974) together with appropriate common knowledge conditions. Examples are given in which it is shown how this more general account of convention can be used to analyze norms of justice as well as coordination problems. It is only a general sense of common interest; which sense all the members of the society express to one another, and which induces them to regulate their conduct by certain rules. I observe, that it will be for my interest to leave another in the possession of his goods, provided he will act in the same manner with regard to me. He is sensible of a like interest in the regulation of his conduct. When this common sense of interest is mutually express'd, and is known to both, it produces a suitable resolution and behavior. And this may properly be call'd a convention or agreement betwixt us,... David Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature And so it goes — we're here because we're here because we're here because we're here. Once the process gets started, we have a metastable self-perpetuating system of preferences, expectations, and actions capable of persisting indefinitely. As long as uniform conformity is a coordination equilibrium, so that each wants to conform conditionally upon coordination by the others, conforming action produces expectation of conforming action and expectation of conforming action produces conforming action. This is the phenomenon I call convention. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

The normativity of Lewis Conventions

David Lewis famously proposed to model conventions as solutions to coordination games, where equilibrium selection is driven by precedence, or the history of play. A characteristic feature of Lewis Conventions is that they are intrinsically non-normative. Some philosophers have argued that for this reason they miss a crucial aspect of our folk notion of convention. It is doubtful however that Lewis was merely analysing a folk concept. I illustrate how his theory can (and must) be assessed using empirical data, and argue that it does indeed miss an important aspect of real-world conventions.     

“I'll Have What She's Having”: Commentary on Paper by Karen E. Starr and Lewis Aron

This discussion utilizes a feminist discourse originating in the 1970s to reconsider Freud's famous question, “What do women want?” and from there explores some hidden dimensions in Starr and Aron's paper concerning female agency, sexuality, and the twists and turns of psychoanalytic theory and social conventions. Highlighting Rachel Maines's researches into the use of vibrators in medical treatment in particular, the discussion illuminates how social conventions function as powerful determinants that legislate what is seen and not seen, what is questioned and what is accepted—and ultimately what is considered psychoanalytic “bedrock.”     

Characterizing the Dynamics of Learning in Repeated Reference Games

The language we use over the course of conversation changes as we establish common ground and learn what our partner finds meaningful. Here we draw upon recent advances in natural language processing to provide a finer-grained characterization of the dynamics of this learning process. We release an open corpus (>15,000 utterances) of extended dyadic interactions in a classic repeated reference game task where pairs of participants had to coordinate on how to refer to initially difficult-to-describe tangram stimuli. We find that different pairs discover a wide variety of idiosyncratic but efficient and stable solutions to the problem of reference. Furthermore, these conventions are shaped by the communicative context: words that are more discriminative in the initial context (i.e., that are used for one target more than others) are more likely to persist through the final repetition. Finally, we find systematic structure in how a speaker's referring expressions become more efficient over time: Syntactic units drop out in clusters following positive feedback from the listener, eventually leaving short labels containing open-class parts of speech. These findings provide a higher resolution look at the quantitative dynamics of ad hoc convention formation and support further development of computational models of learning in communication.     

Conventionalism and the world as bare sense-data

We are confident of many of the judgements we make as to what sorts of alterations the members of nature's kinds can survive, and what sorts of events mark the ends of their existences. But is our confidence based on empirical observation of nature's kinds and their members? Conventionalists deny that we can learn empirically which properties are essential to the members of nature's kinds. Judgements of sameness in kind between members, and of numerical sameness of a member across time, merely project our conventions of individuation. Our confidence is warranted because apart from those conventions there are no phenomena of kind-sameness or of numerical sameness across time. There is just ‘stuff’ displaying properties. This paper argues that conventionalists can assign no properties to the ‘stuff’ beyond immediate phenomenal properties. Consequently they cannot explain how each of us comes to be able to wield ‘our conventions’.     

A probabilistic corpus-based model of syntactic parallelism

Work in experimental psycholinguistics has shown that the processing of coordinate structures is facilitated when the two conjuncts share the same syntactic structure [Frazier, L., Munn, A., & Clifton, C. (2000). Processing coordinate structures. Journal of Psycholinguistic Research, 29(4) 343–370]. In the present paper, we argue that this parallelism effect is a specific case of the more general phenomenon of syntactic priming—the tendency to repeat recently used syntactic structures. We show that there is a significant tendency for structural repetition in corpora, and that this tendency is not limited to syntactic environments involving coordination, though it is greater in these environments. We present two different implementations of a syntactic priming mechanism in a probabilistic parsing model and test their predictions against experimental data on NP parallelism in English. Based on these results, we argue that a general purpose priming mechanism is preferred over a special mechanism limited to coordination. Finally, we show how notions of activation and decay from ACT-R can be incorporated in the model, enabling it to account for a set of experimental data on sentential parallelism in German.     

Convention as correlated equilibrium

Aconvention is a state in which agents coordinate their activity, not as the result of an explicit agreement, but because their expectations are aligned so that each individual believes that all will act so as to achieve coordination for mutual benefit. Since agents are said to follow a convention if they coordinate without explicit agreement, the notion raises fundamental questions: (1) Why do certain conventions remain stable over time?, and (2) How does a convention emerge in the first place? In a pioneering study, Lewis (1969) addresses these questions by applyingnoncooperative game theory. Lewis defines a convention as aNash coordination equilibrium of a noncooperative game that issalient, that is, it is somehow conspicuous to the agents so that all expect one another to conform with the equilibrium. This paper presents a new game theoretic definition of conventions, which formalizes the notion of salience and which also generalizes the class of conventions Lewis discusses in his work. I define a convention as acorrelated equilibrium (Aumann 1974, 1987) satisfying apublic intentions criterion: Every agent wants his intended action to becommon knowledge. I argue that many conventions correspond to correlated equilibria that are not Nash equilibria, and that this is consistent with Lewis' general viewpoint. Finally, I argue that game theoretic characterizations of convention, such as Lewis' and my own, help to explain a convention's stability, but that a fully satisfactory account of the emergence of convention requires a theory of equilibrium selection beyond the scope of Lewis' work.I thank Cristina Bicchieri, Vince Crawford, Greg Kavka, Brian Skyrms, and an anonymous referee for their many helpful comments on earlier versions of this essay. I would also like to express my gratitude to the U. C. Irvine Focused Research Programs in Public Choice and Scientific Explanation and the Sarah Scaife Foundation for funding the research leading to this essay.[T]his may properly enough be call'd a convention or agreement betwixt us, tho' without the interposition of a promise; since the actions of each of us have a reference to those of the other, and are perform'd upon the supposition, that something is to be perform'd on the other part. Two men, who pull the oars of a boat, do it by an agreement or convention, tho' they have never given promises to each other. In like manner are languages gradually establish'd by human conventions without any promise. In like manner do gold and silver become the common measures of exchange, and are esteem'd sufficient payment for what is of a hundred times their value.David Hume,A Treatise of Human Nature. Hume (1888, p. 490).     

Candidate Evaluations Through the Lens of Adaptive Followership Psychology: How and Why Voters Prefer Leaders Based on Character Traits

An extensive literature in political science shows how citizens' evaluations of politicians—as well as their electoral behavior—are affected by trait impressions of these politicians. However, deeper, interdisciplinary theory building that seeks to address when and for whom specific trait impressions come to guide candidate evaluations remains absent. In this article, I outline the theory of adaptive followership that seeks to address this shortcoming. Grounded in evolutionary psychology, I argue that leadership evolved as a solution to problems of intragroup coordination in ancestral small-scale societies. In order to understand the traits that drive followers' and voters' evaluations of leaders and politicians, one should therefore focus on problems related to group coordination and ask how these problems might regulate followers' prioritizations of various traits in leaders. On this basis, I outline an analytical framework consisting of three predictions that simultaneously formulate how (1) contexts and (2) individual differences of relevance to a given group-coordination problem regulate trait preferences, and (3) how such preferences differ between leaders and nonleaders (i.e., other social categories). The analytical framework is applied for structuring two reviews (including new empirical studies) of the ways through which intergroup conflict and disease threat, respectively, affect followers' trait preferences in leaders. Finally, directions and suggestions for future research on trait-based candidates and leader evaluations are discussed.     

The Unconventional, but Conventionalist, Legacy of Lewis’s “Convention”

The philosopher David Lewis is credited by many social scientists, including mainstream economists, with having founded the modern (game-theoretical) approach to conventions, viewed as solutions to recurrent coordination problems. Yet it is generally ignored that he revised his approach, soon after the publication of his well-known book. I suggest that this revision has deep implications (probably not perceived by Lewis himself) on the analytical links between coordination, uncertainty and rationality. Thinking anew about these issues leads me to map out an alternative social scientific research programme. The traditional ontological equipment of methodological individualism should be reinforced in order to admit the existence of an “intersubjective” world beside the two familiar worlds: the “objective” world of observable things, and the “subjective” world of expectations and individual beliefs. In particular, language becomes necessary to understand coordination via conventions, rather than the other way round. That has led a group of institutionalist economists and pragmatist sociologists to develop an enlarged model of rationality, no longer isolated from questions of coordination and values. This model is the basis for the “Economics of Conventions”.     

The Berlin Wall on the Therapist's Couch

This paper falls under the rubric of the sociology of knowledge, which bridges the gap between phenomenological philosophy and the human sciences (Berger et al., 1969). It presents an empirical investigation of the communicative construction of psychotherapeutic reality. I examine therapeutic talk and psychotherapists' reconstructions of the transition from state socialism in Germany in 1989. In both instances I show how psychotherapists' commonly shared interpretative conventions and rules of reasoning produce typical accounts. The first part of the paper shows how certain interpretative conventions and rules of reasoning organize therapeutic talk and interaction in general. The second part focuses on how the interpretative conventions typical of therapy also inform psychotherapists' interpretations of the transition from state socialism.     

Is behaviorism false because there is no such thing as conditioning? Popper and skinner on learning

Sir Karl Popper has claimed that behaviorism is misguided because it holds that conditioning occurs through repetition. According to Popper, there is no such thing as learning through repetition. To the limited extent that philosophers of science have concerned themselves with behaviorism, this attack is one of the most direct and unique in that the battleground is not over the value of mentalism/cognitivism but a bold claim that conditioning—the heart and soul of behaviorism—is fictitious. This paper examines the soundness of Popper's argument against behaviorism by examining whether operant and classical conditioning rely on learning through repetition and suffer from other problems Popper attributes to the notion of conditioning. Although Popper correctly attributes certain properties to classical conditioning, he fails to undermine the empirical evidence that such conditioning occurs. Second, we claim that although B. F. Skinner is never entirely clear, operant conditioning does not rely on repetition nor does it suffer from the other problems Popper attributes to conditioning. Thus, Popper's argument also fails because of his assumption that all conditioning is classical conditioning and therefore his misattributing properties of classical conditioning to operant conditioning. We conjecture that the earlier polemics of John Watson and Watson's sole reliance on classical conditioning probably contributed to Popper's confusion on this point.     

Foster Children and ADHD: Anger, Violence, and Institutional Power

This paper explores the ways in which foster children and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) intersect as social and medical categories. Through the method of interpretive biography based on the official case file, this paper shows how the experiences of violence and ADHD become linked in the child's life through the emotion of anger. In this way, it is possible to see how the power dynamics of the medical, educational and welfare systems lock the diagnosis with its embedded meanings into the child's life. It is also possible to see how counter forces like a caring foster family can challenge medical and welfare authorities.     

Understanding the relationship between repetition priming and mere exposure

Over the last two decades interest in implicit memory, most notably repetition priming, has grown considerably. During the same period, research has also focused on the mere exposure effect. Although the two areas have developed relatively independently, a number of studies has described the mere exposure effect as an example of implicit memory. Tacit in their comparisons is the assumption that the effect is more specifically a demonstration of repetition priming. Having noted that this assumption has attracted relatively little attention, this paper reviews current evidence and shows that it is by no means conclusive. Although some evidence is suggestive of a common underlying mechanism, even a modified repetition priming (perceptual fluency/attribution) framework cannot accommodate all of the differences between the two phenomena. Notwithstanding this, it seems likely that a version of this theoretical framework still offers the best hope of a comprehensive explanation for the mere exposure effect and its relationship to repetition priming. As such, the paper finishes by offering some initial guidance as to ways in which the perceptual fluency/attribution framework might be extended, as well as outlining important areas for future research.     

Why is Ethics First Philosophy? Levinas in Phenomenological Context

This paper explores, from a phenomenological perspective, the conditions necessary for the possession of intentional content, i.e., for being intentionally directed toward the world. It argues that Levinas's concept of ethics as first philosophy makes an important contribution to this task. Intentional directedness, as understood here, is normatively structured. Levinas's ‘ethics’ can be understood as a phenomenological account of how our experience of the other subject as another subject takes place in the recognition of the normative force of a command. This supplies a condition that—as the paper shows by examining Husserl and Sartre on how our experience of the Other constitutes an ‘objective’ world—earlier phenomenologists have misunderstood, because they have treated ethical experience as ‘founded’ on a prior theory of representation (‘ontology’ in Levinas's language). Ethics is first philosophy because it is only by acknowledging the command in the ‘face’ of the Other that we can account for the sensitivity to the normative distinctions that structure intentional content. Throughout, the paper shows how Levinas's analyses, in Totality and Infinity, draw upon and develop the analyses of Husserl and Sartre.     

Whose Place is This Anyway? Reflecting upon Hospitality and Higher Education

In this essay I propose that using online tools to connect geographically‐separated classrooms for real‐time collaborative learning experiences may effectively develop intercultural competency in the religious studies classroom. I explore personal examples from several international and inter‐institutional collaborations with Jacques Derrida's reflections on hospitality to explain how using online tools in this way productively puts into question conventions about place, host, and guest. This engagement of students in collaboration with others beyond their classroom is effective because it takes the focus of learning past facts students might learn towards how they are communicating to learn.     

Expression,indication and showing what’s within

This essay offers a constructive criticism of Part I of Davis’ Meaning, Expression and Thought. After a brief exposition, in Sect. 2, of the main points of the theory that will concern us, I raise a challenge in Sect. 3 for the characterization of expression that is so central to his program. I argue first of all that a sincere expression of a thought, feeling, or mood shows it. Yet attention to this fact reveals that it does not go without saying how it is possible to show such things as thoughts, feelings or moods; we need an account of how this is possible, and I offer a partial such account in Sect. 4. Second, much of the attraction of Davis’ program depends on its ability to explain how linguistic meaning can be arrived at without covertly presupposing linguistic conventions. This in turn depends, in Davis’ hands, upon the claim that it is possible to express any of a wide range of ideas in the absence of conventions. I argue in Sect. 5 that the account of showing at which we will by then have arrived makes clear that Davis needs, and lacks, an explanation of how it is possible to do this.

Moving Forward: The Existential Motion of the Self in Kierkegaard's Pseudonymous Works

Each of Kierkegaard's pseudonymous authors address the question of the existing individual and what it truly means to be a self. This article discusses the existing individual as depicted by the pseudonymous authors, focusing on motion, activity, and repetition. In particular, this article seeks to pinpoint the motion and activity of the self through Kierkegaard's notion of repetition, contending that repetition is a decisive action brought forward discontinuously through a breach in time's succession. I address the self's movement forward in four sections. In the first I introduce the overarching distinction between the motion of existing individuals and empirical objects, distinguishing the character of my investigation. After clarifying this distinction, the second section focuses on Anti-Climacus’ conception of the self as activity (a positing of the synthesis), revealing that for an existing individual the self is not given but a task to be actualized. The final section first details the positing of the synthesis as repetition and second contends that, through repetition, the inner workings of the self reveal its activity as a discontinuous breach in time that occurs by virtue of the eternal.     

Here Today,Gone Tomorrow? Assessing How Timing and Repetition of Scandal Information Affects Candidate Evaluations

Scholars and political consultants alike know that during a campaign even the hint of a scandal has the potential to distract from a candidate's policy messages—or even worse—can have dire consequences on Election Day. But does it matter whether the scandal breaks early as opposed to late in the campaign? And how do citizens respond when the scandal drags on for weeks? This study represents the first effort to shed light on these temporal dynamics. Results reveal that timing affects the immediate impact of scandal information, the rate at which those initial effects decay, and candidate evaluations offered at the campaign's conclusion. Additionally, I develop two competing hypotheses regarding how citizens may process scandal information when it is repeated throughout a campaign. Empirical tests suggest that voters eventually reach a saturation threshold after which additional repetition of scandal information has negligible effects on evaluations unless new details are a prominent feature of ongoing coverage, in which case repetition can extend the negative effects of scandal.     

Crossing Boundaries: Commentary on Paper by Sarah Hill

This commentary focuses on two aspects of Hill's presentation. First, it addresses the critical role of repetition compulsion in carrying into analytic enactments the patient's early, unsymbolized traumas. This discussion addresses, furthermore, Hill's reference to her early, preverbal, experience with an African nanny, as this resonated with some of the author's personal experiences. It is suggested that, particularly in American culture, the identities of white children who experience extended care by black nannies must be regarded as multiply determined, race being a critical determinant. How this aspect of white identity is negotiated in a culture bounded by established racial dichotomies is regarded as critical to analytic inquiry, regardless of the racial makeup of the analytic dyad.