Understanding text after severe closed-head injury: assessing inferences and memory operations with a think-aloud procedure

A think-aloud method was used to examine the content of information available to working memory during narrative comprehension in a CHI population. Twenty severe CHI participants (>1 year post-injury) and 20 controls talked aloud after they read each sentence of story narratives. Trabasso and Magliano's (1996a) verbal protocol analysis was then used to code for the production of inferential and non-inferential clauses and the memory operations that supported inferential clause production. We found that CHI and control groups produced a comparable number of clauses, that inferences dominated narrative comprehension, and that both groups produced more explanatory inferences than predictive or associative inferences. Despite these qualitative similarities, the CHI group demonstrated poorer comprehension, generated proportionately fewer inferences, relied less on retrieval as a memory source for explanatory inferences, and produced more non-inferential clauses and associative inferences.     

Referential cohesion and logical coherence of narration after closed head injury

A group with closed head injury was compared to neurologically intact controls regarding the referential cohesion and logical coherence of narrative production. A sample of six stories was obtained with tasks of cartoon-elicited story-telling and auditory-oral retelling. We found deficits in the clinical group with respect to referential cohesion, logical coherence, and accuracy of narration. The occurrence of deficits depended on the condition of narrative production and, to some extent, on the particular story used. The primary implications of this study pertain to the attention given by researchers to the feature of discourse production being studied and processing demands of the task.     

Toward a Science of Transdisciplinary Action Research

This paper offers a conceptual framework for establishing a science of transdisciplinary action research. Lewin's (1951) concept of action research highlights the scientific and societal value of translating psychological research into community problem-solving strategies. Implicit in Lewin's formulation is the importance of achieving effective collaboration among behavioral researchers, community members and policy makers. The present analysis builds on Lewin's analysis by outlining programmatic directions for the scientific study of transdisciplinary research and community action. Three types of collaboration, and the contextual circumstances that facilitate or hinder them, are examined: (1) collaboration among scholars representing different disciplines; (2) collaboration among researchers from multiple fields and community practitioners representing diverse professional and lay perspectives; and (3) collaboration among community organizations across local, state, national, and international levels. In the present analysis, transdisciplinary action research is viewed as a topic of scientific study in its own right to achieve a more complete understanding of prior collaborations and to identify strategies for refining and sustaining future collaborations (and their intended outcomes) among researchers, community members and organizations.     

Argumentative Ordering of Utterances for Language Generation in Multi-party Human–Computer Dialogue

In trying to control various aspects concerning utterance production in multi-party human–computer dialogue, argumentative considerations play an important part, particularly in choosing appropriate lexical units so that we fine-tune the degree of persuasion that each utterance has. A preliminary step in this endeavor is the ability to place an ordering relation between semantic forms (that are due to be realized as utterances, by the machine), concerning their persuasion strength, with respect to certain (explicit or implicit) conclusions. Thus, in this article, we propose a mechanism for assessing utterances, in terms of their argumentative force. The framework designed conflates insights from Asher and Lascarides’ SDRT (“Segmented Discourse Representation Theory”), and from Anscombre and Ducrot’s AT (“Argumentation Theory”). These mechanisms are included in a language generation component of a multi-party dialogue system for book reservation applications (i.e., a “virtual librarian”), and thus evaluated via typical human–machine conversations.

Learning on Work Placement: The Narrative Development of Social Competence

This paper explores the development of social competence by examining examples of research interviews conducted with 35 British undergraduate students on work placements. Work placement schemes are a characteristic of contemporary higher education, which is particularly geared towards students’ development of employability and transferable skills. Among these skills is that of social competence which is often taken for granted as emerging from normative adult developmental processes. Research on social competence is mostly confined to developmental psychology and focused on studying children and adolescents in their social settings. Moreover, the methodology of social competence is often developed from a child-developmental perspective, neglecting the situation-specific development beyond childhood. The paper argues that social competence is examinable as situated discursive practice and that it is essential to understanding career development. Membership categorisation analysis identifies the participant’s fluid positioning in narrating experiences of work and university. Lastly the paper addresses implications for theories of development and learning and considers ways in which this study can be expanded in the future.

Moving to the speed of sound: context modulation of the effect of acoustic properties of speech

Suprasegmental acoustic patterns in speech can convey meaningful information and affect listeners' interpretation in various ways, including through systematic analog mapping of message-relevant information onto prosody. We examined whether the effect of analog acoustic variation is governed by the acoustic properties themselves. For example, fast speech may always prime the concept of speed or a faster response. Alternatively, the effect may be modulated by the context-dependent interpretation of those properties; the effect of rate may depend on how listeners construe its meaning in the immediate linguistic or communicative context. In two experiments, participants read short scenarios that implied, or did not imply, urgency. Scenarios were followed by recorded instructions, spoken at varying rates. The results show that speech rate had an effect on listeners' response speed; however, this effect was modulated by discourse context. Speech rate affected response speed following contexts that emphasized speed, but not without such contextual information.     

Understanding the glue of narrative structure: Children's on- and off-line inferences about characters’ goals

Because characters’ goals play a key role in the structure of narratives, the ability to make inferences about goals is essential to narrative comprehension. Despite their importance, no previous studies have examined the process by which children make these goal inferences. In the current study, we examined 6- and 8-year-old children's goal inference making processes through think-aloud protocols. We also examined the product of comprehension, the mental representation of text, through free recall and comprehension questions. The results revealed that children of both ages regularly made appropriate goal inferences while listening to narratives. In addition, the number of goal inferences predicted children's recall of the stories. Thus, children as young as 6 years old are sensitive to the vital role of characters’ goals in narrative structure, and they can engage in sophisticated cognitive processing while they listen to narratives to form coherent mental representations of them.     

Virtue blindness and hegemony: qualitative evidence of negotiated ethical frameworks in the social language of university research administration

The study used critical discourse analysis (CDA) to elucidate normative structures of ethical behavior in university research administration which may be useful for knowledge transference to future studies of research integrity. Research administration appears to support integrity in the research environment through four very strong normative domains: (1) respect for authority structures; (2) respect for institutional boundaries; (3) professionalism; and (4) a strong sense of virtue. The strong norm structure of research administration, however, appears to be threatened by the fifth domain, (5) political power, which is inhabited by prestigious faculty with tenure, top-down authority misalignment, and the power for some institutional members to circumvent the system. The strong normative structure also appears threatened by the overall consequentiality of the regulatory environment, and shifting contexts that threaten personal virtue. In the end, the normative structure is fluid, politically acquiescent to power, and ambiguous. Although the professional core of the norm structure is strong, the strengths and weaknesses in the overall system can be connected to poorly constructed elements of the institutional environment.