Metrical Characteristics of English Interviews

Abstract

An “interview” is more specific way of talking, and it is the technique to gain the particular data effectively which the interviewer wants to know through the conversation. In this paper, English interviews: Larry King Live on CNN were metrically analyzed. Larry King Live is one of the CNN’s highest-rated shows, and Mr. King is regarded as the first American talk show host to have a worldwide audience. For comparison, English news materials from CNN Live Today as well as the inaugural addresses of the three U.S. Presidents were analyzed. In short, frequency characteristics of character- and word-appearance were investigated with a program written in C++. In this analysis, an approximate equation of an exponential function [y = c * exp(-bx)] was used to educe the characteristics of each material. Moreover, to obtain the difficulty-level, the percentage of the American basic vocabulary as well as the value of K-characteristic was calculated. As a result, it was clearly shown that the interviews have the same tendency as English journalism in character-appearance. Moreover, it was shown quantitatively that the interviews are a little easier to listen than CNN news.