Abstract

In spoken interactions, interlocutors carefully plan, and time their utterances, minimizing gaps and overlaps between consecutive turns. Cross-linguistic comparison has indicated that spoken languages vary only minimally in terms of turn-timing, and language acquisition research has shown pre-linguistic vocal turn-taking in the first half year of life. These observations suggest that the turn-taking system may provide a fundamental basis for our linguistic capacities. The question remains, however, to what extent our capacity for rapid turn-taking is determined by modality constraints. The avoidance of overlapping turns could be motivated by the difficulty of hearing and speaking at the same time. If so, turn-taking in sign might show greater toleration for overlap. Alternatively, signed conversations may show a similar distribution of turn-timing as spoken languages, thus avoiding both gaps and overlaps. To address this question we look at turn-timing in question–answer sequences in spontaneous conversations of Sign Language of the Netherlands. The findings indicate that although there is considerable overlap in two or more signers’ articulators in conversation, when proper allowance is made for onset preparation, post-utterance retraction and the intentional holding of signs for response, turn-taking latencies in sign look remarkably like those reported for spoken language. This is consistent with the possibility that, at least with regard to responses to questions, speakers and signers follow similar time courses in planning and producing their utterances in on-going conversation. This suggests that turn-taking systems may well be a shared cognitive infrastructure underlying all modern human languages, both spoken and signed.

Highlights

  • Spontaneous conversations among speakers often run smoothly with slight overlaps and gaps between consecutive turns (Sacks et al, 1974)

  • The Timing of Question–Answer Sequences To test whether signers optimize turn-taking on the basis of stroke-to-stroke turn boundaries, we compared turn transition times in Nederlandse Gebarentaal (NGT) with turn transition times in spoken question– answer sequences in ten languages as reported in Stivers et al (2009)

  • This study uses a corpus analysis of Sign Language of the Netherlands (NGT) in order to address the question as to what degree turn-timing in signed conversation differs from turntiming in spoken conversation

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Summary

Introduction

Spontaneous conversations among speakers often run smoothly with slight overlaps and gaps between consecutive turns (Sacks et al, 1974). A general observation in studies of spoken interaction is that speakers orient toward a one-at-a-time principle when taking turns at talk, and do so at a surprisingly fast pace across a wide range of Frontiers in Psychology | www.frontiersin.org de Vos et al. Turn-timing in signed conversations spoken languages. The universality of this tightly organized behavior in spoken conversation, as well as its clear precursors in early infancy, make a case for turn-taking constituting an important part of human communicative ethology (Levinson, 2006). A leading question for the research reported here is to what extent sign language users operate the same turn-taking system as used in spoken languages, especially with regard to turn-timing

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