Story Characters Research Articles

The Development of Referring Expression Use from Age 4 to 7 in Swedish-Speaking Children

ABSTRACT When telling a story, a speaker needs to refer to story characters using appropriate expressions, which requires a mental model of the discourse. We hypothesize that, compared to those of adults, children’s discourse models are based more on factors that are less cognitively demanding, such as animacy, and as they grow older, discourse factors such as givenness will start to play a larger role. To test this, we conducted a longitudinal study of referring expression use in elicited narratives. Swedish-speaking children (n = 17) were tested three times between age 4 and 7 and compared to adults (n = 20). The results show that children, like adults, take into account if, when and how a character has been mentioned earlier when referring, but that they rely more on animacy than adults. These results indicate that the various cues for referential choices are in place in preschool children’s discourse models, but are weighted differently than in adults.

Examining Readers’ Emotional Responses to Stories

Abstract: Emotional responses are a central feature of readers’ narrative experiences. Situations in which readers adopt characters’ goals and experience similar emotional reactions to story events are often the focus of research on readers’ experiences of stories. However, readers may understand (or appraise) story events in a way that differs from the main character, and may consequently feel different emotions. In the current work, we leverage an appraisal theory perspective to clarify conditions under which readers experience emotions that mirror characters’ emotional responses to story events, as well as conditions under which readers experience distinct emotions. Study 1 examined readers’ experience of anger toward different story characters. Study 2 examined readers’ experience of sadness or fear for one story character. Results suggest that readers appraise the event from both a character’s perspective as well as their individual view, which generally translates into the experience of emotions that correspond with both the character’s appraisals and their own.

Brave Early Childhood Characters in The Children's Story “Play Together Yuk!” by Watiek Ideo

One of the important aspects of early childhood is character. Character is attached to the child and helps him to be able to live life. This study aims to describe and analyze the brave characters of early childhood in the children's story "Main Bareng Yuk" by Watiek Ideo. This research is qualitative with a type of literature research. Data collection uses reading and recording techniques. Data analysis uses reduction techniques, data encoding, verification, and conclusion drawing. The results showed that there are brave characters of early childhood in the story "Play Yuk" by Watiek Ideo, namely: Courage to invite others to play, courage to compromise, courage to take other people's things, courage to express feelings, and courage to apologize.

Secondary characters in narratives of wrongful conviction

Research on wrongful convictions has focused mainly on the relationships and interactions among wrongfully-convicted persons and state actors, perpetuating an overly-simplistic understanding of the harms of wrongful conviction. In this article, I analyze narratives of wrongful conviction obtained through in-depth interviews with 15 exonerated men in the U.S. to shift attention toward these stories’ “secondary characters”—those individuals who were neither the main protagonists nor the key antagonists in participants’ narratives, but who nonetheless significantly shaped how the men made sense of their experiences of harm and their journeys from victimhood to vindication. Drawing on research in narrative victimology, I argue that focusing on the secondary characters in wrongful conviction stories facilitates a more nuanced understanding of how the injustice of wrongful conviction is experienced and processed—one that avoids reproducing the binary logic of the criminal legal system, which too often reduces wrongful conviction cases to one-dimensional stories of innocent people versus the state.

Effects of negative emotional valence on readers’ text processing and memory for text: an eye-tracking study

AbstractComprehension of stories requires readers to take the perspective of the story characters and imagine or feel their cognitive and affective states. The study investigated how variations in emotional valence within a literary text affected readers’ global text processing, as reflected in their eye movements during the first and second-pass reading, and their memory for text. Processes of reading were also examined in relation to readers’ dispositional empathy. Undergraduate students (N = 42) were assigned to an emotionally negative or neutral reading condition. They read a natural text passage from a suspense story while their ocular behavior was registered. After reading, they responded to multiple-choice questions assessing their memory of the text. Results revealed longer first-pass fixation times for content evoking negative emotions than for neutral content, which could be suggestive of a more analytical processing of the former. These effects were however local and did not impact the processing of the text at global level. Memory for the emotionally negative content was more accurate than memory for the neutral content. Dispositional empathy did not contribute to reading processes and outcome. Findings are discussed against the mixed results in the current literature and practical implications are also outlined.

Взаимодействие тематических доминант рекреативности в информационном теледискурсе

The research paper is devoted to the urgent problem of content change in news discourse as a whole, and informative TV discourse in particular. The article presents the results of a study in combinatorial features of the recreation thematic dominants in the news TV discourse. Frequent nuclear and borderline thematic dominants of positive and negative recreation are identified. Discursive schemes, which reflect the variety of relations that arise between nuclear and borderline themes to implement a recreational function, are built. It has been established that the active combination of recreational themes models special communicative television space in accordance with the emotional aim of receiving pleasure, which is facilitated by verbal explicators of various modes of perception (lexemes with semantics of colour), vocabulary of emotional and aesthetic assessments. An emotional-and-sensual image is revealed to be created in news reports about official events, urban objects. In some cases semantic development is presented with a focus on fashion sphere and description of colour palette of the event by means of units, which belong to semantic fields "Fashion", "Colour". The verbal series of thematic dominants of negative recreation is made up of lexical units with the meaning components 'violence', 'instruments of violence', 'locations', 'love', 'interpersonal relations', 'struggle', which reflect the events in personal life of the news story characters.

The structure of the character in stories of Anmar Rahma Allah

Addressing is an important form of textual thresholds in modern critical studies that critics have alerted to, after it was far from their interests, and it constituted a great impetus for creators in their creative texts, until it became an art and industry sought by everyone. Because it is no less important than the text itself, the title establishes a relationship with its text, as it shortens the way for us to understand the content of the text and its connotations, and at the same time it constitutes a bright sign in front of the reader in exploring the depths of that text, so this study came to illuminate the heading structure in the stories Anmar Rahmatalla in his three stories

Pengembangan Bahan Ajar Buku Cerita Rakyat Bergambar Berbasis Aplikasi Canva Untuk Meningkatkan Hasil Belajar Peserta Didik Kelas IV Sekolah Dasar

The purpose of this study was to develop, determine user responses and determine the effectiveness of teaching materials for illustrated folklore books based on the Canva application in improving student learning outcomes. The type of research used is development research. The research model used is the ADDIE model. The type of data used is quantitative and qualitative data using instruments in the form of interviews, questionnaires, and questions. Based on the results of the study, it was concluded that the teaching materials that had been developed were suitable to be used as teaching materials in class IV Indonesian language content for finding characters in fiction stories. The percentage of expert validation results is 82% from material and language expert validation, and 91% from design expert validation. The user's response is very good because the results of the fourth-grade teacher questionnaire analysis show the percentage of the attractiveness aspect is 94%, the material aspect is 75%, the language aspect is 88% and the story selection aspect is 94%. Meanwhile, for the responses from students, the attractiveness aspect is 83%, the material aspect is 86%, the language aspect is 82% and the story selection aspect is 82%. The teaching materials developed were effective in improving the learning outcomes of fourth-grade students at SD Negeri 111 Bengkulu Utara. This is based on the results of the t-test with = 2.1 > = 2.0 then H0 is rejected and Ha is accepted.

Impacts of character morality on egocentric projection and identification

Studies in the social cognition literature indicate that several strategies play a role in how observers understand an observed actor, including by simulating the actor's perspective (identification), and/or an audience member projecting their own perspective onto the actor's mind (egocentric projection). In processing story characters, there is evidence that taking a character's perspective and projecting one's own perspective are distinct psychological mechanisms used to understand a character. Manipulating a common and much studied narrative feature—character morality—we examined how morality influences the way audience members process story characters. Three experiments consistently found that audience members tend to have higher levels of both egocentric projection and identification with the character when interpreting moral characters, compared to immoral characters. Confirmatory factor analysis shows that egocentric projection and identification are two distinct constructs.

At her pleasure: Black women writing sexual desire

Black women’s bodies and sexualities have particularly been exposed and spoken about in public spaces from an outsider perspective. In this essay, I ground the exploration of sexual pleasure as described and imagined by Black female characters in contemporary short stories written by Black French women. I examine three short stories from the anthology Volcaniques: Une anthologie du Plaisir (2015) by Gisèle Pineau, Léonora Miano, and Hemley Boum to explore how these writers complicate, expand, and subvert heteronormative notions of pleasure, and seek it via their Black female characters. Instead of further silencing Black women’s sexuality for fear of reinscribing hypersexual tropes, or reiterating narratives of trauma and unhappy sexualities, these narratives reclaim women’s bodies and sexualities for their pleasures. I take an intersectional and afrofeminist approach to underscore the different forms of sexual (and other forms of) pleasure for middle-class Black French women. These narratives prove to be a mirror for other Black women who read and experience pleasure as well as a window to the variety of ways they experience and write about (sexual) pleasure and desire. Ultimately, beyond body and sexual positivity, by writing about these sexual matters, these compelling narratives lay claim to the humanity of middle-class Black women.

The Ministry of Flowers by Andrea Witzke Slot

Reviewed by: The Ministry of Flowers by Andrea Witzke Slot Phill Provance (bio) the ministry of flowers Andrea Witzke Slot Valley Press https://www.valleypressuk.com/book/146/the_ministry_of_flowers 104 pages; Print, $12.52 What does it mean to be human in an uncaring world? For me, one answer has come in the form of Andrea Witzke Slot's latest collection, The Ministry of Flowers, which evinces an awareness singularly apt for our times. It is, however, not a collection intent upon pat answers, reciprocating the world's mysteries with mystery in kind. In other words, it is a book that achieves the difficult ends of inspiring childlike wonderment in adults by reintroducing us to the world—as if, for want of a more recent analogy, her speakers are the characters of Lewis Padgett's classic short story "Mimsy Were the Borogoves," attempting to teach us how to rethink our common reality in non-Euclidian terms. Thus, Slot refreshes our perspective, showing us newly discovered aspects of our surroundings we previously failed to notice, and consequently conveying a hint of salvation through her work. Perhaps the most obvious expression of this is felt in Slot's employing a wide variety of forms. If, per Raymond Williams's seminal Marxism and Literature (1977), "There is a … tendency in the analysis of art to look … [for] fully articulate and systematic expressions of … ideology in the content (base-superstructure) or form (homology) of actual works," what we encounter in The Ministry of Flowers is a mind willing to give a wide variety of ideologies a fair hearing. For Slot's is a creative consciousness ostensibly as comfortable with couplets as with prose poetry, with the long, short, and dropped line alike. As a result, at times we confront entirely filled pages, while at others our eyes alight on utter minimalism. And yet, from Slot this seems less an intention to exhibit poetic prowess as to establish an overarching sense of ebb and flow. Surely this is by design, and yet, though readily apparent, it augments, rather than detracts from, the collection's content—which provides these forms an equally powerful and cohesive counterweight. For instance, beginning with the collection's title, we [End Page 144] are deeply anchored in tradition with an allusion to Dickinson's "Between My Country—and the Others": Between My Country—and the Others—There is a Sea—But Flowers—negotiate between us—As Ministry. In other words, from the reader's very first glance, The Ministry of Flowers announces its primary themes of connectivity, framework, and communication, for doesn't a ministry inherently entail attending to place and others? Clearly, this is why the collection begins with the prose poem "Panoply": Some days the rigid silhouette of all we are is revealed in plates of glass. Some days we might touch the strange mesh of armor that keeps us upright and steady and wonder at how little keeps us from flopping into heaps on the floor like the billowing collapse of a circus tent as stakes are pulled from the ground. One may wonder, of course, whether we can trust this first poem as indicative of the collection's overall theme and mood, but reading on, we realize that what it establishes is the assumption of human fragility underpinning the themes of its sequels. Subsequently, vulnerability looms large—and not just that of humanity but of the world around us: the environment, our fellow creatures, the newborn in an incubator as well as the truck driver awaiting a shower at a truckstop. Consequently, the collection seems to interrogate the universe as to the ontological necessity for this state of affairs; why exactly, we might imagine the poems' speakers asking, must we endure universal vulnerability—and, granting that we must, how do we do so? Certainly, if we are to concur with Slot's own assertion that "there are two kinds of poets" we might infer from the collection's thrust that these two types comprise those who make statements and those who ask questions, classing Slot among the latter. And yet, the correlative question then becomes what answers The Ministry of Flowers might offer, whether these answers seem...

ОТ МАРГАРИТЫ К ЖЕМЧУЖНИКОВУ («ЛЕГКОЕ ДЫХАНИЕ» И.А. БУНИНА)

The paper offers a non-canonical interpretation of Ivan Bunin’s “Light Breathing”, a text which became canonical in the 20th century thanks to Russian formalists and L.S. Vygotsky, as well as later interpreters, which had demonstrated the multiplicity and multilayered meanings of its poetic system. Faust code – one of the significant cultural archetypes of modernity – acts as the main semiotic key of the proposed interpretation. In the paper, within the framework of the structural method, the attention is focused on the following aspects of the text: name semantics, numerology, multilingual transitions and correspondences, intertextual analogies, the embeddedness of Bunin himself in the system of the story, etc. In addition to “Light Breathing” and other works of Bunin’s fiction, the material for the research was also his diaries and literary-critical essays. The paper shows that the central figure of the system is Russian poet Alexei Mikhailovich Zhemchuzhnikov: his patronymic name coincides with the patronymic of the story character Alexei Mikhailovich Malyutin (who says of himself that he is “Faust with Margarete”) and his surname is etymologically related to the name Margarete (‘pearl’). Consistently applied structural method allows to discover hidden levels of semantics and to understand the peculiarities of text composition. The presence of the figures and works of Zhemchuzhnikov, A.A. Fet and A.K. Tolstoy in the formation of the characters’ portraits and the nature of treatment of the theme of creativity in the short story is revealed. I examine the grounds of the principle of mirroring, the nature of metamorphosis, and the ways in which Bunin’s own presence is captured in the short story. The research provides an explanation of Bunin’s conceptual system as a whole, which includes notions of inverting the parts in the opposition sets: part – whole, singular – plural, old – young, masculine – feminine.

Hearing about a story character's negative emotional reaction to having been dishonest causes young children to cheat less.

There is extensive research on the development of cheating in early childhood but research on how to reduce it is rare. The present preregistered study examined whether telling young children about a story character's emotional reactions towards cheating could significantly reduce their tendency to cheat (N =400; 199 boys; Age: 3-6 years). Results showed that telling older kindergarten children about the story character's negative emotional reaction towards rule violation significantly reduced cheating, but telling them about the positive emotional reaction towards rule adherence did not. These results show that children as young as age 5 are able to use information about another child's emotional reaction to guide their own moral behavior. In particular, highlighting another child's negative emotional reaction towards a moral transgression may be an effective way to reduce cheating in early childhood. This finding, along with earlier cheating reduction findings, suggests that although cheating is common in early childhood, simple methods can reduce its occurrence.

Comprensión oral y escrita: efectos de la estructura textual

Reading comprehension is the ability to create a mental representation of a written text. It constitutes the main mechanism through children incorporate new knowledge at school age. Reading comprehension achievement has been systematically associated with oral comprehension and reading rate. Furthermore, both oral and reading comprehension has been related to inferences generation and different linguistic abilities, like vocabulary and syntax processing. In the case of text comprehension, also orthographic recognition of written words plays a fundamental role and, for that reason, reading comprehension would be a greater challenge than oral comprehension for early readers. Indeed, word recognition during reading is essential for text meaning construction. It is well known that a slow and laborious reading mechanism would overload cognitive processing and that reading automaticity is essential to carry out text processing. Longitudinal studies realized in different orthographies indicated that reading rate was the variable that had greatest impact on reading comprehension in early readers. In studies carried out in shallow orthographies, it was also observed that reading performance have an important impact on reading comprehension measure after 3 to 5 years of instruction. However, although impact of reading skills and oral comprehension mechanisms on reading comprehension has been reported in several studies, there is another important factor to consider: text structure. Studies propose that children tend to understand “narrative schemas” more easily since they are exposed to this type of text from a very early age. Likewise, all narrative texts present, in general, the same type of structure, respect temporal sequence of events and focus on story characters, their actions and motivations. In contrast, expository texts present new information to children, are oriented to a specific topic, contain less familiar and more technical vocabulary and a higher level of abstraction. This type of structure presents numerous cohesive connections and greater propositional density than narrative texts. The present study aims to compare listening and reading comprehension of narrative and expository text. For this, a group of 32 4th graders was evaluated in oral and reading comprehension of narrative and expository texts. In reading comprehension test, children read narrative and expository texts and then orally answered a series of questions. In oral comprehension, both narrative and expository texts were read aloud to children and then they answered questions about the texts orally. Vocabulary and reading rate were also measured. Data analysis shows correlations between oral comprehension and vocabulary. Reading comprehension were associated to vocabulary, oral comprehension and reading rate. Results suggest that oral and reading comprehension are associated with different linguistic skills and to each support access skills. In comprehension test, measures show higher performance in narrative oral comprehension texts when compared to reading comprehension. This result could be related to children reading rate. In fact, reading performance shows that children were “slow readers” according to the reading tests scales used in this study. Difference between oral and written comprehension in narrative texts, was not transferred to expository. In this type of texts children had low scores, without significant differences, in oral and reading comprehension. Results suggested that expository structures challenge children comprehension in both, oral and written modality. It is suggested that different types of expository texts difficult hierarchization of information that allows, in turn, the construction of text mental representation. Data of this study suggest the importance of establish interventions that allow children to improv text processing for access higher levels of comprehension in different textual structures. Furthermore, it is necessary in educational practices to expose children to expository structures from an early age. On the other hand, it is necessary to rethink reading instruction methods that originate low reading performance. https://doi.org/10.16888/interd.2022.39.3.8

The role of bilingual discussion prompts in shared E-book reading

This randomized controlled trial study examined the effects of bilingual discussion prompts with feedback within a multimedia interactive e-book on parent-child shared reading for young English language learners aged 3–7 in China. Sixty-four parent-child pairs read a multimedia English storybook with bilingual discussion prompts in the treatment condition, and forty-three pairs read the same multimedia storybook without discussion prompts. After reading the storybook twice, children in the discussion-prompt group outperformed the control group on story comprehension and retelling measures. However, children in both groups showed comparable gains in English vocabulary. According to our qualitative analysis of parent-child responses on discussion pages, when parents follow the question-response-evaluate-feedback flow of the discussion sessions, they tend to practice dialogic reading strategies and scaffold children's learning naturally and effectively without explicit training. With the learning facilitation from both the storybook and parents, children received more comprehensible input, produced more English output, and became active storytellers instead of passive learners. Moreover, the e-book with a built-in questioning avatar established children's parasocial relationship with the story characters. These findings suggest an exciting potential for multimedia interactive e-books, powered by bilingual discussion prompts, as an effective educational tool for families from diverse linguistic backgrounds.

An analysis of Politeness Strategies Used by Major Characters in Social Game : A study of Seventh Singularity Story of Fate/Grand Order Social Game

Politeness strategy is used in conversations to save addressee’s face by performing an expression that is less threatening for the addressee’s face. The aims of this research are to analyze politeness strategies used by two major characters of the seventh singularity story of Fate/Grand Order social game, and also to analyze the factors that influencing their choicess of politeness strategies. This research employed a descriptive qualitative method. The description of the data is in the form of utterances and examined based on Brown and Levinson theories of politeness strategy. Based on the obtained result, it can be concluded that the two major characters, Mash Kyrielight and Enkidu/Kingu applied four kinds of politeness strategy (bald on record, positive politeness, negative politeness and off record). Both characters mainly used positive politeness strategy, while the least used strategy is bald on-record. Their choice of politeness strategies mostly influenced by social distance factor, imposition and also the power factor.

Implementasi Program Penguatan Pendidikan Karakter Siswa Melalui Cerita Rakyat

Character Education Strengthening Program (PPK) in schools can be done one of them through learning local folklore. This paper discusses the implementation of strengthening student character education through local folklore. The method used is observation, interviews and classroom action research with a sample of SMAN 13 Maros class XII. The results of the study were concluded through three stages, namely: 1) the results of observations of the Indonesian language learning textbook material used showed that the material for strengthening character education through local folklore had not been included. 2) After carrying out literary learning modeling with local folklore material, it shows an increase in students' understanding of several folklore titles, characters, various characters, story content, and setting. 3) there is an increase in students' understanding of the story text regarding the characters of the story characters such as brave characters, patient characters, loyal characters, and intelligent characters.

"العناصير الداخلية في "المال والحب" في قصة القصيرة "المضيل"

This study aims to reveal the intrinsic elements short story " Al-Mālu wa al-Ḥubbu " in the anthology al-Mudīl by Saīd ‘Arafah and the relation among them. The story applied in this research is structural theory with structural analysis methods. The analyzed elements are character, plot, setting, theme, title, and point of view.
 Based on the analysis, the main character is Nasya’at. Meanwhile the additional figures in this short story are Faruq, Ridwan Barakat, Zubaidah, Abu Dahab al-Jablawy, the wife of Nasya’at, Doctor Shafwat and Syamandi. The plot in this short story is a straight line. The setting of the place in this short story are the palace, school, teacher’s room, hospital, and the directorate of security. The setting of time in this short story are after sunset, evening, morning, and early morning. The setting of social in this story is the social setting of society around the palace. The title of the short story " Al-Mālu wa al-Ḥubbu " refers to the themf of the story. The point of view used in this short story is a third person perspective-unlimited. The theme in this short story is ’’wealth and love which is taken on a good path will bring benefits, but the one which used for a bad path will bring destruction’. In this short story, the main character is portrayed as a good and generous doctor who is his belief being abused by other characters in the short story. This short story has a relationship between the elements, they are themes with characters, themes with plot, themes with titles, and themes with background. Each intrinsic element in this short story has and interrelation in producing the meaning of the story.

Al Ikhtiyaajaat wa ad-Dawaafi’ Li asy-Syakhsiyyah ar-Roiisiyyah fi al-Qisshotaini al-Qoshiirotaini “Ash’udu Zaujaini” wa “Ana al-Maut” Li Taufiq al-Hakim (‘Ilmu an-Nafsi al-Adabi Li Henry Murray)

The short story entitled "The Happiest Couple" is set about a man who wants to marry his beloved woman, whom the man knows through radio broadcasts on a cooking channel, and about the man's life after marrying the woman. The short story "I am The Death" is about the ambition of a rich and intelligent man who wants to move to another world by committing suicide, but is prevented by a woman and ends up changing his mind. In the end, the two short stories provide dialogue between characters and explain the character's behavior. These two short stories are included in a collection of stories entitled "Arinillah" by the famous writer Taufiq Al-Hakim. The aims of this study are as follows: (1) To find out the shape of the needs and motives of the main character in the short stories " The Happiest Couple" and "I am The Death" by Taufiq Al-Hakim. (2) To find out the description of the main character in the short stories "The Happiest Couple" and "I am The Death" by Taufiq Al-Hakim. This study uses the theory of personality psychology from Henry Murray's perspective.This research is a descriptive and qualitative research. This study used several data collection techniques such as reading and note-taking techniques. From the results of the research and discussion conducted, it can be seen that each main character has the same type of needs, but each main character has his own way or action to fulfill his needs. Behavior can be influenced and affect the environment and the people around him. Besides, we can't have everything we need according to what we want. However, the person will continue to try to fulfill his needs.

NOVEL RAHASIA SALINEM KARYA BRILLIANT YOTENEGA DAN WISNU SURYANING ADJI: PERSPEKTIF GASTROCRITICISM

Indonesia as a culinary paradise has a variety of foods, while literature as a medium can be used as a tool to introduce various Indonesian culinary delights. This study aims to discuss food issues, especially “pecel”, to reveal the secrets of story characters in showing their identity and as an effort to preserve the culinary arts of the Indonesian archipelago. This study uses a qualitative method with a gastro criticism perspective. The research object is the novel Rahasia Salinem by Brilliant Yotenega and Wisnu Suryaning Adji. In this study, food in literature is not only used as the story's object, but both have material, physical, social, and cultural relationships. The results showed four concepts from the perspective of gastro critism, namely (1) food and pleasure, (2) food and art (bricolage), (3) food and names, and (4) food and history. The results of this study are expected to contribute to the development of literary studies in a cultural context as an effort to introduce and preserve local cuisine through literary works.