Everyday Conversation Research Articles

A research brief investigating educational television and U.S. children’s interest in science and world culture

ABSTRACT Research on educational television has overwhelmingly investigated the impact of viewing on children’s knowledge acquisition. However, this content might influence other important outcomes, such as children’s interest in learning about new topics. To investigate this possibility, we invited parents of 3- to 8-year-old children (N = 83) to answer three surveys over 1 month. The first survey included a video encouraging families to view a popular science program (Hero Elementary) or cultural program (Let’s Go Luna). The remaining surveys asked about children’s exposure to science and cultural programs, as well as their engagement with science and cultural topics in everyday conversation. Although our encouragement intervention had no impact on children’s exposure to science or cultural programs, viewing that content was associated with increased science and cultural talk over time. These findings suggest that educational television might motivate children to explore new topics of interest in non-mediated contexts.

Downtoners and intensifiers in different registers

Abstract The article analyzes the frequency of downtoners and intensifiers in seven Estonian registers based on data from the Estonian Pragmatics Corpus. These particles are most common in instant messaging, followed by institutional interaction, everyday conversation, online comments, printed fiction, media, and academic prose. The analysis revealed that previously offered situational features that increase frequencies (orality, spontaneity, dialogicity, everydayness and involved production) correlate only with frequencies of downtoners in comments, fiction and media. The frequency of downtoners in instant messaging is significantly higher than in spoken dialogues, and the use of all particles in academic prose is significantly lower than expected. We propose hypotheses to explain those anomalies. Ten especially frequent particles were identified: six downtoners and four intensifiers. Those particles account for 15% of all downtoners/intensifiers and account for 76% of particle use, with their proportion varying across registers from 87% in everyday conversation to 43% in academic prose.

Functions of the particles tõesti ‘really’ and tõepoolest ‘indeed’ in the spoken, online and printed registers of Estonian

Abstract The article examines the use of two Estonian pragmatic particles, tõesti ‘really’ and tõepoolest ‘indeed, truly’, in everyday conversations, online news comments and academic prose. The data is drawn from the Estonian Pragmatic Corpus. The material analyzed reveals that the main function of both particles in the different registers is to confirm and emphasize some statement, fact, general knowledge, etc., either in the previous text or in the current utterance or sentence. Both particles can add an element of surprise or bewilderment to the sentence or utterance. The use of tõepoolest is associated with higher degrees of formality, whereas tõesti, being a relatively frequent particle, can occur in both formal and informal texts.

Pragmatic particles as distinguishing features of registers

Abstract The study explores the potential of utilizing particle use data to differentiate between seven Estonian registers: everyday conversation, institutional interaction, printed media (newspapers), prose fiction, academic prose, instant messaging, and internet comments. The objective is to develop a simple yet effective model that enables researchers to comprehend the internal logic behind register differentiation based on particle use. Particles are considered promising differentiators due to their independence from text content. The article outlines the chosen method, the model creation, and the testing process. A key finding reveals that hierarchical relationships between particles within registers prove more reliable indicators than general use frequencies. The method involves establishing correspondences between particle pairs and register pairs, facilitating the measurement of distances between registers. During testing, the model demonstrates high accuracy across registers, encountering some difficulties in categorizing fiction and institutional interaction. Overall, the study confirms the efficacy of the proposed method in distinguishing registers based on particle use, underscoring the significance of particles in linguistic analysis.

Proverbial economies of STS.

This article discusses examples from an extended family of aphorisms, stories, and themes that have circulated widely in STS and remain associated with the formation and integration of the field. Drawing upon Harvey Sacks's insightful remarks about features of everyday conversation, which he related to ancient practices in oral culture, we argue that familiar citation magnets in STS operate in many respects like proverbs, parables, and an extended family of neatly and memorably packaged viral articulations in ordinary language. After discussing the contingent production of proverbial truth, the article focuses on three well-known examples that combine memorable proverbs and themes with parables: Winner's account of the low parkway bridges designed by city planner Robert Moses to show that technology has politics; Pinch and Bijker's concise history of the bicycle to illustrate the social construction of technology, and Star and Griesemer's viral two-word theme of 'boundary objects' as artifacts that sustain collaboration across organizational contexts. The discussion of these cases suggests that different elements of these examples become the focus of subsequent citations and applications, and that ambiguities about the origins and meanings of the cited items opens new avenues for critical reflection on practicing citational justice and the nature of STS as an affiliative discipline.

Exploring third spaces during pre‐service teacher online intercultural conversations

AbstractWe examined intercultural conversations in English between South African and Dutch pre‐service teachers during a Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) project. Unlike traditional COIL research, which emphasizes good practices and professional development, our approach explored the significance of everyday conversations in finding common ground. Through video analysis, we explored instances when common ground fostered a third space—a hybrid, in‐between space—with the potential to promote equity and inclusivity. Results highlight how intercultural, professional, and personal conversations created temporary moments of third space. The role of “connection” in a COIL project shows how specific snapshots of intercultural communication and personal and normative conversations give alternative insights into pre‐service teacher professional development. These dynamics suggest the importance of a more humanistic approach through descriptions of small, everyday conversational snapshots. Results in this study confirm that a North‐South COIL project using English as a lingua franca is an effective way to promote inclusion and mutual understanding.

Do gestures have meaning? An empirical analysis on the gestures performed by Fidel Castro at the United Nations

In everyday conversations, there are said to be unconscious meanings that we convey through our body. For example, if a story is being told, our hands move according to the message, following a rhythm and forming shapes that we are unaware of. According to McNeill (1992), gestures are a form of language different from speech, but even though they have been regarded as individual entities, they are, in fact, parallel and work in synch with each other. This is the scope of the analysis of gestures. In the following paper, the objective was to test whether there is an association between gestures and meaning. Consequently, the gestures of former Cuban president, Fidel Castro, were extracted and analyzed from his intervention at the United Nations in 1979. The process of annotation was carried out on the program ELAN, based on a series of categories: the type of gesture and topic, the position and movement of both arms and hands as well as the orientation. Additionally, a series of quantitative and qualitative analysis were performed through the statistical program R. A Chi-squared test showed a significant relationship between the type of gestures and the topics which was further corroborated through a conditional inference tree and a multiple correspondence analysis, reaffirming the idea that these are form-meaning pairs. Moreover, there was a strong connection between the type of gesture and arm movement, suggesting that this is due to the intention of the message while the orientation of the hand was a clear indicator of arm movement.

Telepractice-delivered communication training for informal caregivers of people with aphasia: A pilot study

Purpose To establish proof of concept of a student-led, telepractice-delivered communication partner training towards enhancing communication between people with aphasia and their informal caregivers in everyday conversations. Method Two dyads were recruited, each consisting of a person with aphasia and their caregiver. A pre-training questionnaire was completed by caregivers, followed by a weekly communication training session delivered by graduate student clinicians via telepractice to each dyad over 12 weeks. The caregivers then completed a post-training questionnaire. Both questionnaires included 13 Likert-scale questions and one open-ended question requiring an extended response. Result Pre- to post-training improvements for both dyads were identified on two domains of the questionnaire: (a) frustrations of the caregiver and person with aphasia and (b) caregivers’ knowledge and confidence in using communication strategies. This quantitative data was supported by additional extended responses regarding informal caregivers’ current communication strategies when communicating with the person with aphasia. Conclusion Both informal caregivers reported integrating communication strategies learned as part of the training in their interactions with the person with aphasia and experiencing fewer communication breakdowns during the two weeks following the training. The pilot study offers proof of concept for incorporating telepractice-delivered caregiver communication training as part of aphasia rehabilitation.

Not Talking about Climate Change: Everyday Interactions, Relational Work and Climate Silences

Despite evidence of extensive and growing concern about climate change, citizens remain relatively unlikely to discuss it in everyday conversation, presenting a puzzle to commentators and researchers. Different explanations of climate silence have been suggested, most notably from social psychology and from political economy perspectives, which posit forms of cultural control. However, there is limited evidence about the relational contexts of everyday climate talk and the meanings that people themselves attach to it. In this article, we analyse data from new qualitative research and explore how climate talk is patterned, forms of self-silencing and the meanings attached to climate talk, with reference to its interactional and relational contexts. We argue that social interactional contexts, relational work and mundane forms of practical constraint play an under-investigated yet crucial role in limiting climate talk.

The Effect of Root-Mean-Square and Loudness-Based Calibration Approach on the Acceptable Noise Level

environment contains many background noises in everyday conversations, it is necessary to evaluate the noise tolerance. The Acceptable Noise Level (ANL) provides an approach to quantifying the maximum amount of background noise a listener is willing to put up with while listening to a target story without becoming tense. Exploring noise tolerance in speech perception, the study investigates how different calibration methods impact normal hearing participants’ monotic and dichotic ANL results. Methods: This investigation utilizes a pared-sample t-test for statistical analysis, adopting a comparative observational approach. This study applied the Persian version of the typical ANL test. Two approaches have equalized the target and background stimuli: Root Mean Squared (RMS) and loudness match calibration via Adobe Audition. Using these modified materials the Most Comfortable Level (MCL), the Background Noise Level (BNL), and ANL were compared in terms of RMS and loudness match calibration. Fifty normal persons aged (18–39), under the conditions of monotic and dichotic listening, participated in this study. Results: The statistical analysis using a paired-sample t-test revealed no significant differences in the outcomes of the ANL test between the calibrations of RMS and loudness matching under both monotic and dichotic listening conditions (p=0.31 and p=0.67, respectively). Conclusion: The study suggests that calibration procedures, namely RMS and Loudness matching, do not affect ANL in either monotic or dichotic conditions. Keywords: Loudness; calibration; acceptable noise level; root mean square

Group Rapport Building in an Institutionaized Face-To-Face Interaction: a Case Study

When people are engaged in any interaction, they are likely to respond to each other's verbal and nonverbal cues. This responsiveness is a critical factor in the notion of rapport. In this paper, the author argues that the same human dynamics that govern everyday conversations are at play between participants in institutionalized conversations such as classroom discourse. The purpose of this study is to develop critical aspects of "conversational involvement" (Duranti, 1986; Goodwin, 1986; Gumperz, 1982; Tannen, 1985) as rapport-building devices and to provide observable phenomena that characterize rapport with participants' verbal and nonverbal cues in informal and formal conversation. In this study, nine people participated: a Korean professor of an elementary Korean language class at a major US university and eight undergraduate students whose first language is English. Three fifty-minute classroom sessions were videotaped, and segments that illustrated the teacher's and students' behaviors that facilitated rapport were transcribed and qualitatively analyzed. The author recorded the frequency of the teacher's verbal and nonverbal cues that appeared to foster rapport. This study found that the teacher shared small talk in informal before-class conversations by bringing up insignificant details about daily life. The teacher played the role of teacher during class by directing a lesson. However, she continued to utilize various rapport-building devices through selected verbal and nonverbal cues to engage her students in the conversation. In this classroom, as in everyday conversation, the participants demonstrated their desire to listen to, be responsive to, and be influenced by individuals in a certain way. The participants were part and parcel of achieving their goals in the classroom. The participants created a certain alignment to achieve their goals and signal that they were involved in the interaction. Then, the students would be able to learn the target language more through the involvement of the classroom activity, which is one of the outcomes of good rapport.

<b>Analysis of State Changes in English Causative Constructions: Insights from Construction Grammar</b>

This research aims to explore how English causative constructions convey changes in state, using the frameworks of Construction Grammar and Radical Construction Grammar. The 310 English language samples were selected based on their relevance to illustrating transitions caused by internal or external factors, sourced from reliable texts, diverse contexts, varied grammatical constructions, and common usage patterns. Through a thorough examination of syntax and semantics, the study aims to illustrate how causative constructions effectively capture dynamic processes and cognitive perceptions. Emphasis is placed on the roles of the agent and patient, with the analysis seeking to uncover how these structures deal with causality and, crucially, changes in state. The findings show that causative structures in English mainly depict physical changes, although there is still a significant representation of emotional and mental changes. This analysis reveals the universal and language-specific aspects of causative constructions and provides insights into how they are used in everyday conversations and cognitive activities.

Campaign against living miserably: A look from social learning theory (SLT)

ABSTRACT The Campaign Against Living Miserably (CALM) aims at advocating against suicide and changing the way mental health is addressed in everyday conversation. Social learning theory (SLT) explains how people imitate others’ behaviors—for example, through a process called learning by imitation. Observation and imitation are vital aspects of how people develop behaviors and habits. One of these behaviors is highly negative and controversial: suicide and the unhealthy mental health relationships that come with it. People can emulate the death of another by copying their behavior, sometimes without even entirely meaning to do so. This paper applies the tenets of SLT—i.e. attention, retention, reproduction, and motivation—to aspects of CALM and to the negative impacts of phenomena such as social media influencers (SMIs) and celebrity suicides. What makes this approach interesting is that the CALM campaign can benefit from the use of one of the longest-established theories in the fields of psychology and communication. More precisely, regarding mental health and the media, most studies have focused on how social media is causing depression or anxiety. This is why this manuscript adds fresh insights by using key SLT precepts to raise awareness as to how these suicidal thoughts and symptoms form.

Memory and protest in Belgrade: Remembering the 1990s in the mass demonstrations of 2023

The history of the 1990s and of political life in Serbia can be viewed as a history of protest. It was during this decade, in which Slobodan Milošević held power, that an entire generation of activists became part of a process of learning to engage in civil resistance. In waves of massive anti-regime protests as well as in smaller, yet persistent, anti-war protests, they asserted that ‘Belgrade is the World’. This article examines the ways in which practices and themes from these protests have resurfaced more recently, and how this activism is remembered and referenced in the 2020s. Based on data collected in Belgrade during anti-regime protests in 2023, which began as a movement ‘against violence’ (‘ protiv nasilja’), it traces how the memory of protest of the 1990s turned into memory in protest as it appeared in banners, chants, slogans and speeches, as well as in everyday conversation among citizens, some three decades later. Deploying the concept of the memory-activism nexus, the article analyses generational claims in Serbia, the practices of protesters, their hope in activism, their fear of cultivating false expectations and their continuing demands for a better future. It places cultural memory in Serbia in the context of a politics of disappointment, illustrating that memory in protest can function as both a mobilising force and a source of political paralysis.

Everyday conversations that impact health communication: developing and validating the everyday family health communication measure

ABSTRACT Research has shown that targeted, or episodic, conversations impact health behavior outcomes, like drinking, smoking, and sex, even later in life during emerging adulthood. However, little is truly known about families that engage in these episodic conversations. Research has speculated that the mundane everyday conversations may influence episodic communication and their subsequent behaviors. Therefore, steps were taken to better understand these everyday, or macro-level, health conversations. Study I operationalizes everyday family health communication that occurs within families to explore the if and why people subsequently engage in episodic health communication using a scale with 35 items developed from prior research. Participants (N = 163) completed a survey, which allowed for several factor analyses to narrow the measure down to 16 items. Study II validates the measure by examining the influence of everyday family health communication on targeted, episodic, health conversations, and health outcomes. Study II included 216 participants who responded to this new measure, as well as items pertaining to episodic communication (e.g. about alcohol or drug use) to assess the effects of everyday family health communication on episodic health communication within families. Results indicate that everyday family health communication was important in understanding family episodic communication about health behaviors and health behavior outcomes.

Request for confirmation sequences in Egyptian Arabic

Abstract The article presents a description of request for confirmation (RfC) sequences in everyday conversation in Egyptian Arabic. Through a quantitative analysis of 200 sequences excerpted from telephone calls, the analysis is concerned to identify the main design features of RfC sequences and their context-sensitive distribution and use. Analysis reveals that RfCs in Egyptian Arabic often do not bear special syntactic or prosodic marking. Lexical devices, such as inference markers, tag questions, and modulation markers, make explicit the specific epistemic position of the requesters. RfCs mostly attract confirmations. These can be accomplished by minimal responses; however, in most cases, a more elaborate format is used. Greater epistemic independence is suggested in confirmations in which no token is used. Non-minimal responses seem to be normative in the case of disconfirmations. Responders can also employ dedicated means for declining to provide a dis/confirmation. The findings of this study support the view of RfC sequences as a complex site for the display and negotiation of knowledge and social positioning.

Everyday Conversations About Economic Inequality: A Research Agenda

ABSTRACTHigh and rising levels of economic inequality come at a tremendous cost to societies, yet the public is often hesitant to confront these inequalities. Prior research has attempted to explain this paradox, pointing to how it is driven by individuals' misperceptions of the extent of inequality, broader narratives that justify inequality, and distrust in government intervention and redistribution. These beliefs and attitudes are not simply a reflection of individual predispositions; they are also a product of societal debates. The limited scholarship on such debates has focused on elite discourse, examining how discussions about inequality unfold among people in positions of power in formalized contexts such as parliaments or the media. Most of this research has been conducted in the Global North. We know very little about how ordinary people talk about economic inequality, especially in the Global South. Everyday conversations about economic inequality deserve more scholarly attention because of their distinct form and extensive range, covering diverse voices and social situations. They reflect how societies struggle with economic inequality and how some groups are silenced, while others have their voices amplified. Finally, conversations may affect opinion formation differently than unidirectional exposure to information. This article reviews the literature and sets out a research agenda to comprehensively study how ordinary people talk about economic inequality in various contexts.

Living with and living by tattoos – discursive analysis of a bodily practice

ABSTRACT In this case study, we present a discursive analysis of tattoos related to significant autobiographical events, examining their pictorial, interpretative, embodied and discursive characteristics in a remembering process. Tattoos are pictorial motifs of a culturally defined system, while tattooed persons as active agents endow them with personal meanings connected to their motives. This study presents the connection between motif choosing and individual motives, as well as the embodied positions of tattoos with their discursive consequences. Our paper underscores that not only new or reinterpreted meanings are created in this practice, but persons also construct their own positions, their own situated selves and identity in a positioning process. Through these discursive identity positions, that are assigned both in everyday conversations and in wider social-cultural discourses, persons construct more positive self-images, thus creating a device for coping with crisis situations.

Topic maintenance in non-fluent aphasia conversation

Background: Studies on communication partner training programs for persons with aphasia reveal improvements in the conversation partners’ communication skills. This article explores the strategies for topic maintenance developed by the conversational partners of three people with non-fluent aphasia before and after an intervention on conversational strategies. Method: We used conversation analysis to examine video-recorded samples of everyday conversations (pre- and post-treatment and follow-up) between three couples. The assessment for topic management was performed with Conversation Analysis Profile for People with Aphasia (CAPPA). The intervention was conducted over a period of five weeks. The partners were trained to use strategies for better topic maintenance (multiple-choice, multimodality, and message verification). At six weeks post-therapy, a third recording was made. Results: After the intervention, changes in topic maintenance were observed. The use of strategies is related to the pre-existing context and the presence of visual support. Discussion/Conclusion: Individuals with non-fluent aphasia and their conversation partners engage in multimodal conversations and benefit from the use of strategies to overcome barriers to understanding, leading them to maintain a conversational topic.

The Multifaceted Seafarer: An Explorative Discourse Analysis of Seafarers’ Portrayals in Swedish Maritime Magazines

Seafaring is a highly male‐dominated occupation. Within the industry, there is an ambition to increase the proportion of women working in maritime professions. In this endeavor, it is relevant to examine how seafarers are portrayed in various contexts. This study aimed to explore the image of seafarers as presented in Swedish maritime magazines: How are seafarers described, and can these descriptions be seen as performative in shaping a professional identity? To meet this aim, a discourse analysis was performed, based on 20 texts from two maritime magazines, representing both rating and officer seafarers. Overall, six subject positions inhabited by seafarers were identified, with several overlapping characteristics. For example, traits of the traditional seafarer were also found in the masculine seafarer and the flexible seafarer. Furthermore, it is argued that several of the subject positions are difficult to combine with what is referred to as the gender‐equal seafarer, mainly due to challenges in balancing family life with extended periods at sea. The study shows that today’s seafarers, according to how they are depicted in Swedish maritime magazines, have considerable agency in shaping their own professional identity without being forced to conform to a hegemonic masculinity. Finally, it is suggested that the term “seafarer” be used instead of “seaman” in both print and everyday conversations, for increased inclusiveness and representation.