Clarification Questions Research Articles

Genres of Art History and Rationales For and Against the Inclusion of Art History in Elementary School Curricula: A Philosophical Study Addressing Clarification and Justification Questions Regarding Art History Education

Genres of Art History and Rationales For and Against the Inclusion of Art History in Elementary School Curricula: A Philosophical Study Addressing Clarification and Justification Questions Regarding Art History Education

Learner Use of Strategies in Interaction: Typology and Teachability*

This paper reports on a two‐phase study of L2 learner use of listener feedback, particularly their use of clarification questions, in NS‐NNS discourse. The initial research questions of interest concerned the degree to which patterns in listener clarification questions could differentiate learners of varying proficiency, the degree to which use of clarification strategies (move types) could be explicitly taught (rather than developed alongside long‐term gains in proficiency), and the extent to which strategy use influenced actual understanding of listening passages.The first phase of the study was designed to formulate a typology of clarification questions associated with learners along a continuum of L2 proficiency. In this phase of the study, four types of clarification questions were identified through discriminant analysis as being related to language proficiency. These move types are defined as global reprise, local reprise, forward inferencing, and continuation signals.The second phase of the study was an elicitation experiment in which learners listened to a narrative and asked clarification questions. The study examined learner use of clarification questions in two distinct presentation settings (distant, video presentation and live, one‐on‐one presentation) and with three types of prior training in questioning strategies (global, local, and inferential). The experiment was designed to assess the effects of these presentation settings and of the prior training on learners’ ability to ask clarification questions of the native speakers and to summarize the story that they had heard. The results of this second phase of the study indicate that prior training of learners in specific questioning strategies can exert an effect on their subsequent behavior in interactions and can influence their immediate comprehension of a text as well.

Limits on negative information in language input

Hirsh-Pasek, Treiman & Schneiderman (1984) and Demetras, Post & Snow (1986) have recently suggested that certain types of parental repetitions and clarification questions may provide children with subtle cues to their grammatical errors. We further investigated this possibility by examining parental responses to inflectional over-regularizations and wh-question auxiliary-verb omission errors in the sets of transcripts from Adam, Eve and Sarah (Brown 1973). These errors were chosen because they are exemplars of overgeneralization, the type of mistake for which negative information is, in theory, most critically needed. Expansions and Clarification Questions occurred more often following ill-formed utterances in Adam's and Eve's input, but not in Sarah's. However, these corrective responses formed only a small proportion of all adult responses following Adam's and Eve's grammatical errors. Moreover, corrective responses appear to drop out of children's input while they continue to make overgeneralization errors. Whereas negative feedback may occasionally be available, in the light of these findings the contention that language input generally incorporates negative information appears to be unfounded.

Clarification questions that work

The author describes the nature and purpose of clarification questions used in writing proposals to the government. Editing guidelines for clarification questions are given. The need to present a position to the government and conceal it from competitors simultaneously is stressed.< <ETX xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">&gt;</ETX>

Use of Self-Questioning with a Computer-Mediated Text System and Measures of Reading Performance

This study investigated the effects of a computer-mediated text system (CTS), designed to facilitate use of questioning strategies, on third-grade students' performance on vocabulary, comprehension, and prediction measures. The subjects were 48 third-grade average and good readers assigned randomly to one of four treatment conditions (three experimental and one control). Students in the experimental conditions read passages using the CTS and were trained to generate questions for clarification and/or focus of attention. Students in the control condition read passages printed on paper and did not receive any questioning training. The Nelson Reading Skills Test and an assessment of ability to predict reading performance were administered both before and after the treatment. Results supported the hypothesis that the CTS would be an effective medium for teaching students to generate questions to improve reading performance. Additional findings revealed that average readers made significantly greater gains than good readers in comprehension and vocabulary knowledge, whereas good readers made greater gains in ability to predict vocabulary performance. These findings indicated that students of average reading ability can learn how to use a reading strategy and apply it to a reading task. The results of the relation between computer feedback to student-generated questions and subsequent reading performance are also discussed. Outcomes of this study suggest the need for future research on the use of computers in the understanding and enhancement of the reading process.

Report on discussion of paper by P. J. H. Sharpe.

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Dentists' verbal communication leads during an interview with geriatric patients

A reliable method has been developed to describe dentists' verbal communication leads using closed circuit television. The purpose of this investigation was to compare these leads during the greeting and initial discussion portion of an initial dental interview for ten dentists with 20 patients older than 65 years. Leads were categorized as controlling, noncontrolling, or neutral. A controlling lead was defined as a lead that allowed the dentist to exert authority in a controlling manner. The most frequently used leads in this category were closed-ended questions and structuring. Leads were categorized as noncontrolling if the lead allowed patients to express themselves (acceptance, approval, clarification, interpretation, and open-ended question). Examples of frequently observed neutral leads included small talk and information giving. The frequency of noncontrolling, neutral, and controlling leads was 28%, 40%, and 32%, respectively. Correlations between these three categories were weak and indicated that they were measuring different qualities of the communication process. When the three categories of leads were analyzed by doctors and patients' gender, the mean numbers of leads were similar, although male dentists tended to be more controlling with male patients and less controlling with female patients. These differences were not statistically significant using the analysis of variance.

Feedback to first language learners: the role of repetitions and clarification questions.

ABSTRACTThe conclusion that information regarding the grammatically of children's speech is unavailable in parental input has recently been challenged (Moerk 1983 a, b, Hirsh-Pasek, Treiman &amp; Schneiderman 1984). The present study expanded on this research by broadening the definition of ‘negative feedback’ and by describing individual styles of mother–child dialogues. The purpose was to investigate whether mothers of four 2-year-old children responded differentially to their children's well-formed or ill-formed utterances with explicit and implicit feedback. The middle-class, English-speaking, mother–child dyads were recorded in a naturalistic context at home during play and eating activities. Explicit and implicit feedback were different in terms of the proportion of responses available to the child and their relation to well-formed and ill-formed utterances. The style of response was similar for most analyses across the four mothers.

Social Sciences and Nursing Education

suggest that you explain not only the purpose of the meeting, but also what has happened in its planning and preparation. Explain how the meeting will proceed and what participation and help is expected from the audience. Do not hesitate to mention any possible difficulties the group may need to deal with, in either procedure or action, and your confidence in their ability to carry through. Allow questions for clarification on any points. Finally, before proceeding with the program, throw out two or three questions calculated to get quick affirmative decisions without debate.

Harold Lasswell; Policy Scientist for a Democratic Society

In recent years the social sciences have come under attack from an increasing number of directions. Laymen have been perennially sceptical of their utility. In fact the social sciences have made so little impact on the public that to label oneself a political scientist, sociologist, or anthropologist to all but a small segment of the population is to invite further questions for clarification of meaning. Numerous philosophers, on the other hand, have increasingly ingi5tcd that an enduring system of generalizations, comparable to those that prevail in the physical or biological sciences, will never be discovered and accordingly a science of man can never really exist. What is new in the nature of the attack today is that many who are themselves social scientists and their patrons, the foundations upon whose largesse the social sciences to a considerable degree depend, have begun if not to doubt, at least to question, whether the social sciences can measure up to commonly held expectations. Two questions pressing upon the social sciences have played a significant part in bringing about this self-scrutiny. The first is simple in its formulation but vexing in its solution. Can the social sciences pass beyond the relativism of the Weberian tradition?1 Can they say whether the goals of a democratic society are superior to those of dictatorial communism? To this question the social scientist has of course traditionally replied that the testing of the relative merits of ends lies beyond his competence.2 For him the desire of each man is a datum with which the social scientist must work. And while he has tolerated the notion that perhaps other disciplines, such as philosophy, might be able to suggest a universal system of values,