Processing and Interpretation of Turn-Timing in Conversation (InterTurn)

• Applicant: Dr. Mathias Barthel
• Subject Area: Applied Linguistics, Computational Linguistics
• Term: since 2022
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 497498146

This three-year research project will investigate the processes of interpreting silent pauses between two turns of talk in conversation. The timing of utterances is known to influence how the following turn will be interpreted - the so called gap effect. For instance, granting a request after a long silent pause can be interpreted as unwillingness to actually do the favour. Previous research on how utterances are interpreted mainly focused on the linguistic content of an utterance, i.e., on what is said, ignoring utterance-timing. Yet, investigating the processes of timing interpretation and what factors influence it will be key to fully understanding how interlocutors understand each other in social interactions. The proposed research project will (a) identify under what conditions the gap effect emerges, (b) answer whether the effect is identical or different in native and non-native speakers of a language, and (c) characterize the cognitive processes that are at play when gaps are interpreted and when expectations about the upcoming response become influenced by the gap. The gap effect will be compared in two groups of speakers: (i) speakers that attend to what is being said versus speakers that are momentarily distracted and (ii) native speakers versus non-native speakers. We will explore the gap effect with a multi-method and multi-angles approach that breaks new ground on several frontiers while being informed by previous research in conversation analysis, linguistics, and cognitive psychology. To arrive at a comprehensive description of turn-timing interpretation, we will use behavioural, eye-tracking, and physiological methods as well as state-of-the-art statistics, capitalizing on the strengths and advantages of each of them.In three work packages, we will gradually zoom in into the processes of gap interpretation. The first work package will contain a rating study. Participants will be presented with short dialogues containing requests and offers with gaps between turns that are of different lengths. They will rate the willingness of the last speaker to grant the request or accept the offer, which is predicted to depend on the lenght of the gap before the response. The second work package will contain an EEG study in which participants will also be presented with short dialoges while their brain responses are recorded. In both of these studies, one of the speakers of the short dialoges will be (a) either a native or a non-native speaker of German, and (b) either attentive or distracted at the time of the critical turn transition. The third work package will contain an eye-tracking study that will investigate the time-course of participants' expectations about the upcoming response that they generate during the gap between turns. The project's results will enable us to evaluate the adequacy of competing models of language comprehension.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants