Cataphoric Devices in Spoken Discourse

Abstract

We propose that speakers mark key words with cataphoric devices. Cataphoric devices are counterparts to anaphoric devices: Just as anaphoric devices enable backward reference, cataphoric devices enable forward reference. And just as anaphoric devices mark concepts that have been mentioned before, cataphoric devices mark concepts that are likely to be mentioned again. We investigated two cataphoric devices: spoken stress and the indefinite this. Our experiments demonstrated three ways that concepts marked by cataphoric devices gain a privileged status in listeners' mental representations: Cataphoric devices enhance the activation of the concepts that they mark; cataphoric devices suppress the activation of previously mentioned concepts; and cataphoric devices protect the concepts that they mark from being suppressed by subsequently mentioned concepts.When people communicate, they talk about actions, events, ideas, other people, and a host of topics. We shall refer to these topics as "concepts" in a discourse. Some concepts are introduced but never referred to again; other concepts play a key role in the discourse. Speakers would benefit if those key concepts achieved a privileged status in their listeners' mental representations because speakers could refer to key concepts assured that their listeners could easily access them. Listeners would benefit, too: They could use key concepts as cornerstones when developing their mental representations.In this paper, we propose that speakers mark key concepts with certain discourse devices, what we call cataphoric devices. In this paper, we also demonstrate how concepts marked by cataphoric devices gain a privileged status in the mental representations that listeners build when comprehending discourse. WHAT ARE CATAPHORIC DEVICES?We envision cataphoric devices as counterparts to anaphoric devices. Anaphoric devices enable backward reference. For instance, English speakers use anaphoric devices like the pronoun she or the definite noun phrase the woman to refer to a previously mentioned female. Speakers master the use of anaphoric devices as they are mastering communication.

Readers’ sensitivity to linguistic cues in narratives: How salience influences anaphor resolution

“…One possibility is that there is a general mechanism such that readers continually adjust the amount of processing devoted to each text input on the basis of its perceived importance, or salience. This is consistent with the findings that text in the focused portion of a sentence is remembered better (e.g., Gernsbacher & Jescheniak, 1995) and that readers are more likely to detect errors in text that is linguistically focused (e.g., Bredart & Docquier, 1989). These findings suggest that linguistic focus serves as a cue to readers to process the information more thoroughly.…”

“…Syntactic focus has been manipulated with whquestions (e.g., Birch & Rayner, 1997;Cutler & Fodor, 1979), it cleft constructions (e.g., Birch & Garnsey, 1995;Morris & Folk, 1998), and subordinate versus main clauses (e.g., Baker & Wagner, 1987). These linguistic focusing devices have been found to lead to better memory for the focused portion of the sentence (e.g., Gernsbacher & Jescheniak, 1995) and longer reading times (e.g., Birch & Rayner, 1997;Carpenter & Just, 1977). Moreover, in a story continuation task, Birch et al (2000) found that readers were more likely to refer to concepts from earlier in the story if they had been syntactically focused than if they had not, suggesting that syntactic focus serves to increase the accessibility of the focused concepts as well as to increase readers' expectations that these concepts will continue to be prominent in the story.…”

“…In addition, several studies in which the processing of single sentences were examined have demonstrated that subtle structural changes in the grammatical form of the sentence alter the salience of text information; this has been found with the use of whquestions (e.g., Birch & Rayner, 1997;Cutler & Fodor, 1979), it cleft constructions (e.g., Birch & Garnsey, 1995;Morris & Folk, 1998), and subordinate versus main clauses (e.g., Baker & Wagner, 1987). These linguistic focusing devices lead to better memory for the focused portion of the sentence (e.g., Gernsbacher & Jescheniak, 1995),…”

The Role of Suppression and Enhancement in Understanding Metaphors☆

“…Our paper suggests one central reason for the comparability of metaphor and literal comprehension: They are understood via exactly the same general comprehension mechanisms. Specifically, we demonstrated that the same mechanisms of enhancement and suppression that underlie comprehension in general (e.g., Gernsbacher & Faust, 1991a) and language comprehension in particular (e.g., Gernsbacher & Jescheniak, 1995;), are also crucial for metaphor understanding. Our findings suggest that metaphor comprehension could be naturally accounted for within the Structure Building Framework (Gernsbacher, 1990;1991a;1995;1997c).…”

“…Suppression is the active reduction in activation of activated memory nodes that represent information that is potentially confusing or irrelevant for comprehension. Gernsbacher and her colleagues have demonstrated the role of these two mechanisms in lexical access (e.g., Gernsbacher & Faust, 1991b;Gernsbacher & St. John, in press), anaphora (e.g., Gernsbacher, 1989;1997a), cataphora (e.g., Gernsbacher & Jescheniak, 1995;Gernsbacher & Shroyer, 1989), as well as the comprehension of non-linguistic information (e.g., Gernsbacher & Faust, 1991a).…”