OBJECT GROUNDING AND GESTURE IN COLLABORATIVE PHYSICAL TASKS

Ciara R. Wigham, 15 Dec. 2010

OBJECT GROUDING DURING CPTS*

Initiation1. simple (elementary)2. complex (episodic, instalment, provisional, dummy, proxy)

Refashioning3. request for expansion4. rejection (direct or indirect)

Acceptance5. explicit6. implicit

basic exchange

Clark and Wilkes-Gibbs (1986)

B Provide instructions for procedures to be performed on the object.C Check task-status to ensure the actions have the desired effect.

A Collaborators come to mutual agreement on the objects to be manipulated:

*collaborative physical tasks

EXAMPLE OF OBJECT GROUNDING PROCESS Helper: now these fork looking

things down here. Worker: uh? H:the metal fork things at the

bottom W:okay H: those should go on the

wheel axle inside of the nuts on the axle.

W: Ok H: are they on ok? W: yep, all set.

A: Object identification

Request for expansion

Expansion

Explicit acceptance

B: Procedural statement

C: Monitor comprehension, task status

GESTURES USED IN CPTS (FACE TO FACE)

Fussell et al (2004:279)

A

ABC

BC

B

Grounding phase

FUNCTIONS OF INITIATION PHASE

Instruct partner to add new objects to the domain (introduce new linguistic and semantic contexts)

Refer to objects already introduced in dialogue (anphora)

Refer to an object that is present in shared domain but not part of linguistic context

deictic references (of place)

PLACE DEICTICS

identifying“this one”

informing“the cube in front of me”

acknowledging“go to it”

(Levelt, 1989)

a relatum system a coordinate system

A primary deictic reference: the speaker = relatum + origin of the coordinate“the block behind me”

A secondary deictic reference: speaker = origin of coordinate system but relatum is some

other object“the cube behind the red cube”

VERBAL / GESTUAL PLACE DEICTICS (POINTING)

Referring act is successful if an addressee identifies the intended referent from the distractors

Assumption that pointing acts are used only if ‘proper’ means of referring do not suffice (Piweck, 2007:2):

Lester et al, 2009 – only include a pointing act if a pronoun cannot be used to refer to object

Claassen (1992) only resorts to pointing acts if no purely verbal means of identification can be found

Van der Sluis and Krahmer (2001) pointing as last course of action; pointing act only if the object is sufficiently close and a purely verbal referring act would be too complex.

PIWECK, 2007

Half of all referring acts include pointing not a fall-back strategy

Speakers more frequently point when object is not part of domain focus (Grosz, 1977) Object referred to in proceeding utterance

Object adjacent to an object referred to in proceeding utteranceObject in area speaker explicitly directed addressee's attentione.g. “if you look at the bit in the front”Cremers, 1994

focussing expression

Dutch speakers, build structure in shared workspace that is same as that of instructor, only builder allowed to move lego blocks, analysis 20 dialogues

CREMERS, 199610 pairs Dutch speakers, Instructor-builder, Blocks four colours, three sizes, four shapes

Four categories of referential expressions: 1. Reference to physical object - colour (97,3%, size, shape (17,8%)

2. Reference to the location of the object in the domain ‘transition of attention’ (new region) - location with respect to participants –hardly every accompanied by pointing gestures - location with respect to other objects - never accompanied by pointing gestures

3. Reference to the orientation of the object in building domain – no gestures

4. References to the history which was developed in course of actions (7.1% utterances) – few accompanying gestures. When used in references to objects that were talked about before and located in domain.

GESTURE TERMINOLOGY (KENDON, 2004)

locution- spoken component alonea movement excursion –body parts employed in a gesture (pl.

sucession of)home position gesture home position

nucleus gesture phrase gesture unit

or retraction

Kita (1993) – sustained end of stroke

may contain more than one gesture phrase

Often coincide with idea units semantic coherence or “co-expressiveness” (McNeill, 1992:23)

Sacks and Schegloff (2002)

often conjunction with nucleus semantic sense

conjunction of two different modes of expression

multimodal act

GESTURE TRANSCRIPTION McNeill coding system (1992)

[(preparation) (pre-stroke hold) stroke (post-stroke hold) (retraction)]

() = optional element[] = gesture unit

and it seemed that [is kissing the man’s nose]DEICTIC-regulatory-index finger pointing at his nose

[]onset and offset of movementAnalysis - relevant type of gesture and primary functionality