Examines mothers' and fathers' speech for similarities and differences as expressed in four categories of messages to their preschool daughters and sons: plans, strategies, symbolic play utterances, and extrasituational references. (MP)

This study lends support to the modes of speech continuum and points to a relationship between linguistic and communicative competence. Results indicated that communicative competence of preschoolers increased with age and suggested a hierarchy from context-centered through topic-centered probes. Correlations with linguistic competence indicated…

Calls for less repetition in the opening parts of business or technical reports, i.e., in cover letters, prefaces, abstracts, and introductions. Examines theoretical and empirical work on repetition in discourse and on designing effective unrepetitive openings for business and technical reports. (PD)

Transcripts from four weekly one-hour elementary school science lessons indicate the possible interpretations of the teacher's utterance "What do you mean?" by attending to its interactional context. (MLF)

Errors in reading and speaking are not the result of failure to comprehend or communicate. Rather, such errors are "miscues," which show the effects of psycholinguistic processes that have taken unexpected turns. The nature of these miscues reveals the underlying cognitive schema that guide a person's comprehension and verbalization. (Author/SJL)

Reports on the progress of speech communication education in community colleges since the 1975 Association for Communication Administrators' Denver conference. (PD)

Experiments supported the following: (1) output-error assumption, by finding larger emotional responses for verbal slips than for correct vocalizations; (2) editing assumption, by finding that edited vocal responses require more processing time than unedited responses; (3) social acceptability editing criterion, by observing that neutral verbal…

Findings support (1) the claim that the power of style is directly related to judgments of competence in a hypothetical court case and (2) less strongly, the claim of a direct relationship between power and communicator attractiveness. (Language style features included intensifiers, hedges, polite or hesitation forms, and deictic phrases.) (PD)

Presents a rationale for using oral reading in the classroom; discusses the learning it fosters as a link between speaking and silent reading; and suggests to teachers techniques for developing oral reading skills. (SJL)

Uses psychological sex-role designations (masculine, feminine, and androgynous) to extend the investigation of gender differences related to two communication variables: self-disclosure and communication apprehension. (JMF)

Discusses a class survey project in which future teachers interview secondary school students to determine their views on education and interpersonal communication. Enables prospective teachers to practice communicating with adolescents, to assess their needs and interests relative to communication education, and to apply educational theories of…

Examines reactions to male and female discussants who express positions of dissent in small decision-making groups. Results indicate that both men and women were persuasive when they used well-supported arguments. The use of qualifiers (tag questions, disclaimers) only had an adverse affect, however, when used by women. (PD)

Discusses Richard McKeon's architectonic productive art method and its application to the pedagogy of invention. (Defines architectonic productive art as a systematic method for recognizing the organizing principles in the inquired subject which is itself an organizing system.) (PD)

Discusses the damaging effects of "group libel", the use of language to subjugate groups of people, and the conflict these elements present with the First Amendment commitment to freedom of speech. (JMF)

Compares three popular approaches to experiential learning with respect to purpose, philosophy, format, leadership, language, and strategy. Each is uniquely designed to elicit highly emotional involvement, confessions of failure in the past and immediate present, and attempts to communicate with integrity. (JMF)