Research supported by United States Public Health Service Grant MH-06781 from the National Institute of Mental Health, and Grant 41-32-66-306 from the University of Illinois Research Board.

Drawn from a 1978 Speech Communication Association seminar, this collection of papers and other materials explores the subject of argumentation as epistemology. The first paper reviews several critiques of traditional argumentation theories and offers directions for new theories, and the remaining eight papers offer responses to the ideas and…

Developmental differences in categorization in a communication situation were investigated among 16 adult women and 16 nine-year-old children who instructed 7-year-old children in either the organization of groceries in a mock kitchen (home task) or the sorting of photographs of common objects into compartments (school task). In both tasks, the 18…

Extralexical information, that is, those semantic properties evoked by words which are not usually accommodated in lexicons of any kind, is essential for the comprehension of numerous ordinary sentences in a natural language. A brief review of studies on forms of extralexical information shows that those works do not deal with: (1) questions of…

This study compared a Piagetian and an Ausubelian preschool program on: (1) the types and frequencies of teacher-child verbalizations and (2) the degree to which these patterns of verbalizations supported teacher stated theoretical and pedagogical principles. Thirty-two 10-minute videotapes of 16 preschool children (8 within each program) recorded…

This research study examined the hypothesis that listener behavior could influence the performance of young speaker-listener pairs in referential communication tasks. (In referential communication, a speaker attempts to describe a target referent in such a way that a listener can pick it out from an array of potential referents.) Subjects were 28…

The relationship between a therapist's verbal and nonverbal communication of therapeutic effectiveness was investigated. In a design intended to eliminate many of the methodological problems which exist in this area of research, subjects (N=102) were asked to rate videotaped segments showing combinations of three different levels of both verbal…

When an interview is used as a research technique, the process of the dialogue between the experimenter and the subject is a part of the experimental conditions. The dialogue can be extensively structured, or it can be open-ended. Though the latter situation may provide more information about the subject's thought processes, there is a greater…

THIS INVESTIGATION STUDIED THE EFFECTS AND INTERACTION OF SELECTED PRACTICE, TASK, AND SUBJECT VARIABLES ON LEARNING PERFORMANCE. SUBJECTS SELECTED WERE RETARDED, NORMAL, AND SUPERIOR CAUCASIAN PUPILS. EACH WAS ADMINISTERED EIGHT TASKS FORMED BY COMBINING THE TASK MEANINGFULNESS AND RECITATION TYPE VARIANTS. THESE TASKS WERE ADMINISTERED IN…

THE INITIAL PHASE IS TO SEEK THE SYNTACTIC PATTERNS MOST COMMONLY USED IN THE SUBJECTS' VERBAL COMMUNICATION. THESE COMMON PATTERNS ARE REFERRED TO AS STRUCTURAL VOCABULARY. ONCE LEARNED, THESE WORDS PROVIDE SYNTACTIC SUPPORT TO AID THE STUDENT IN THE RECOGNITION OF OTHER WORDS WITHIN SENTENCE ORDER. ADULTS NEED IMMEDIATE CONFIRMATION OF THEIR…

A STUDY DESIGNED TO DETERMINE THE EFFECT ON CLASS PERFORMANCE OF VERBAL CUES ADMINISTERED AS PUPILS WORKED ON A GROUP READING TEST WAS CONDUCTED. THE SUBJECTS WERE PUPILS IN 18 SECOND-GRADE CLASSES AND 18 THIRD-GRADE CLASSES TO WHICH 36 FEMALE STUDENT TEACHERS WERE ASSIGNED. THE TASKS WERE TWO SUBTESTS OF THE "NEW DEVELOPMENTAL READING…

A DISCUSSION WAS PRESENTED ON THE PROBLEMS OF MEASURING SPEECH RATE, A CRITICAL VARIABLE IN SPEECH COMPRESSION, BOTH IN DESCRIBING THE INPUT TO ANY SPEECH COMPRESSION SYSTEM AND IN CHARACTERIZING THE OUTPUT. THE DISCUSSION WAS LIMITED TO SPEECH RATE MEASUREMENT OF "ORAL READING RATE," ONLY, AND DID NOT DEAL WITH THE MEASUREMENT OF…

THE PROJECT DESCRIBED IN THIS REPORT WAS DESIGNED TO PROVIDE EVIDENCE OF THE EFFECTIVENESS OF A COUNSELOR TRAINING EXPERIENCE WHICH UTILIZED A SIMULATED COUNSELING INTERVIEW AS THE INSTRUCTIONAL VEHICLE. THE TRAINING EXPERIENCE WAS DESIGNED TO TRAIN COUNSELORS (1) TO DISCRIMINATE BETWEEN COGNITIVE AND AFFECTIVE ELEMENTS OF CLIENT VERBALIZATIONS…

This study tests a proposition derived from Wittgenstein's theory of language development, which suggests that a social activity framework shared by interacting members serves two primary functions. Just as the activity framework prepares the child to comprehend speech relevant to the shared activity, (Function One), so it prepares the parent to…