Maria: Explaining football

The following conventions for transcribing speech are taken from ten Have, 2007, and are the conventions which we have used in our transcriptions.

Sequencing marks

[

A single left bracket indicates the point of overlap onset (where the second speaker begins speaking before the first has finished). For example:

A: did I tell you what happened yesterday when I went to the shop

B: [no what happened

=

Equal signs, one at the end of one line and one at the beginning of the next, indicate no 'gap' between the two lines: the second speaker begins speaking at the moment that the first speaker finishes.

Timed intervals

(0.0)

Numbers in brackets indicate elapsed time in silence by tenths of seconds. Thus, (5.6) is a silence of 5 seconds and 6-tenths of a second.

(.)

A dot in brackets indicates a tiny 'gap' within or between utterances.

Characteristics of speech production

word

Underlining indicates some form of stress, via the pitch or loudness of the utterance. An alternative method is to print the stressed part in italics.

::

Colons indicate prolongation of the sound immediately before. Multiple colons indicate a more prolonged sound.

-

A dash indicates that the speaker's speech is cut off abruptly. For example:

A: but then I-

.,?

Punctuation marks are used to indicate characteristics of speech production, especially intonation. They are NOT referring to grammatical units. See below.

.

A full stop indicates a stopping fall in tone: the speech sounds as if the speaker is indicating the end of their speech by lowering the pitch they are speaking at.

,

A comma indicates a continuing intonation, like when you are reading items from a list.

?

A question mark indicates a rising intonation, not a question. For example:

A: I'm reading a great book at the moment?

The absence of an utterance-final marker indicates that the speech did not end with a particular intonation or change in intonation: the speaker did not raise their pitch, or lower it, or sound particularly as if they intended to finish or continue speaking.

¯

Arrows indicate marked shifts into higher or lower pitch in the utterance-part immediately following the arrows. For example, the second part of this phrase would be uttered at a significantly higher pitch than the first:

A: then he said perhaps ­which he knows really annoys me

WORD

Upper-case letters indicate sounds which are particularly loud in relation to the surrounding talk (perhaps shouted).

°

Utterances or utterance-parts bracketed by degree sounds are relatively quieter than the surrounding talk. For example:

A: so I went in and °don't say anything but°I'm going to buy it there instead

< >

Right/left carets bracketing an utterance or utterance-part indicate speeding up

.hhh

A dot-prefix row of 'h's indicates an inbreath. Without the dot, the 'h's indicate an outbreath.

w(h)ord

A bracketed (h), or row of (hhh)s, within a word indicates breathiness as in laughter, crying etc.

Transcriber's doubts and comments

( )

Empty brackets indicate the transcriber's inability to hear what was said. The length of the bracketed space indicates the length of the untranscribed talk. In the 'speaker' designation column, empty brackets indicate inability to identify a speaker.

(word)

Bracketed words are especially dubious hearings or speaker identifications.

(())

Double brackets contain transcriber's descriptions rather than, or in addition to, transcribed speech.

ten Have, P. (1999). Doing conversation analysis: A practical guide. London, Sage.

A: right (0.8) what’s your favourite game.

YP: ((yawns)) (2.5) I don’t know none

A: what games do you like to play

YP: football.

A: brilliant what I’m gonna ask you to do now then is, can you tell me,

YP: [you want me to name a football player

A: no I’ve got no idea about football players what I’d like you to do (.) is explain to me how you play football with as much detail as you can so I don’t I actually don’t know anything (.) about football .hhh so

YP: [you kick it into a goal, you just shoot it at people, er no you don’t you kick it at the person who you’re aiming at

A: mm

YP: er (1.8) don’t kick it through windows like I do, ((laughs))

A: [yeah

YP: ((coughs)) er (2) windows (1.5) °hang on a minute I’m trying to think (0.3) when did I play football I played it with my mates°

A: ok so describe to me, (.) everything you can about the game football so how you play it, what you need to do to win, what the rules are,

YP: wear a uni-wear a erm football t-shirt and football shorts. a kit I meant to say.

A: [mm

A: ok

YP: [er can’t remember..° it’s hard to think this° ((breathes in)) dududududu (4.2) the rules is not to kick each other (1.5) and swear at each other that’s not a good rule,

A: mm

YP: [.hhh erm (1.8) when somebody gets injured wait until the person comes and sorts them out.

A: right yeah

YP: that’s the goalkeep-no it’s not the goalkeeper it’s the referee.

A: mmhmm

YP: or manager

A: mhm

YP: and don’t start a fight after a game like some people do

A: no ( ) so what do you have to do to be really good at football.

YP: errr you have to have the energy for it.

A: mhm

YP: you have to do a lot of training to .hh (0.8) a lot of training to do football like Sheffield United does a right lot of training but then they turn round and say they’re crap afterwards

A: right (0.5) .hh and what do you do to win.

YP: erm score a goal ((laughs))

A: - yep is that all

YP: yeah and then you win a trophy afterwards if you get to the penalties, er get to the erm what’s it called,

A: (2.7) - I think it is penalties isn’t it?

YP: yeah and trophy awards I can’t remember what it’s called now.

A: - ( ) is that the word you’re thinking of

YP: yeah (1) think it’s called that? do you ever watch Match of the Day.

A: I don’t no I don’t know anything about football,

YP: I got to see the torch last night on the tv,

A: - ooh brilliant

YP: [it was on the tv (0.8) the torch was on the tv from Sheffield.

A: cool (.) did you see you on the tv were you on there too

YP: no an I seen this bloke carrying the torch from a different place.

A: mm

YP: [this one who’s doing the Olympic thing

A: right yeah

YP: the one who’s got no legs. he has got legs but it’s like them plastic ones.

A: yeah (1.8) ok (1.6) erm and can you tell me why why football’s your favourite game.

YP: [((yawns))

YP: cos I like to kick a ball around.

A: yeah

YP: (1.8) cos if I don’t kick a ball around I kick walls instead ((laughs))

A: [I don’t believe that

YP: .hh I kick the walls instead of kicking a ball and that’s how you injure your foot.

A: - but you look so - calm

YP: (2) not after I-no at home if we haven’t got a football at home I boot the wall

A: wow

YP: [and that’s why I’ve made a mess of the wall.

A: I bet you have I bet

In order for you to make sense of the information which you have just analysed, we will provide data from five further participants to enable you to make meaningful comparisons. We will also include information on what you would expect from a ‘typically developing’ group of participants for you to refer to; this data is taken from Nippold et al.’s 2005 study.

To compare your data to other data from our sample of young people with language disorder, use the information below.

Participant 1
Total T-units: 29
Mean length of T-unit (wds): 9.2
Clausal density: 1.55

Participant 2
Total T-units: 18
Mean length of T-unit (wds): 6.67
Clausal density: 1.56

Participant 3
Total T-units: 41
Mean length of T-unit (wds): 9.96
Clausal density: 1.39

Participant 4
Total T-units: 15
Mean length of T-unit (wds): 6.00
Clausal density: 1.20

Participant 5
Total T-units: 15
Mean length of T-unit (wds): 8.53
Clausal density: 1.53

To analyse our participants’ language samples in relation to what you would expect from a typically developing young person, use the information below, taken from Nippold et al.’s 2005 study. Nippold’s study used participants who were considered typical language users (that is, they showed no evidence of any speech, language or communication need and had not been identified as having language disorder at any point in their education) from a number of age groups.

They used the expository discourse task to analyse the participants’ language use. Their findings are summarised below. Please note, only the mean (average) result is shown here, for the purposes of comparison and analysis within this Teen Talk task.

Measure: Age 8
Total T-units: 33.05
Mean length of T-unit: 8.59
Clausal density: 1.42

Measure: Age 11
Total T-units: 33.30
Mean length of T-unit: 9.29
Clausal density: 1.45

Measure: Age 13
Total T-units: 36.15
Mean length of T-unit: 8.68
Clausal density: 1.42

Measure: Age 17
Total T-units: 44.00
Mean length of T-unit: 10.59
Clausal density: 1.56

Measure: Age 25
Total T-units: 51.55
Mean length of T-unit: 11.04
Clausal density: 1.54

Measure: Age 44
Total T-units: 60.55
Mean length of T-unit: 11.46
Clausal density: 1.59

Based on: Nippold, M. A., Hesketh, L. J., Duthie, J. K., Mansfield, T. C. (2005) Conversational versus expository discourse: A study of syntactic development in children, adolescents, and adults. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research. 48, 1048-1064.

Maria's mean T-unit length (at 7.95) is somewhat lower than some of the other participants. Her clausal density (at 1.41) is only slightly below the group’s mean (at 1.45). Two of Maria’s fragments (“this one who’s doing the Olympic thing” and “the one who’s got no legs”) also contain relative clauses.

Using normative data from Nippold et al.’s 2005 study, we see that Maria’s mean T-unit length (at 7.95) is significantly lower than the mean for her typically-developing age-matched peers (at 10.59). Her clausal density is also lower than for her typically-developing age-matched peers (at 1.56), but less so. This, along with the data from the transcription regarding the types of subordinate clauses which Maria uses, suggests that she is capable of producing complex language, although this may be seen less in Maria’s language than in others’.