Cognitive Foundations of Attitudes(1)

7/27/2019 Cognitive Foundations of Attitudes(1)

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PERCEPTION & LANGUAGE

REGARD

Dennis R. Preston

Michigan State University

[email protected]


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The linguistic world is made up of only two

parts:

1. The structural part, which I conceive of

broadly, consists of the following:

a. phonetics and (morpho)phonology,

b. morphology and (morpho)syntax,

c. semantics, andd. pragmatics


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2. The language regardpart, which

responds to a variety of linguistic and

nonlinguistic factors, exemplified in the

following:

a. Is a speaker well-educated?b. Is a speakers language deficient?

c. Is a message well-organized?

d. Does a speaker sound friendly?

etc


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In earlier work, Nancy Niedzielski and I

(2000) tried to situate these within a more

general framework of linguistic concerns.

These regard concerns are known

variously as language att i tudes, fo lkl inguist ics, and language ideolog ies.

I will deal only with the first two.


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a

b1 bn

a Cognitive states andprocesses which govern a

Language production and comprehension

b Cognitive states and

processes which govern b

Conscious

reactions toand comments

on language

Subconsciousreactions to

language


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The top of this triangle (a) is the traditional

language stuff. For the sentence I stuck

him with a pen, all the technical categorieslisted above come into play (for both

speaker and hearer):

a. Phonetics and (morpho)phonologyi. [aystkmwpn]

ii. {PAST}/stk/ /stk/

b. (Morpho)syntaxi. {stick} + {PAST}

etc


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The end result is that

a. the speaker has meant tocommunicate that they stuck

somebody with a pen, and

b. the hearer has understood

that the speaker meant just that.

What could be simpler!


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Its not simple.

Underlying athere is an a, the domain of

the cognitive principles which allow the

utterance and understanding of the thingsuttered and understood at a.

Linguists are most excited about finding

those afeatures that enfranchise athecompetencethat underliesperformance.

Thats not our concern today.


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Scholars have not ignored the bottom of the

triangle.

The right hand side (tacit knowledge) has

been most exploited by social psychologists

under the label language atti tudes; the lefthand side (declarative knowledge) has been

the domain of fo lk l inguist ics.

That makes the triangle look like this.


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Linguistic elements (at a) and theories (at a)

may encourage responses (along b).

a

b1 bn





Deliberativereactions to

and commentson language

Automaticreactions to

language


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Lets cut the b continuum in half and pretendthat people are only aware or unaware.

I know its more complicated than that, butlets begin on the far left and look first at folk

linguistics.

Why should we study what real people

believe about linguistics and language?


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Folk linguistic studies must be done if we wanta complete ethnography of language for any

group. If we do not know what nonlinguistsbelieve about language, we lack fullinformation about perhaps the most importantelement of their cultures.

A: THE

ETHNOGRAPHYOF LANGUAGE

REASON


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Folk linguistic studies should be done if we

have any interest in the insights of those who

use language daily. Why would we assume thatany linguists could not gain clues about

language by listening to the linguistic comments

of the folk?

B: THE LINGUISTICTHEORY REASON


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It would be surprising if folk belief did not bearon many elements involved in variation and

change. Although much goes on below the

conscious level, not everything does, and folkclues about winners and losers in language

variation and change should be interesting,

perhaps even explanatory.

C: THE LANGUAGE

VARIATION AND

CHANGE REASON


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How could one imagine doing appliedlinguistics without knowing the linguistic beliefs

of the group with whom the work is to be done.To do so is to invite disdain for or outrightopposition to ones attempts.

D: THE APPLIED

LINGUISTICSREASON


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So, maybe its a good idea to do folk

linguistics, but two reasons are usuallygiven not to do it:

A. Many things in language that the folk

talk about arent really there at all, orthings the folk say about language are

completely wrong, and

B. Things that are there are completely

inaccessible to folk knowledge.


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Yes, the content of the computational

system is inaccessible to nonexperts, but if

one takes a more surface oriented notion of

structure, many facts are (Silverstein 1981),

but may be available in different ways

(Preston 1996).

But there is no special value in folk opinions

being correct. Only one of the justifications

outlined above (linguistic theory) wouldhinge on that necessity.


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LABOV on FOLK KNOWLEDGE in the US and England

The overt responses in American and English society

generally are quite poor as far as vocabulary is concerned.Poverty-strickenwould be the best term for this

vocabulary. The inadequacy of peoples overt remarks about

their own language is directly reflected in the fact that there

are only a few words that they use to convey the subjectiveresponse that they feel. But some of the references made

here today show that there are highly institutionalized folk

attitudes toward language which are much richer than those

which we are accustomed to meeting in the U.S. and

England. (Labov, discussion of Hoenigswald 1966:23)


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That might mean that folk linguistics is worth doing in

other countries, but I believe that Labov is also wrong

about Britain and America. He is concerned, forexample, about nasals:

Frequently, if you ask somebody what he thinks of this

style of speech (nasalized), hell say its very nasal; and ifyou produce a speech of this sort (denasalized), hell say

thats very nasaltoo. In other words, the denasalized

speech characteristics of some urban

areas and extremely nasalized speech are treated in thesame way. (Labov, discussion of Hoenigswald 1966:23-4)

But Labov does not differentiate between the folk and

linguistic taxonomies of nasal.


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Lets examine this accessibility issue more

carefully. Silverstein (1981) surveys 5

conditions for folk linguistic availability:

1. Unavoidable referentiality

2. Continuous segmentability3. Relative presuppositionality

4. Decontextualized deducibility

5. Metapragmatic transparency


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1) Unavoidable referentiality: For example, the deference-

versus solidarity-with-hearer pragmatic system is realized as a

second or third person plural (deferential) versus a second personsingular (solidary) e.g., German Sieversus du; French vous

versus tu. The opposition is unavoidably referential, for the

pronoun forms which carry the pragmatic system are the same

ones which refer to individuals. In contrast, although a speakers

selection of a certain phonetic variant in a given performance

might symbolize greater deference to a hearer (as a result of the

greater formality associated with that variant), such variants are

not in themselves referential; therefore, although formality versus

informality is a pragmatic opposition, its realization in the use of aparticular phonetic variant is not unavoidably referential and less

open to folk awareness.


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2) Continuous segmentabilityrefers to the fact that some linguistic

units are not interrupted by other material. In I am going to town,

the entire sentence, each word, phrases such as to town, and evenmorphemes such as -ingare all continuously segmentable. The form

which refers to the progressive aspect, however, is am -ing, and

displays discontinuity, making it less open to awareness.

In a discussion of the passive, however, an equally discontinuousphenomenon, several US English speaking respondents provide

evidence for considerable awareness of the construction (Niedzielski

and Preston 2000). Subject-verb agreement, multiple negation, and

so-called split infinitives, all discontinuous or potentially so, are alsofrequently discussed phenomena in English, suggesting that some

other factors may overcome Silversteins purely linguistic

categorizations.


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3) Relative presuppositionalityis Silversteins term for the degree

to which a pragmatic function depends on contextual factors to

realize its meaning. At one end of this scale are such items as this

and that, which successfully function only if there is a physical

reality to which they can be linked, a relative physical (or mental)

distance which supports the choice between them, or a prior mention

of some entity. Such presuppositionally dependent items do very

little creative work and are readily available to the folk as linguisticobjects.

At the other end of the scale are items which are context creating.

For example, Duranti (1984) notes that third person subject pronounoccurrence in Italian (a pro-drop language) signals a main

characterand usually one towards whom the speaker displays

positive affect.This function of overt pronoun realization in Italian

is hidden to folk speakers.


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4) Decontextualized deducibilitysays more about how linguisticfacts are accounted for by the folk than about their general

availability. One common path taken by folk commenters on

linguistic objects is that of specifying thededucible entailed

presuppositions,a characterization which is the equivalent ofstating the meaning. In other words, providing the contexts in

which the form in question fits or is true is a common folk activity.

Consider the following:


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((In a discussion of Christmas, H has asked if there is any difference

betweengift andpresent; D has said earlier that there is not, but he

returns to the question.))

D: Oftentimes a gift is something like you you go to a Tupperware

party and theyre going to give you a gift, its- I think its

more impersonal, - than a present.

G: No, theres no difference.D: No? Theres real- yeah theres really no difference. Thats true.

Maybe the way we use it is though.

G: There is no difference.

U: Maybe we could look it up and see what giftmeans.D: I mean technically theres no difference.

((They look upgift andpresentin the dictionary.))

(Niedzielski and Preston 2000)


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5) Metapragmatic transparency: When the folk say what went on,

they are more likely to mimic what was actually said if the

performance is metapragmatically transparent.Suppose Wanda is

cold and that Karla is near the thermostat. Wanda could say:Brrrrrrrrr!

Im freezing.

Arent you cold?

I wonder if the furnace is broken?Would you mind if we had a little more heat in here?

Turn up the heat.

Turn up the heathas the greatest metapragmatic transparency, and

folk accounts of the interaction between Wanda and Karla are morelikely to result in an observation that Wanda asked Karla to turn up

the heatthan in any of the other request forms. Wanda said Arent

you cold,and by that meant for Karla to turn up the heatwould be a

strange report (except for a linguist or a philosopher).


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Even recognizing such detail does not characterize

how folk attention may express itself. Preston (1996)

provides the following classification:

1)Availability: Not all areas (whether of performance, ability, or

reaction) have equal availability. They may be ranked as follows:

a) Unavailable; the folk do not comment on some topics (e.g.,

specific phonological features of some accents).b)Available; the folk will discuss some matters carefully

described by a fieldworker (e.g., deviant sentences), but they

do not normally do so.

c) Suggestible; although seldom initiated in ordinaryconversation, the folk will comment on topics if they arise;

they do not require elaborate description from a fieldworker.

d) Common; topics of usual folk linguistic discussion.

2) A Al h h i h b i h l f h d


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2)Accuracy: Although it has no bearing on the value of the data,

folk descriptions of language may be inaccurate or accurate.

3)Detail: A linguistic object may be characterized with great

specificity or none.

a) Global; for example, the phonological detail of an accent

might be unavailable, but that does not limit comment on the

accent.

b) Specific; in some cases, linguistic characterization is detailed

(e.g., accounts of speakers who are said to drop their gsin -ingforms).

4) Control: In both account and performance, folk linguists may

or may not control the variety (or any aspect of it) under

consideration.

This last cuts across the first three considerations in

unexpected ways. A speaker who reports on only the global

aspects of an accent might nevertheless give a detailed

imitation of it (which might be in part accurate, in part

inaccurate).


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Given these conditions, one may ask why

language is ever overtly noticed.

The Japanese sociolinguist Takesi Sibata has a

simple (and I believe partly correct) explanation:

the average language user is so involvedwith communicating that he is usually not

conscious of the words he uses(1971:375).

And I would add not conscious of the words

others use either. Even items that have the

linguistic and pragmatic character to be available,because of what we may call the communicative

mandate, go unnoticed.


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What sorts of language acts allow us to

overcome the communicative mandate?

Again Sibata has identified at least part of

the answer:

It appears to be natural for forms whichdiffer from those which one usually uses to

attract ones attention(1971:374).

And I would add to this usually uses or

that one expects to be used....


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Lets return to I stuck him with a penand try

to place an account of that sentence by areal person into the details of this triangle.

What could make a real person payattention to the form of this sentence?


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Ill modify just the (broad) phonetics a bit:

[astkmwpn]

This sentence is now noticeable to some.

The top-of-the-triangle (aand a) facts that

make it so are simple:

1) This new speaker has a rule (a) that

monophthongizes /y/ to [] (a).

2) And a rule (a) that merges // and // to

[] before nasals (a).


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The hearer has neither rule and could say

things like the following to record their

awareness of the form of this utterance:

1) This speaker pronounces his I like ah.

2) This speaker uses the same vowels inpinandpen.

But thats not the way the folk linguisticworld usually turns. The trip from ato bis

very messy.


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The folk say things like:

He sounds like some redneck Southerner.

He sounds like some shit-kicker.

He sounds like he doesnt have enough

sense to come in out of the rain.He sounds like some racist bastard.

He sounds like hes married to his cousin.

He sounds like he could make good

moonshine.

etc


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All this suggests that, once we have the right

configuration of a(perhaps a), we can move

directly to folk responses.

To obey Sibatas law (with my revision), one

need only do a contrastive analysis of theirown speech and the others (or of the

expected variety of a speaker and their

actual performance) to trigger a b response.


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Sibatas rule: The speaker says [pn] for

pen; but the hearers rules yield [pEn], and

causes them to notice the pronunciation.

My corollary: In another setting, a hearer

knows a speaker is from the Southern US,

but they say [pEn], so the pronunciation isstill noticed.

So, once we have noticed a linguistic fact,

we can move directly to a folk response.


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a

b1 bn








language

In other words, the path shown here.

Hearers notice istriggered


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This is horribly inadequate. Stimuli dont

directly trigger responses. Maybe something

like this:

a Focus b b1

When the folk notice (Focus) language data(a), they process it through an underlying

belief system (b), understanding it as

something that can be made sense of withinthat system. These steps precede any

response (b1).


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a

b1 bn








language

In other words, the new path shown here.



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In our example, the vowel merger before

nasals is different from the hearers system

(Sibatas rule) and triggers notice; it allowsthe hearer to conclude that the speaker is

Southern. All the redneck, shit-kicker,

hillbilly, moonshine-making, cousin-marryingstuff listed above spills out from b.

What makes this folk linguistic (except for

the trigger)?Another revision.


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a Focus b ab b1

Step a: Speaker produces an [] in pen.

Step Focus: Hearer notices it, since their

own rule produces an [].

Step b: Hearer recognizes that this a isSouthern and provides caricatures of

such speech (b).

Stepab: Hearer imbues fact (a) with thecharacteristics retrieved from b.

Stepb1: Hearer utters folk remark (b1).


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Important fact:

Language itself (aand a) does not carrylanguage regard features intrinsically. This

model suggests that regard features are

formed by an association between languagefeatures (at any linguistic level) and

nonlinguistic caricatures held about groups of

speakers.


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a

b1 bn




processes which governb




language

In other words, the path finally shown here.


ais redefinedin terms of babtriggers b

response


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a ab

Focus b b1a ab

How can afactors play a role?

Since Americans know that Hillbillies are sodumb they cant tell the difference between

pinand pen, a belief about intelligence and

phonological contrast may be triggered, a

very peculiar linguistic notion, but one not

so strange in a folk theory of language.


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If all this is true, responses of any sort at b

are only clues to what we are really after:

The identity of b concepts and their

application to a and a material.

Not everything we have done so far in folk

linguistics is wrong, but I recommend taking

a careful look at our methods (and results)

within this more cognitively oriented model.


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Perhaps the best-known techniques in folk

linguistics have been done within perceptualdialectology. Two techniques hand-

drawn maps and ratings of areas will

illustrate qualitative and quantitative

approaches to such folk data, respectively,and I will relate the findings to what we have

already discussed.


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Instructions: Its well known that people in different parts of the country speak

English differently. Draw boundaries around the speech areas of the US as you

know them on the above map and write inside the area the label you use toidentify that kind of speech, the area, or speakers of that variety. If you use more

than one label, give all you use. If this map is not detailed enough for you to

indicate some of the things you know about speech in a particular area, use the

back to draw such a smaller area and label it. If you have any comments about

what you have done, please write them down on the back of the page as well.


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QuickTime and aTIFF (LZW) decompressor

are needed to see this picture.

Hand-drawn map of US dialect areas

(Chicago, 1984, age 18, EA, male, coach)


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There are many ways to talk about this map;

one might investigate the areas and the

labels.

This respondent labels Chicago as Normal

talk for the average person.

Detroit is a place for Black fro talk, and

much of the South is the home of Southern

talk the worst English in American.

This respondent cares for much more than

regional distribution (a linguists afact).

H h d f ill t


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He has made sense of a silly request

(where do people speak differently?), by

applying a sense-making strategy (fromb

),one that reformulates our task into one

about the regional implications of good and

bad English.

Subsequent quantitative interpretation of

numbers of maps from southeastern

Michigan led to a generalization about where

such respondents put the speech areas of

the US.


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Generalized areas and density of response by southeastern

MI respondents.

This map is interesting as regards outlines, but

more interesting for the number of respondents who

isolate different areas. 94% identify a South, 61% a

home area, and 54% a NYC area. Why?


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If large numbers of Michiganders draw a

South and a NYC area, there must be a

reason, one which appears to be somethingother than linguistic distinctiveness. The b

here may be that questions of linguistic

difference are sent through a correctnessevaluator before they are responded to.

Armed with this information, it was possible

to go directly for attitudinal responses thatreflected the bfact uncovered in this

previous research.


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Southeastern Michigan ratings of the 50 states, Washington,

D.C. and New York City on a scale of 1 to 10 for correctness.


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These Michiganders are not reticent to

assert that Michigan has the very best

English and that places like Alabama andNew York City have the worst.

Such work as this allowed us to posit an

underlying theory of language (a big b) forspeakers of American English. We suspect

it may not be very different for others,

although Swedes like Book Languageand Danes like the National Language

Board.

THE LANGUAGE Two


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THE LANGUAGE

Good Language

THE LANGUAGE

Dialect #1 Dialect #2 Dialect #3 etc...

Ordinary Language

Dialects

A Folk Theoryof Language

A Linguistic Theory

of Language

Errors

Idiolect #1 Idiolect #2 etc...

Two

theories of

language


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In the US, and I suspect in many other

places as well, it is this top-down rather

than bottom-up view of the very existenceof the language itself that underlies a

great deal of folk linguistic belief. It not only

explains much of what I have shown you

but also empowers at least prescriptivism

and odd beliefs about the the ease with

which the standard variety may be learned.

But I am way ahead of myself.

Lets back up and place this research in the


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Let s back up and place this research in the

cognitive framework I proposed earlier.

a Focus b ab b1...bn

The Focus in the map drawing task is ondifferences in dialect areas (a). Since there

are no actual data, we dont know what was

considered by the respondents, but when

they considered a, no matter what data they

had in mind, they resorted to a bbelief that

ranks varieties on the basis of correctness.


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In the next step, they have redefined

whatever linguistic details they have in mind

(at whatever level of specificity and with

whatever degree of authenticity) as ab, a

complex array of the imagined details along

with the deeper folk belief about correctness

and the position of the South within that belief(as well as beliefs that support that

positioning).

a Focus b ab b1...bn


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In the final step, the respondents have taken

their redefined information and used it in

constructing whatever sort of response hasbeen requested of them. Although much of

the process may have been covert in this

particular case, we are still pretending that it

has fallen on the far left of the continuum, inpart perhaps due to the overt specificity of

the request itself.

a Focus b ab b1


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Suppose, however, we change what we will

focus on and how we draw the respondentsattention to that focus.

Thats what I hope to do with reference to

region, phonetic detail, discourse evidence,

and the role of language regard in variation

and change in the remainder of this course.


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But next we will turn to a more sophisticated

cognitive model that will better show howevery time you manipulate just one aspect of

investigation you will produce something

new, something further revealing, andsomething which will take you deeper into

this area of the linguistic subsciences.

This should be the end of my first session.


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This more sophisticated model of language

regard will allow us to consider the other sideto the triangle, the language attitudeside,

where, as I suggested earlier, we are often

more concerned with covert, subconsciousresponses.

First, lets ask social psychologists what anattitude is.

An attitude is a psychological tendency


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An attitude is a psychological tendency

that is expressed by evaluating a

particular entity with some degree of favoror disfavor (Eagly and Chaiken 2005:744).

The relationship between attitudes and

Concepts & beliefs(cognition),Behaviors(action), and

Emotions(affect)

is two-way: all three contribute to as well as

result from attitudes.

But they are all distinct.


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A particular entity is called an attitudeobjectby social psychologists, and they note

that such entities are presented (Focus in

our earlier terminology) within specificeliciting conditions.


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Eliciting conditions include (at least):

1) Setting time, place, participants

2) Form of the stimulus written or audio

(video) presentation, isolated or in context

3) Task type written or verbal, timed or

untimed, scalar or identificational

4) Representation of the attitude objectdirect or indirect


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A more complete representation of a


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Eliciting Conditions

Attitude

Object

Associated

Representations

TaskType Setting WorkingMemory

A more complete representation of a

stimulus, resulting in a construal

Automatic

Processes

Prior

Experience



Input from


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QuickTime and aTIFF (LZW) decompressorare needed to see this picture.

Input from

Automatic Processes

or

Working Memory

Prior experience

Implicit Response


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AttitudeObject

Associated

Representations

Task

TypeSetting

Working

Memory

Automatic

Processes

Prior

Experience

Attitudinal

Cognitorium




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AttitudeObject

Associated

Representations

Task

TypeSetting

Working

Memory

Automatic

Processes

Prior

Experience

Attitudinal

Cognitorium



Explicit Response


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Implicit Response Input

Explicit Response Input

Response


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Implicit Response Input

Explicit Response Input

Response


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Southerners

Poorly

EducatedViolent

Sympathetic

Prejudiced FriendlyIgnorant

UnprejudicedGenuine

Honest

Hypocritical


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Southerners

Poorly

EducatedViolent

Sympathetic


UnprejudicedGenuine

Honest

Hypocritical

Bad English

Judges LV1 speakers LV2 speakers

A ib S S lid i S S lid i


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Attribute Status Solidarity Status Solidarity

A. Majority group LV1 LV1 LV1 LV1

B. Majority group

for Status/in-group

for solidarity LV1 LV1 LV1 LV2

C. In-group LV1 LV1 LV2 LV2

D. Majority group

for status/minoritygroup for solidarity LV1 LV2 LV1 LV2

Ryan, Giles, and Sebastian (1982:9) outline of language

regard types

What type of society is the US? How can we

find out? If Michiganders are LV1, what are

southerners?


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D.C. and New York City on a scale of 1 to 10 for pleasantness.


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Auburn University ratings of the 50 states, Washington, D.C.

and New York City on a scale of 1 to 10 for pleasantness.


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A simplified map of southern Michigan hand-drawn areas of US

dialect differences for trait evaluation.

slo fast


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slow fast

polite rude

snobbish down-to-eartheducated uneducated

normal abnormal

smart dumbformal casual

bad English good English

friendly unfriendly

nasal not nasal

speaks with without a drawl

speaks with without a twang

South North

R k Att ib t M R k Att ib t M


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Rank Attribu te Mean Rank Attribu te Mean

1 Casual 4.66 1 No dr aw l 5.11

2 Friend ly 4.58 2 No twan g 5.07

3 Down-to-ear th 4.54 3 Normal 4.94

4 Poli te 4.20 4 Smart 4.53

5 Not nasa l 4.09 5 Good En glish 4.41

* 6 Down-to-ear th 4.19

6 Normal [Ab normal] 3.22 7 Fast 4.12

7 Smart [Dumb] 3.04 8 Educa ted 4.09

8 No twan g [Twan g] 2.96 9.5 Friend ly 4.00

9 Good En glish [Bad Eng.] 2.86 9.5 Poli te 4.00

10 Educa ted [Uned ucated] 2.72 11 Not nasa l 3.94

11 Fast [Slow] 2.42 12 Casual 3.53

12 No dr aw l [Drawl] 2.22

Michigan ratings of the North and the South for 12

attributes (scale = 1 to 6)

Judges LV1 speakers LV2 speakers

Att ib t St t S lid it St t S lid it


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Attribute Status Solidarity Status Solidarity

A. Majority group LV1 LV1 LV1 LV1

B. Majority group

for Status/in-groupfor solidarity LV1 LV1 LV1 LV2

C. In-group LV1 LV1 LV2 LV2

D. Majority group

for status/minoritygroup for solidarity LV1 LV2 LV1 LV2

This study, in which the responses are teased

out with folk categories, suggests, unlike therating task, that Northerners are insecure

about the pleasantness of their own variety,

ascribing that attribute to Southern speech.


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Southerners

Poorly

EducatedViolent

Sympathetic


UnprejudicedGenuine

Honest

Hypocritical

Bad English


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1 2 3 4 5 6 7 SN

[ay] [a:]


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Male & Female voice ratings


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2.39 2.65

3.25

4.01

5.45.99

6.43

3.313.69

4.5

5.77

6.597.16

7.61

0

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

Step 1 Step 2 Step 3 Step 4 Step 5 Step 6 Step 7

Monophthongization steps

Female

Male

Results for responses to male and female speakers

seven-step monophthongization of guide

S th


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Southerners

Poorly

EducatedViolent

Sympathetic


UnprejudicedGenuine

Honest

Hypocritical

Bad English

Male


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Now lets turn to a few more samples of

investigation of language regard, from

both the folk and attitudinal sides, to

further our understanding of how such

data are collected and interpreted,particularly with an eye towards their role

in language variation and change.


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D-S variables= Traditional dialect variant vs. Standard variantOrigin: Local community vs. Copenhagen

LOCALspeech Cph

(=Locally accented Stand ard) (=Copenhagen-Based

Standard)

Cph-variables= High/Older variant vs. Low/Younger variant

CONSERVATIVE Cph MODERNCph

LANCHART Speaker Evaluation Experiment

V i d i ti


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Voices and varieties

Copenhagen Cb1 Mg2 Mb5 Cg4 Cb7 Mg8 Mb11 Cg10

Elsewhere Cb1 Mg2 Lb3 Cg4 Mb5 Lg6 Cb7 Mg8 Lb9 Cg10 Mb11 Lg12

C = ConservativeM = ModernL = Local

b = boyg = girl

numbers = order on the tape


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IntelligentStupid C *** M *** L ***ConscientiousHappy-go-lucky C / M * L *

TrustworthyUntrustworthy M / C ** L **

Goal-directedDull M / C / L *

Self-assuredInsecure M *** C / L ***FascinatingBoring M *** L *** C ***

CoolUncool M *** L ** C ***

NiceRepulsive M * C / L ***

Wilcoxon Signed Pair Test Friedman Test

*** = p


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Tokens were created that varied along the

continuum between sod and shod and placedin front of a VC segment

Listeners were asked to choose whether they

heard sod or shod.Some were told the speaker was a man, others

it was a woman all heard the same tokens

When listeners believed the speaker was awoman, they made the boundary between

the categories at a higher frequency than

when they thought it was a man.


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i

e

u

o

General American English

heat

hit

hate

head

hat

hot

hut

caught

coat

could

hoot


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The Northern Cities Chain Shift


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Hi. My name is Monica, and Ive grown up

in Lansing my entire life. My parents are

from Lansing, and my grandparents are from

Lansing too. I went to Waverly High School,

which is about ten minutes away, and I went

to St. Gerard for my primary education.

Monica:// is frontup: // is back

Lansing & grandparents: // is high & front

ten& education: // is low & back

The Northern Cities Chain Shift


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Nancy Niedzielski played the word lastfor


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Formant values of tokens offered to respondents to match with speakers last

Token # F1 F2 label1 900 1530 hyper-standard2 775 1700 canonical //

3 700 1900 actual token produced by speaker

southeastern Michiganders. They first heard the

vowel at the ACTUAL position.Then she asked them to pair that pronunciation

with one of three others: the same, one closer

to so-called canonical //, and one even lowerand farther back.


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e

i

u

oActual

Canon

Hyper

200

300

400

500

600

700

800

900

1000

10001500200025003000


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Respondent matching results for the vowel in last

token 1 2 3hyper canonical actual

____________standard // token Total10% 90% 0%

n= 4 38 0 42

Where is Michigan?


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Mt. Pleasant

23,285

Ithaca

3,009

Roscommon

858


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Systems of selected Michigan speakers (Ito and Preston, 1998)

Tammy (local loyalty):

R: Have you ever wished to live somewhere ELSE?


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yT: Um:. I've thought about it, but- I don't really want to go - anywhere

else,cause if - if I go to Florida or somewhere, it's summer all thetime. Which I don't mind, but but I miss the ...winter and if I were to

go somewhere where its snow (-y, -ing) all the time Id miss thesummer. And I like the fall too and its

[R: Yeah It's beautiful.

[T: Uh huh. And that's why I like

Michigan. I don't want to - go anywhere.

R: I see. Uh. So::. Well you mentioned a little bit, but what is the bestthing or the advantage or the worst thing or disadvantage to: livesomewhere around here?

T: To living somewhere around here? (pause) Um::. I don't know asthere's disadvantages. Some of the advantages- I look at is - i-when I- ever I have a family I would rather be up here because - Iwould be less apt to run into the crime and the gangs and all thatstuff. And if youre out in the country it doesn't happen as often,and - then I wouldn't have to be so worried about when my kids goout at night and things like that. So Id rather live here. Where Iknow my territory more or less.

Sherry (nonlocal orientation)


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y ( )

R: Have you ever wished to live somewhere elseS: Oh: I wouldn't mind living on the la:ke. Higgins Lake, its like real

close to here, and I usually waitress at restaurants out by the lake.So, ... I've often thought that it would be neat to live on the lake, but... Id just as soon get out of Roscommon. So it doesn't really, Ihavent really been (laughs) something Ive given much thought to.

R: I see. Um. So, what is the advantage to live ... here?S: Well, I don't know. Living in California I just- I liked the climate, I

liked the place, its something new. Its just seems to suit to mypersonality. I like seeing new places. So, ... I guess it would bemore ... close to things, than I dont know, it just clicks wi th me,so

R: So what would be the ... worst thing or the disadvantage livinghere?

S: Living here? Ah- well, being far from everything.R&S: (laugh)S: Living kind of ... sheltered away from, uh


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0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100

I

E

Q

A

Overall comprehension results for Peterson &

Barney, 1952 (percent correct)


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0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100

I

E

Q

A

Overall comprehension results;

Preston, 2005 (percent correct)

ATTITUDES


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CONCLUSIONS:

1) Eliciting conditions are a source of

variation.

2) Processing (automatic vs.deliberative) is a source of variation.

3) The excited network modules are a

source of variation.4) There is no one response truer

than another.

PERCEPTIONS


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CONCLUSIONS:

1) Eliciting conditions are (still) a

source of variation.

2) Processing (automatic vs.deliberative) is (still) a source of

variation.

3) The excited network modules are(still) a source of variation.

4) There is no one perception more

accurate than another

Why is language regard important to


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y g g g p

sociolinguistics in particular?

The stability of norms is important to basicconcepts in the field:

[Evaluation of /r/] is typical of many other

empirical findings which confirm the view ofNew York City as a single speech community,

united by a uniform evaluation of linguistic

features, yet diversified by stratification in performance.

(L b 1972 117 it li i )

Cognitive Foundations of Attitudes(1)

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Transcript of Cognitive Foundations of Attitudes(1)