Deciding on units of analysis within Centering Theory

Abstract Many efforts in corpora annotation start with segmenting discourse into units of analysis. In this paper, we present a method for deciding on segmentation units within Centering Theory (Grosz et al. 1995). We survey the different existing methods to break down discourse into utterances and discuss the results of a comparison study among them. The contribution of our study is that it was carried out with spoken data and in two different languages (English and Spanish). Our comparison suggests that the best unit of analysis for Centering-based annotation is the finite clause. The final result is a set of guidelines for how to segment discourse for Centering analysis, which is also potentially applicable to other analyses.

[1]  M. Taboada,et al.  Subjects and topics in conversation , 2010 .

[2]  蒋家义.  How to Do Things with Words之脉络分析 , 2009 .

[3]  Csr Young,et al.  How to Do Things With Words , 2009 .

[4]  S. Reeves,et al.  Discourse Analysis , 2018, The Study of Language.

[5]  Christian Chiarcos,et al.  5. Rhetorical distance revisited: A parameterized approach , 2008 .

[6]  Mirella Lapata,et al.  Modeling Local Coherence: An Entity-Based Approach , 2005, ACL.

[7]  Jeanette K. Gundel,et al.  Topic and Focus , 2008 .

[8]  M. Walker,et al.  Centering in Naturally-Occurring Discourse: An Overview , 2007 .

[9]  J. Sadock.  Speech acts , 2007 .

[10]  Maite Taboada,et al.  Applications of Rhetorical Structure Theory , 2006 .

[11]  W. Mann,et al.  Rhetorical Structure Theory: looking back and moving ahead , 2006 .

[12]  Tony Berber Sardinha.  Building Coherence and Cohesion: Task-oriented Dialogue in English and Spanish , 2006, Computational Linguistics.

[13]  Anna-Brita Stenström.  A step forward in multilingual corpus research , 2006 .

[14]  Loreley Hadic Zabala.  Centering Theory in Spanish: Coding Manual , 2006 .

[15]  Sandra A. Thompson,et al.  The clause as a locus of grammar and interaction , 2005 .

[16]  Susana María Doval Suárez,et al.  The dynamics of language use : functional and contrastive perspectives , 2005 .

[17]  M. Taboada,et al.  Anaphoric terms and focus of attention in English and Spanish , 2005 .

[18]  Mirella Lapata,et al.  Modeling Local Coherence: An Entity-Based Approach , 2005, ACL.

[19]  Massimo Moneglia,et al.  C-ORAL-ROM: Integrated Reference Corpora for Spoken Romance Languages , 2005 .

[20]  Edward Gibson,et al.  Discourse coherence and pronoun resolution , 2004 .

[21]  Barbara Di Eugenio,et al.  Centering: A Parametric Theory and Its Instantiations , 2004, Computational Linguistics.

[22]  Christian Chiarcos,et al.  Salience-Driven Text Planning , 2004, INLG.

[23]  Nikiforos Karamanis,et al.  Entity coherence for descriptive text structuring , 2004 .

[24]  Karen Kukich,et al.  Evaluation of text coherence for electronic essay scoring systems , 2004, Natural Language Engineering.

[25]  Cecilia E. Ford.  Contingency and Units in Interaction , 2004 .

[26]  Maite Taboada,et al.  The Genre Structure of Bulletin Board Messages , 2004 .

[27]  María Teresa Taboada,et al.  Building coherence and cohesion , 2004 .

[28]  Laurence R. Horn,et al.  The handbook of pragmatics , 2004 .

[29]  Maite Taboada,et al.  Reference, Centers and Transitions in Spoken Spanish * , 2003 .

[30]  Joel R. Tetreault,et al.  An Empirical Evaluation of Pronoun Resolution and Clausal Structure , 2003 .

[31]  C. Coelho.  Story narratives of adults with closed head injury and non-brain-injured adults: influence of socioeconomic status, elicitation task, and executive functioning. , 2002, Journal of speech, language, and hearing research : JSLHR.

[32]  Peter H. Fries,et al.  On Theme, Rheme and discourse goals , 2002 .

[33]  Eleni Miltsakaki,et al.  Toward an Aposynthesis of Topic Continuity and Intrasentential Anaphora , 2002, Computational Linguistics.

[34]  Cem Bozsahin,et al.  Contextually appropriate reference generation , 2002, Natural Language Engineering.

[35]  S. Thompson.  “Object complements” and conversation towards a realistic account , 2002 .

[36]  Maite Taboada,et al.  Centering and Pronominal Reference: In Dialogue, In Spanish , 2002 .

[37]  A Corpus-Based Evaluation of Centering and Pronoun Resolution , 2001, CL.

[38]  Rodger Kibble.  A Reformulation of Rule 2 of Centering Theory , 2001, Computational Linguistics.

[39]  M. Restrepo,et al.  Article use in Spanish-speaking children with Specific Language Impairment , 2001, Journal of Child Language.

[40]  Sharynne McLeod,et al.  Elucidating the effects of different definitions of ‘utterance’ on selected syntactic measures of older children's language samples , 2001 .

[41]  Nancy Ide,et al.  A Hierarchical Account of Referential Accessibility , 2000, ACL.

[42]  Massimo Poesio,et al.  Specifying the Parameters of Centering Theory: a Corpus-Based Evaluation using Text from Application-Oriented Domains , 2000, ACL.

[43]  Margret Selting,et al.  The construction of units in conversational talk , 2000, Language in Society.

[44]  Massimo Poesio,et al.  Pronominalization revisited , 2000, COLING.

[45]  Daniel Marcu,et al.  An Empirical Investigation of the Relation Between Discourse Structure and Co-Reference , 2000, COLING.

[46]  Andreas Stolcke,et al.  Dialogue act modeling for automatic tagging and recognition of conversational speech , 2000, CL.

[47]  J. Windsor,et al.  General language performance measures in spoken and written narrative and expository discourse of school-age children with language learning disabilities. , 2000, Journal of speech, language, and hearing research : JSLHR.

[48]  Michael Strube,et al.  Dialogue Acts, Synchronizing Units, and Anaphora Resolution , 2000, J. Semant..

[49]  Ozg Ur,et al.  Contextually Appropriate Reference Generation , 2000 .

[50]  Udo Hahn,et al.  Functional Centering - Grounding Referential Coherence in Information Structure , 1999, Comput. Linguistics.

[51]  Michael Strube,et al.  Resolving Discourse Deictic Anaphora in Dialogues , 1999, EACL.

[52]  Daniel Marcu,et al.  Discourse Structure and Co-Reference: An Empirical Study , 1999 .

[53]  R. Kibble.  Cb or not Cb? Centering theory applied to NLG , 1999 .

[54]  Jungyun Seo,et al.  Anaphora Resolution using Extended Centen’ng Algorithm in a Multi-modal Dialogue System , 1999, Workshop On The Relation Of Discourse/Dialogue Structure And Reference.

[55]  Amanda Stent,et al.  A Preliminary Model of Centering in Dialog , 1998, ACL.

[56]  Massimo Poesio,et al.  Long Distance Pronominalisation and Global Focus , 1998, COLING-ACL.

[57]  Michael Strube,et al.  Never Look Back: An Alternative to Centering , 1998, COLING-ACL.

[58]  Maj-Britt Mosegaard Hansen,et al.  The Function of Discourse Particles: A Study with Special Reference to Spoken Standard French , 1998 .

[59]  M. Walker,et al.  Centering Theory in Discourse , 1998 .

[60]  KehlerAndrew.  Current theories of centering for pronoun interpretation , 1997 .

[61]  Marilyn A. Walker,et al.  Centering, Anaphora Resolution, and Discourse Structure , 1997, ArXiv.

[62]  Megumi Kameyama,et al.  Intrasentential Centering: A Case Study , 1997, ArXiv.

[63]  Rebecca J. Passonneau,et al.  Discourse Segmentation by Human and Automated Means , 1997, CL.

[64]  Teun A. van Dijk,et al.  Discourse as structure and process , 1997 .

[65]  Jeannett Martin,et al.  Genres and Registers of Discourse , 1997 .

[66]  S. Eggins,et al.  Analysing Casual Conversation , 1996 .

[67]  E. Schegloff.  Interaction and grammar: Turn organization: one intersection of grammar and interaction , 1996 .

[68]  Udo Hahn,et al.  Functional Centering , 1996, ACL.

[69]  Jean Carletta,et al.  Assessing Agreement on Classification Tasks: The Kappa Statistic , 1996, CL.

[70]  Cecilia E. Ford,et al.  Interaction and grammar: Interactional units in conversation: syntactic, intonational, and pragmatic resources for the management of turns , 1996 .

[71]  Judy Delin.  Wallace Chafe. Discourse, Consciousness, and Time: The Flow and Displacement of Conscious Experience in Speaking and Writing , 1996 .

[72]  Sandra A. Thompson,et al.  Interaction and grammar: Frontmatter , 1996 .

[73]  Barbara A. Fox,et al.  Practices in the Construction of Turns: The "TCU" Revisited , 1996 .

[74]  Cecilia E. Ford,et al.  Interactional units in conversation: Syntactic, intonational, and pragmatic resources for the mana , 1996 .

[75]  Scott Weinstein,et al.  Centering: A Framework for Modeling the Local Coherence of Discourse , 1995, CL.

[76]  W. Chafe.  Discourse, Consciousness, and Time: The Flow and Displacement of Conscious Experience in Speaking and Writing , 1996 .

[77]  Marti A. Hearst.  Multi-Paragraph Segmentation Expository Text , 1994, ACL.

[78]  Kathleen F. McCoy,et al.  RAFT/RAPR and Centering: a comparison and discussion of problems related to processing complex sentences , 1994, CL.

[79]  Malcolm Coulthard,et al.  Advances in Written Text Analysis , 1994 .

[80]  Barbara J. Grosz,et al.  Pronouns, Names, and the Centering of Attention in Discourse , 1993, Cogn. Sci..

[81]  Ingegerd Bäcklund.  Theme in English telephone conversation , 1992 .

[82]  Kathleen Bardovi-Harlig,et al.  A Second Look at T-Unit Analysis: Reconsidering the Sentence , 1992 .

[83]  David R. Traum,et al.  CONVERSATION ACTS IN TASK‐ORIENTED SPOKEN DIALOGUE , 1992, Comput. Intell..

[84]  W. Poser.  Papers from the Second International Workshop on Japanese Syntax , 1992 .

[85]  Enric Vallduví,et al.  The Informational Component , 1990 .

[86]  Jeanette K. Gundel.  The Role of Topic and Comment in Linguistic Theory , 1988 .

[87]  William C. Mann,et al.  Rhetorical Structure Theory: Toward a functional theory of text organization , 1988 .

[88]  David Barnwell.  Some comments on T-unit research , 1988 .

[89]  M. Kameyama.  Japanese Zero Pronominal Binding : Where Syntax and Discourse Meet , 1988 .

[90]  Carl Pollard,et al.  A Centering Approach to Pronouns , 1987, ACL.

[91]  William C. Mann,et al.  RHETORICAL STRUCTURE THEORY: A THEORY OF TEXT ORGANIZATION , 1987 .

[92]  Megumi Kameyama,et al.  A Property-Sharing Constraint in Centering , 1986, ACL.

[93]  Candace L. Sidner,et al.  Attention, Intentions, and the Structure of Discourse , 1986, CL.

[94]  Harrie Mazeland,et al.  Turns and discourse units in everyday conversation , 1985 .

[95]  J. Klecan-Aker,et al.  A Comparison of T-Units and Cohesive Ties Used By First and Third Grade Children , 1985 .

[96]  Barbara A. Fox.  Discourse Structure and Anaphora: References , 1987 .

[97]  Scott Weinstein,et al.  Providing a Unified Account of Definite Noun Phrases in Discourse , 1983, ACL.

[98]  Scott Weinstein,et al.  Control of Inference: Role of Some Aspects of Discourse Structure-Centering , 1981, IJCAI.

[99]  T. Reinhart.  Pragmatics and Linguistics: an analysis of Sentence Topics , 1981, Philosophica.

[100]  Stephen J. Gaies,et al.  T-Unit Analysis in Second Language Research: Applications, Problems and Limitations. , 1980 .

[101]  Anne S. Davis,et al.  The Stability of T-Unit Length: A Preliminary Investigation. , 1980 .

[102]  Aravind K. Joshi,et al.  Centered Logic: The Role of Entity Centered Sentence Representation in Natural Language Inferencing , 1979, IJCAI.

[103]  S.-Y. Kuroda,et al.  The categorical and the thetic judgment , 1979 .

[104]  Diane Larsen-Freeman,et al.  An ESL Index of Development , 1978 .

[105]  Roy C. O'Donnell,et al.  A Critique of Some Indices of Syntactic Maturity. , 1976 .

[106]  Michael Halliday,et al.  Cohesion in English , 1976 .

[107]  E. Schegloff,et al.  A simplest systematics for the organization of turn-taking for conversation , 1974 .

[108]  V. Yngve.  On getting a word in edgewise , 1970 .

[109]  Margaret J. Robertson,et al.  Design and Analysis of Experiments , 2006, Handbook of statistics.