A Study in Cross-Cultural Interpretations of Back-Channeling Behavior

1. A Study in Cross-Cultural Interpretations of Back-Channeling Behavior Yaffa Al Bayyari Nigel Ward The University of Texas at El Paso Department of Computer Science February 22, 2008 Meeting of the Society for Cross-Cultural Research

2. Back-Channeling • Short utterances: uh-huh, yeah, mm-hm ... • Show active listening • Frequent: ~4 per minute (English, Arabic) • Below conscious awareness • A turn-taking function

3. Misunderstandings are Common in Cross-Cultural Communication culture- dependent interpretations

4. What Causes Problems? Language-Dependent Culture-Dependent Universal smiles non-lexical utterances words simple emotions emblematic gestures complex emotions ?????????????????? turn-taking mechanisms ?????????????????? Culture-dependent behaviors that we think are universal can cause deep misunderstandings.

5. Cultural Differences in Back-Channeling • frequency (Maynard 89) • words and non-lexicals used • timing (this study) • typically in response to cues by the other • but the cues differ ...

6. Prosodic Cues for Back-Channels English pitch 26th percentile >110 ms time Arabic < 500 ms brief pause pitch >40 ms, with slope > .7% every 10 ms time “When you hear such a cue, respond with a back-channel” is a good description of listener behavior. Game 1: listen to the back-channels Game 2: listen to the cue; what emotional value do you perceive?

7. anexpression of negative affect no yes Initial Hypotheses Pitch downdash perceived as Arab subjects American subjects a cue for a back-channel response yes no

8. Experiment 1 Stimuli lead-in prosodic cue response back-channel downdash full turn cadence silence upturn subjects asked to judge the naturalness of each response, given the context resynthesized to obscure the words, retaining pitch contours

9. Participants • 18 naive American-English speakers • students from an introductory CS class • mostly Spanish-English bilinguals • no knowledge of Arabic • 18 Arabic speakers • 7 living in El Paso Texas, 11 in Qatar • some to total knowledge of English • 18 exposed American-English speakers • with about 25 minutes of training in this aspect of Arabic, several months before

10. Results of Experiment 1 Ratings of the naturalness of the various pairings different* different* * matched-pairs t-test

11. Experiment 2 Subjects were asked to judge the emotional state: “does the speaker sound more positive or more negative?” downdash cadence upturn

12. Experiment 2 Results different* different* * matched-pairs t-test

13. anexpression of negative affect no yes Summary of Experiments 1&2 Pitch downdash perceived as Arab subjects American subjects a cue for a back-channel response significantly different yes no significantly different

14. What Causes Problems? Language Dependent/ Culture Dependent Universal smiles non-lexical utterances words simple emotions emblematic gestures complex emotions back-channeling Behaviors that are culture-dependent, but that people think are universal, can cause deep misunderstandings.

15. Implication and Follow-Up Question Imagine an Arab happens to use this cue while talking to an American (in Arabic or English) • The American is likely to misinterpret it, without suspecting the danger (Experiments 1 and 2) • The Arab may feel the American is not being a cooperative listener ... (Experiment 3)

16. Follow-on Hypotheses Learners of Arabic who back-channel better will be judged as • knowing Arabic better • being nicer • being more socially effective and the effect sizes will be large

17. Well Timed Back-Channeling Poorly Timed Back-Channeling Stimuli Well Pronounced Greeting Poorly Pronounced Greeting Absent Back-Channeling Absent Greeting

18. Results significantly different (matched-pairs t-tests, 54 pairs)

19. Conclusions • The prosody of back-channeling is not universal. (experiment 1). • It is worthwhile for learners to master its meaning. (experiment 3). So they should be taught it, and other turn-taking patterns, and also in other languages. • Americans perceive it as negative, but even a brief exposure reduces this. (experiment 2) So people likely to hear even sound-bites of Arabs should also be taught about it.

20. A Study in Cross-Cultural Interpretations of Back-channeling Behavior Yaffa Al Bayyari Nigel Ward Thank You February 22, 2008 Meeting of the Society for Cross-Cultural Research

21. The Phenomenon • Back-channel feedback happens when • One person is explaining something • The other produces short response indicating he is paying attention • Definition • Responds directly to an utterance of the speaker • Is optional • Does not require acknowledgement by the speaker • Does not interrupt the flow of the conversation

22. Predictive Value of the Cue Corpus-based study found that these times are commonly indicated by a prosodic feature complex which includes a steep pitch downslope, “downdash” (Ward & Al Bayyari, 2006, 2007) • Coverage = 43% • Accuracy = 13%

23. Experiment 3 • Stimuli preparation • 9 audio fragments • 11 sec conversation between Arabic speaker and a learner • Greeting not synthesized • Direction-giving and BC synthesized • Subjects were asked to judge the Arabic learner Good Greeting Good BC Poor Greeting Poor BC No Greeting No BC

24. Previous Work • In Arabic: • Statements & wh-questions end with a falling pitch (Kulk et al., 2005; Eldin & Rajouani, 1999; Rifaat, 2005) • yes-no questions generally end with a pitch rise (Eldin & Rajouani, 1999; El-Hassan, 1988) • Back-channels function pragmatically in Arabic much as in English • Do not always convey understanding • Can overlap the speaker’s talk (Ola Mohamed Hafez, 1991)

25. Results of Experiment 2 – cont. • Answers to question “write 2 or 3 adjectives describing the speaker” by English speakers: • For the downslope: half or more used “angry”, “scared”, “sad” or “disgusted”

26. Hypothesis • The pitch downslope is a cue for back-channel in Arabic, although it is not perceived as such by speakers of American English • The pitch downslope is perceived negatively by American-English speakers but not by Arabic speakers • In Arabic good back-channeling matters & even more than good pronunciation

28. Most likely we’re gonna stay for a month and a week OK OK To see how life is there and probably uncle & aunt are coming with us, so it’ d be good chance for you to come visit us Sharp pitch downslope

29. Masking Original Masked