Lexical Entrainment in Written Discourse: Is Experts' Word Use Adapted to the Addressee?

Abstract

Overlaps with one's interlocutor in the choice of words are called lexical entrainment. This article looks at accounts for these overlaps in word use. The question addressed is the extent to which the word use of the addressee, as opposed to available words from other sources, has a special impact on experts' choice of words. A laboratory experiment was conducted that addresses this question in the domain of online health advice. Eighty advanced medical students responded to a fictitious patient inquiry via e-mail. Results indicate that the mere availability of words (whether they were used by the addressee or not) accounts for experts' word use. Nonetheless, an analysis of experts' reflections on the patient's knowledge also indicated a metacognitive awareness of the specific word choice of the addressee.

Notes

¹It should be noted that, for our purpose, the concept of “expert” was used in contrast to a “layperson” rather than in the sense of a novice, unlike many studies comparing experts and novices in medicine (for a more detailed discussion of this distinction, see Bromme, Rambow, & Nückles, 2001). Therefore, it was possible to run our studies with advanced medical students as “experts.” In the context of our research, domain-related knowledge is critical.

²Many medical concepts (at least those covered within such hotline scenarios) can be phrased in different kinds of words: a specialist term of Greek or Latin origins and a German synonym commonly used by laypersons such as arteriosklerose for arteriosclerosis and the German “translation” gefäβverkalkung (vascular hardening). It should be noted that German has more everyday medical words that are not of Latin or Greek origin than English—for example, the colloquial bauchspeicheldrüse (literally, gland of ventral saliva) is used at least as commonly for pancreas as the term pankreas itself. Naturally, German medical specialists use the same technical language as their colleagues in other countries. Therefore, we can differentiate between a more technical word and a more “common” one. This is very significant for our research context because it signals whether a layperson's perspective is being used. The chosen technical language terms are terms with Latin or Greek origin (therefore, they can also be found in the German Fremdwörterduden—i.e., the dictionary of foreign terms—whereas the everyday language terms are not listed there). Note that due to translation, some terms might appear more or less technical than they actually are in German.

^aThere is no English everyday synonym for pancreas.

³The queries manipulated 11 concepts—4 more than in the illustrations. These 4 concepts could not be included in the illustration because 3 of them were verbs referring to the consultation of a physician and not to the processes involved in diabetes, and the fourth was a concept closely related to another one already in the illustration. As a consequence, these 4 concepts are not considered in further analyses.