Narrative is an important interactional speech communication form that each generation uses (Burke, MacKay, and James, 2000). Narrative production involves organizing and expressing a series of events and facts that were experienced by the speaker (Bruner, 1991). Narrative as specific verbal behavior shares similarities with various styles of spontaneous speech; however, there are marked differences in several important ways like memory processes. The twofold aim of the narrative is to make the listener(s) obtain information, and to provide personal comments in order to make the listener familiar with the speaker’s opinion concerning the topic (Labov, 1981). In a specific type of narrative the speaker is asked to summarize an orally presented text immediately. The input is based on speech comprehension followed by the usual speech planning processes.
Our research question is whether the temporal and disfluency patterns of such narratives show variation in different age groups from young to old. 47 speakers (aged between 20 and 80 years) were randomly selected from BEA database and were divided into five age groups. The
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lengths of the narratives, the number of words the narratives consisted of, the subjects’ speech tempi, relative frequency and durations of phrases, silent and filled pauses, as well as disfluency phenomena, discourse markers and individual differences were analyzed (using Praat software for objective measurements, and GLMM method for statistical analysis within SPSS No. 21. software). A total of 20,000 measured data were subjected to analysis.
Results showed large overlaps between neighboring age groups for almost all parameters. Significant differences were found between the young and the old subjects’ groups in a number of temporal and disfluency parameters (see Rodríguez-Aranda and Jakobsen, 2011). Although speech tempi did not show significant differences across ages, old speakers produced significantly less silent and filled pauses and used significantly longer and more phrases in their narratives than young speakers. No differences were found in the relative frequency of error type disfluencies across ages. However, less hesitation type disfluencies were found in old than in young speakers. Young speakers were found to be significantly better at detecting and repairing error-type disfluencies. Some of the data reflect the dominant use of either short-term or long-term memory that depends on age. Results suggest that there are characteristic differences in covert speech planning processes and control mechanisms over speaking depending on age.
Findings of the study support that (i) old speakers surpass young speakers in some temporal parameters in this type of narrative, and (ii) the age of the speakers do not inevitably correspond to their speaking capability.
Keywords: spontaneous speech, speakers of various ages, durations, pauses, disfluencies
References:
Bruner, J. 1991. The narrative construction of reality. Critical Inquiry, 18(1), 1–21.
Burke, D. M., MacKay, D. G. & James, L. E. 2000. Theoretical approaches to language and aging. In T. Perfect, T. & E. Maylor (Eds.), Models of cognitive aging (204–237). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Labov, William 1981. Speech actions and reactions in personal narrative.
In N. Tannen (Ed.), Analyzing discourse: Text and talk (217–247).
Washington DC: Georgetown University Press.
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Rodríguez-Aranda, C. & Jakobsen, M. 2011. Differential contribution of cognitive and psychomotor functions to the age-related slowing of speech production. Journal of International Neuropsychological Society, 17(5), 1–15.
Beste GÖKÇE PARSEHYAN Istanbul Kültür University
b.gokce@iku.edu.tr
Intergenerational leadership
From Machiavelli up until today, leadership has been a topic researched by many social scientists. While leadership research has found scientific basis towards the end of the 20th century, today, there are still many theoretical evaluations undertaken. There is a lot of rhetoric regarding leadership; how to become a successful leader, what is effective leadership, what is the truth about leadership, unsuccessful leadership examples etc. These are written about in line with the experiences we encounter and experience in our daily work environment. The main problem today can be said to be as follows:
How can leaders sustain long term success if followers are short term and moving through a revolving door? There are members of five different generations in our working environments (Blanchette, and Ellington, 2018): veteran generation (1925–1946), baby boom generation (1946–
1960), generation X (1960–1980), generation Y (1980–1995) and generation Z (1995–2010). By working together, these different generations provide leadership to one another. As the veteran generation and baby boomers are slowly going into retirement, they are leaving their duties to generations X, Y and Z. At this point, generation Alpha will become part of the cycle. There have been four different scenarios developed regarding the type of leadership that will be in place in 2050 when the generation Alpha will become leaders (Suderman, and Foster, 2015): Bio-Circuity Leadership, High-pod Leadership, Automaton Leadership, and Murmeration Leadership. These scenarios developed by Suderman and Foster, in four stages. The first stage was the research question – what will leadership look like in 2050? Stage 2 was scanning and identifying key themes, and required considerable research. In stage 3, identifying driving forces, they assessed how the themes derived from stage 2 have the potential to significantly affect organizations. The last stage was
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scenario development. This stage evaluates the list of drivers and narrows them to two key signals: “How will changes in the context in which we practice leadership change the form of leadership?” and “How will ongoing changes in technology and culture affect the heart of leadership - people?”.
This creates four future leadership scenarios. These four different scenarios have been designed according to the communication between generations and will be in place in 2050. However, at the moment, it is impossible to tell which scenario will dominate.
Keywords: intergenerational leadership, generation X, generation Y, generation Z, generation Alpha.
References:
Blanchette, K.L., & Ellington L. 2018. Strategic Leadership in a Global Virtual Reality. In V.C.X. Wang (Ed.), Strategic Leadership (99–
123). USA: Information Age Publishing.
Suderman, J.L., & Foster, P.A. 2015. Envisioning Leadership in 2050: Four Future Scenarios. In M. Sowcik, A.C. Andenoro, M. McNutt, & S.E.
Murphy (Eds.), Leadership 2050: Critical Challenges, Key Contexts and Emerging Trends (23–38). UK: Emerald Group Publishing.
Tanja GRADEČAK
Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Osijek, Croatia
tgradeca@ffos.hr