Hood, TL; (1992) The conversational structure of expert-novice consultative interactions. Doctoral thesis (Ph.D), UCL (University College London).

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Abstract

Do expert-novice consultations exhibit a consistent pattern to structure across situations? Inadequate analyses and esoteric, small samples hindering recent descriptions of consultation were remedied by a corpus of nearly 100 consultations covering a wide range of topics and subjected to a variety of analyses. First, three widely-different analyses were applied to the same sample and all revealed a consistent pattern across interactions. A Turn-time analysis of turn durations and frequency by role statistically verified a pattern. A Functional Act analysis revealed a pattern using four basic Act Types, Informative, Request, Evaluation and Justification. A detailed Conversational Analysis found consistencies in exchanges of Opening, Pre-closing, Closing, and Question-Answer with an optional Insertion Sequence; unexpectedly, the Answer multi-utterance did not circumvent intervening talk. How is the consultative structure exhibited? Two novel methods supported the existence of four structural states in 3-party chaired queries. A model based on constantly occurring turn-types of role and relative duration showed a good fit for states of Opening, Query, Solution and Closing with optional extensions to talk in each. Cluster analyses of non-topic words verified these states with words distinctively occurring in each. Unchaired dyadic consultations corroborated these results although fit was found for only three of the model states: Opening, Query, and Solution; more frequent and longer turn exchanges in the Solution and Closing sections indicated increased on-line diagnosis and negotiation of the solution formulation. What might this particular consultative structure accomplish? The material exhibited "formal" talk features of turn form, speaker, and topic restrictions and role references, used for both task accomplishment and protection from failure. More successful Expert System interfaces have emulated layman access to the solution process in human-human consultations, suggesting some possible advantage to this structure.

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