Discourse Planning: Empirical Research and Computer Models
Year: 1996
Type: book-chapter
Abstract: Discourse, be it written or spoken, consists generally of more than a single sentence.Production of a multisentential discourse requires planning, or a series of choices thatguide subsequent verbal production. Discourse planning involves the creation andelaboration of communicative goals, and the application of strategies for the selectionand organization of content, taking into account the situation and the available linguisticresources. This chapter will focus on aspects of planning that pertain to producingcoherent discourse, and on computational models to perform this planning process.In the introduction we will discuss some of the problems faced by a producer of anextended piece of discourse. The list is not exhaustive, but it captures the mostimportant issues in discourse planning and shows how they are interrelated. In Section10.3 we will review experimental evidence pertaining to discourse planning. Animportant part of this discussion will address written rather than spoken discourse. Itwill be shown that our understanding of the whole process is far from complete. Webelieve that computational models may help to discover what pieces of the puzzle arelacking and how the different pieces may fit together. Next, in Section 10.4, we willpresent some of the computational models that have been developed for discourseplanning. It should be noted that none of these systems has been developed as apsychological model, hence none of them should be evaluated strictly on that basis.However, it appears that computational work is progressing towards the point whereimplementation and testing of psychological models of discourse planning will becomefeasible.
Source: HAL
Institution: Laboratoire d’Informatique Fondamentale de Marseille
Language: English
Subfield: Linguistics and Language
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W2553828901