Buscando uma visão mais particular de analisar a estrutura informacional, este trabalho apresenta uma análise do tópico e do foco sentencial em paralelos. A análise da distribuição da informação na sentença, ou estrutura informacional, é uma área ainda nova de pesquisa, com diversos termos, bem como sentidos para esses termos, surgindo frequentemente. A presente análise tem por objetivos dissociar o foco e o tópico como complementos um do outro, mostrando uma possibilidade de análise em que o foco e o tópico ocorrem em seus próprios níveis de análise – os paralelos – o que lhes torna mais autônomos e, ainda assim, mais próximos em determinadas análises. O foco é o elemento que recebe maior destaque neste trabalho, que compara ambos os paralelos, porém analisa mais sentenças e problemas envolvendo questões referentes ao foco, como a existência de um tipo de foco informacional secundário, aqui chamado de foco auxiliar, o qual tem como objetivo indicar uma nova informação não solicitada. Ainda, no tratamento dado ao paralelo do foco, relações entre o foco e implicaturas estão presentes. O tópico, por outro lado, é um elemento que ainda necessita de pesquisas mais profundas, estando aqui apresentado de uma forma mais inicial. O desenvolvimento do tópico aqui presente está relacionado a questões mais básicas, mas nem por isso menos importantes. / Looking for a particular way of analyzing the information structure, this work presents an analysis of sentential topic and focus in parallels. The way information is distributed in a sentences, or its information structure, is a research subject still beginning to develop, with many terms, as well as meanings for those terms, coming up often. This analysis aims at dissociating focus and topic as complements of each other, showing a possibility of analysis in which these elements occur in different levels of analysis – the parallels – which allow them more autonomy, as well as closer in some analysis. Focus is the element that will be dealt with more in the present work, which compares both parallels, but analyzes more sentences and problems concerning the focus, such as the existence of a secondary information focus, which is called auxiliary focus, that aims at providing new information that has not been asked for. Also, in the focus parallel, the relation between focus and implicature is dealt with. Topic, on the other hand, is an element that still needs deeper research, here being introduced concerning more basic problems, but still important ones.

German and Swedish are two closely related languages and 80 % of the Swedish words are related to the German language. Even so, the preferences of how you structure information in the two languages differ. The differences are especially visible in the so called prefield and therefore, this sentence initial position stands in focus in this study. To find out what differences there are in the prefield in German and Swedish, not only parts of the German book Die Wand and the Swedish book Isprinsessan have been examined, but also parts of the German translation Die Eisprinzessin schläft. The two books Die Wand and Isprinsessan have been compared to find out what differences there are in the prefield in the two languages. The comparison of Isprinsessan and Die Eisprinzessin schläft had the purpose to show if the translator has chosen to follow the Swedish or the German preferences of how to structure information. The main question of this study is what differences are to be found in the sentence initial position when you compare a Swedish text with its German translation. The results of the analyses showed, that the most striking differences were, that subjects and expletives are more common in the Swedish prefield than in the German, while in the German language you often find adverbials in the prefield. This was also distinct when Isprinsessan and the German translation Die Eisprinzessin schläft were compared. When a subject was found in the prefield in the Swedish text, an adverbial was often found in the German text. This shows, that German and Swedish have different preferences when it comes to structuring information in sentences.

Idag vistas människor på internet i större utsträckning än tidigare och det medför att människor utsätts för ett stort informationsflöde. Enligt tidigare forskning har det för den enskilda individen blivit allt viktigare att kunna sålla bland informationen. Det som har studerats är ett tillvägagångssätt som internetanvändare omedvetet eller medvetet använder sig av när de ska bedöma ett system eller tjänst är hur pass trovärdig systemet eller tjänsten ser ut eller verkar vara. Dessutom har informationskällor olika egenskaper, som design, utformning av gränssnittet, informationsflödet et cetera, som påverkar människors uppfattning kring hur pass trovärdig informationskällan, ett system eller en tjänst anses att vara. Detta i sin tur påverkar en användares vilja och avsikt att använda sig av ett system, tjänst eller informationskälla. Denna studie har studerat hur pass viktigt upplevd trovärdighet är initialt för att en användare ska ta sig an en ny tjänst, samt vilka faktorer som bidrar till upplevd trovärdighet. Studien har genomförts med en anpassad modell av den etablerade technology acceptance model (TAM). Upplevd trovärdighet introducerades i modellen tillsammans med de existerande upplevd användbarhet och upplevd användarvänlighet för att se om det fanns några egenskaper som stärkte avsikt till användning. Studien genomförde sedan användartester med hjälp av “think aloud” och efterföljande intervjuer för att ta reda på deras syn på trovärdighet och hur det förhåller sig till etablerad forskning på området. Det visar sig i studien att den första upplevelsen av ett gränssnitt sätter nivån för hur den vidare upplevelsen blir och kan konstatera att ett väl utformat gränssnitt med tidsenliga färg och formval har stark påverkan för upplevd trovärdighet. Vidare går det att se att första upplevelsen håller i sig trots att användaren möter på motstånd i användartest och där information inte alltid presenteras optimalt. Avsikten till användning förstärks dock genom att kombinera ett väl utformat gränssnitt med tydlig information. Rekommendationer från vänner och antalet användare är också faktorer som bidrar till den upplevda trovärdigheten och avsikten till användning. / The modern human being accesses the internet to a larger extent than earlier and this leads to people facing a grand flow of information. Earlier research suggests that it has become increasingly important for individuals to be able to filter the information. One aspect that internet users consciously or unconsciously use to assess a service or system is its measure of credibility, how credible it appears to be or is. Furthermore, sources of information have different characteristics – for example design, user interface and flow of information – that affects people's perception concerning how credible a service, system or source of information appears to be. This also affects a user's will and intent to use a system, service or source of information. This study has investigated how important credibility is to a user in the early stages of use of a service or system, and map out the factors that affect the measure of perceived credibility. The study has its foundation in the technology acceptance model (TAM). Perceived credibility was introduced in the model together with the already existing perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use to see if there are characteristics that strengthened the intent to use. The study continued with user testing, “think aloud”- techniques and interviews with a group of potential users to find out how they view credibility. The answers were then compared to accomplished research in this area of study. The study shows that the initial experience with an interface sets the bar for the continued experience and that contemporary use of colour and form has profound impact. Even if the user faces issues during user testing and if flaws are found in the flow and structure of information, the first experience still holds its sway. The study also shows that the intent to use magnifies when a well-structured user interface is combined with clear information. Recommendations from friends and the number of users that a service or system has are also factors that contribute to the perceived credibility, which then leads to intention to use.

This thesis is a description of the prosodic patterns in Jaminjung, a language spoken in the Victoria River District in the Northern Territory of Australia. It is a quantitative and qualitative examination of the features associated with the intonational phenomena in Jaminjung. It is based on the idea that, while some aspects of prosody may be universal, each language has its unique characteristics. In this study I will make use of the PENTA model of intonation, a recent development that places communicative functions and articulatory constraints at the core of prosody, thus providing a clear explanation of prosodic phenomena, linking phonetics to semantics. The analyses are based on carefully selected representative tokens of the speech used in specific communicative situations by the Jaminjung speakers from recordings of spontaneous speech. The features associated with the grouping function, that is, in the demarcation or organization of a string of words (or rather syllables) into chunks, are examined. Four main prosodic constituents are recognized: the prosodic word, the phrasal constituent, the intonation unit, and the prosodic sentence. They are distinguished at their left boundaries by pitch resets which increase from unit to unit. The larger constituents are cued at the right edge with F0 lowering and syllable lengthening, cues associated with finality in many languages. The encoding parameters of some major information structural categories, topic and focus and contrast are investigated. A prominence is usually perceived on the first syllable in the focus domain. A [fall] pitch target is associated with this syllable; it is also marked by wider pitch excursions and longer durations. Topics, for their part, are marked by a [high] target on their initial syllables. The prosodic encoding of topics follows a scale of 'givenness', where more given topics are less marked than less given topics. Contrast in focused arguments and topics is encoded with a [fall] target on the initial syllable and thus share this feature with focus, but they also display a wider pitch excursion on all the syllables. This last feature marks contrast as an independent information structure category from focus and topic. Declaratives, interrogatives and imperatives sentences are all predominantly uttered with a falling contour, however, they are clearly differentiated by pitch register - declaratives use lower reaches, imperatives higher reaches, and interrogatives somewhere in between.

1 Kateřina Rysová Annotation The presented thesis is focused on the Czech word order of contextually non-bound verbal modifications. It monitors whether there is a basic order in the contextually non-bound part of the sentence (significantly predominant in frequency) in the surface word order (cf. narodit se v Brně v roce 1950 vs. narodit se v roce 1950 v Brně; literally to be born in Brno in 1950 vs. to be born in 1950 in Brno). At the same time, we try to find out the factors influencing the word order (such as the form of modifications, their lexical expression or the effect of verbal valency). Finally, we briefly compare the word order tendencies in Czech and German. For the verification of the objectives, mainly the data from the Prague Dependency Treebank are used. The work is based on the theoretical principles of Functional Generative Description. Research results demonstrate that, at least in some cases, it is possible to detect certain general tendencies to use preferably one of two possible surface word order sequences in Czech. Abstract The aim of the doctoral thesis is to describe particular aspects of the Czech (and partly also German) word order in the sentences coming mainly from journalistic texts. The first part examines the role of different types of verbal modifications in sentence...

京都大学 / 0048 / 新制・課程博士 / 博士(人間・環境学) / 甲第19808号 / 人博第779号 / 新制||人||187(附属図書館) / 27||人博||779(吉田南総合図書館) / 32844 / 京都大学大学院人間・環境学研究科共生人間学専攻 / (主査)教授 東郷 雄二, 教授 藤田 耕司, 教授 田窪 行則 / 学位規則第4条第1項該当 / Doctor of Human and Environmental Studies / Kyoto University / DFAM

This project aims to investigate the impact of culture on the results of established methods of usability testing. The production and use of technologically advanced information and communication applications are no longer restricted to the Western world, and there are indications that usability testing procedures developed for use in, e.g., Europe or the US do not give reliable results in countries such as India, China or Malaysia. This project is an in-depth investigation of the cultural specifics that go into usability test situations in three countries: Denmark, India and China. In a second phase we want to explore possible developments of the testing methods in order to avoid cultural bias and produce comparable results across countries of the world / <p>This research is a part of project of Culturalusability. http://culturalusability.cbs.dk/</p>

no / Purpose: To develop a perimetric test strategy, Structure Estimation of Minimum Uncertainty (SEMU), that uses structural information to drive stimulus choices. Methods: Structure Estimation of Minimum Uncertainty uses retinal nerve fiber layer (RNFL) thickness data as measured by optical coherence tomography to predict perimetric sensitivity. This prediction is used to set suprathreshold levels that then alter a prior probability distribution of the final test output. Using computer simulation, we studied SEMU’s performance under three different patient error response conditions: No Error, Typical False Positive errors, and Extremely Unreliable patients. In experiment 1, SEMU was compared with an existing suprathreshold cum thresholding combination test procedure, Estimation of Minimum Uncertainty (EMU), on single visual field locations. We used these results to finalize SEMU parameters. In experiment 2, SEMU was compared with full threshold (FT) on 163 glaucomatous visual fields. Results: On individual locations, SEMU has similar accuracy to EMU, but is, on average, one presentation faster than EMU. For the typical false-positive error condition, SEMU has significantly lower error compared with FT (SEMU average 0.33 dB lower; p < 0.001) and the 90% measured sensitivity range for SEMU is also smaller than that for FT. For unreliable patients, however, FT has lower mean and SD of error. Structure Estimation of Minimum Uncertainty makes significantly fewer presentations than FT (1.08 presentation on average fewer in a typical false-positive condition; p < 0.001). Assuming that a location in the field is marked abnormal if it falls below the 5th percentile of normal, SEMU has a false-positive rate of less than 10% for all error conditions compared with FT’s rate of 20% or more. Conclusions: On average, simulations show that using RNFL information to guide stimulus placement in a perimetric test procedure maintains accuracy, improves precision, and decreases test duration for patients with less than 15% false-positive rates.

What explains the shape of Zauzou noun phrases? Zauzou (Trans-Himalayan, China) noun phrases exhibit considerable diversity in both the choice of the phrase's primary reference type, and the presence of classifiers, demonstratives, modifiers, and case marking. This investigation uses a large, previously existing Zauzou textual corpus. The corpus was annotated for variables hypothesized to predict the variation in noun phrase form. Syntactic variables investigated include word order, subordination, subordinate role, and a new variable called "loneliness." Participant semantic variables include thematic role, agency, and affectedness. Referential semantic variables include boundedness, number, and animacy. The information packaging variable investigated is accessibility. Statistical analysis of the corpus revealed that case marking was predicted using a variable called "loneliness." This is where a multivalent verb has only one argument that is explicitly referenced in the clause. Lonely noun phrases are more likely to be case marked. The role of loneliness in motivating case marking confirms that disambiguation can be an explanation for differential case marking. Animacy and accessibility are important predictors of noun phrase weight. Overall, high animacy and high accessibility correspond to reduced noun phrase weight. Agency and thematic role were also significant variables. The Zauzou data makes clear that speech act participants occupy a unique role in the animacy hierarchy. Speech act participants are often unexpectedly light upon first mention, being referred to with a pronoun or zero anaphor. They are often unexpectedly heavy while highly activated, remaining a pronoun instead of reducing to a zero anaphor. Zauzou, like Mandarin and Cantonese, allows classifiers to be used with a noun but without a numeral. In Mandarin, this construction is used only with new or generic noun phrases. In Cantonese, this construction can be used with noun phrases of any accessibility value. Zauzou occupies a unique intermediate position. In Zauzou, a noun with bare noun phrase can occur with new or old noun phrases, but rarely with active ones. This thesis provides evidence for the importance of text corpora. Using a corpus allowed for the simultaneous inclusion of many variables as well as the consideration of genre effects. In addition, the annotated corpus produced in this investigation is an important output; it is available in the supplemental materials accompanying this thesis.

By analyzing the information structure in Turkish sentences, this study seeks to investigate the strategies for marking the pragmatic functions of topic and focus in Turkish. The material, from which the included sentences are taken, mainly consists of literary works and other prose, but several examples from other linguistic and grammatical studies are also cited. A few sentences have been constructed by the author. Functioning as the point of departure for the analysis, a background section gives an overview of the word order typology in general and in Turkish specifically. In Turkish, the primary role of the basic word order (SOV) and its variations is to signal information structure; the pragmatic functions being associated to specific syntactic positions. Topics are sentence initial in Turkish. Subjects are natural topics, while non-subjects placed in the initial position are marked topics. Verbs can be topicalized by duplication. Focus is indicated by sentence stress, which under normal intonation falls on the element preceding the verb. Hence, the typical focus position is the immediately preverbal.  Objects are neutral focus elements, while other constituents receive contrastive focus. When the intonation is marked, a constituent in another position than the immediately preverbal is focused. Both topic and focus constituents can be marked syntactically. Clitics, conjunctions, adverbials etc. functioning as topic or focus markers form the dominant subject of the analysis. The clitic dA has been giving a special treatment since it can be used for both functions. It seems that in written text, the use of dA as a topic marker to the sentence initial constituent tends to be indicated with a subsequent comma.