Seán G Robert
Datos Biográficos
| ID | 203723 |
|---|---|
| NOMBRE | Seán G Robert |
| NOMBRES | Seán G |
| APELLIDO | Robert |
| FIRMA | ROBERT S G |
| AFILIACIONES | Cardiff University |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-5990-9161 |
| VERIFICADO | Sí |
| TOTAL DE OBRAS | 18 |
| TOTAL DE CITAS | 24 |
| TOTAL COMO AUTOR | 18 |
| TOTAL COMO EDITOR | 0 |
| PRIMER AÑO DE PUBLICACIÓN | 2012 |
| AÑO MÁS RECIENTE DE PUBLICACIÓN | 2026 |
| ÍNDICE H | 3 |
Using LLMs to identify discourse derailment as a potential cue for disinformation in social media posts
Identifying disinformation in online social media is important for addressing several risks to society. However, methods for automatically detecting possible disinformation still mostly rely on low-level lexical cues, which are increasingly outdated in a world with access to generative language models. We present a new approach to the automatic detection of disinformation based on measuring discourse ‘derailment’ – messages that try to force the …
Low-certainty modals not future tenses cause increased psychological discounting in English relative to Dutch
The Integration of Norse‐Derived Terms in English
Language change arising from language contact is a complex phenomenon. Peter Matthews encouraged researchers to consider it as firmly grounded in the behaviour of individual speakers. We apply this perspective to investigate the integration of Norse‐derived terms into medieval English, testing for the effect of their phonetic similarity to their English (pseudo)cognates. Controlling for etymology, meaning and textual attestation and using a novel…
The energy trilemma COP-out
Media coverage plays a crucial role in shaping public understanding of energy challenges and climate policy; robustly monitoring the way that energy challenges are depicted in news media is therefore important for understanding progress on meeting climate change goals. This study employs corpus linguistics methodology to analyze global media representations of the energy trilemma - the balance between accessibility, security, and environmental su…
Developing a discourse space for analysing online discourse
Understanding the dynamics of online discourse is crucial for dealing with disinformation, radicalisation and hate speech. However, there are few formal models of how commenters orient their messages to each other to create online discourse. We introduce the concept of a ‘discourse space’—a novel conceptual framework that serves as an abstract meta-representation of discourse. It provides an opportunity to quantify discourse and explore its dynam…
Not Gamers, Just Women Who Play Video Games
This study investigates the barriers to playing video games that women face. Despite gaming being a traditionally male-dominated pastime, 51% of women now game in some capacity compared to 53% of men. However, women are still less likely to play some genres and often face discrimination. A survey of 1000 people in the UK who identify as women and who play mobile games revealed that they experience negative emotions around playing video games: A t…
Investigating environmental effects on phonology using diachronic models
Previous work has proposed various mechanisms by which the environment may affect the emergence of linguistic features. For example, dry air may cause careful control of pitch to be more effortful, and so affect the emergence of linguistic distinctions that rely on pitch such as lexical tone or vowel inventories. Criticisms of these proposals point out that there are both historical and geographic confounds that need to be controlled for. We take…
Explaining Mythical Composite Monsters in a Global Cross-Cultural Sample
Composite beings (“monsters”) are those mythical creatures composed of a mix of different anatomical forms. There are several scholarly claims for why these appear in the imagery and lore of many societies, including claims that they are found near-universally as well as those arguments that they co-occur with particular sociocultural arrangements. In order to evaluate these claims, we identify the presence of composite monsters cross-culturally …
Hey, You ! The Importance of Pragmatics in Localizations of Mass Effect in French and Spanish
The localization of video game dialog for diverse audiences is challenging because of differences in linguistic features between languages and pragmatic norms between cultures. For example, localizers must decide how to translate the English second-person singular pronoun “you” into languages that have a pragmatic distinction between formal and informal pronouns (e.g., “vous” and “tu” in French). These distinctions are used in social interaction …
Distinguishing selection pressures in an evolving communication system
Cross-signing—the emergence of an interlanguage between users of different sign languages—offers a rare chance to examine the evolution of a natural communication system in real time. To provide an insight into this process, we analyse an annotated video corpus of 340 minutes of interaction between signers of different language backgrounds on their first meeting and after living with each other for several weeks. We focus on the evolution of shar…
Prestige and content biases together shape the cultural transmission of narratives
Chield
Language is one of the most complex of human traits. There are many hypotheses about how it originated, what factors shaped its diversity, and what ongoing processes drive how it changes. We present the Causal Hypotheses in Evolutionary Linguistics Database (CHIELD, https://chield.excd.org/), a tool for expressing, exploring, and evaluating hypotheses. It allows researchers to integrate multiple theories into a coherent narrative, helping to desi…
Cultural influences on word meanings revealed through large-scale semantic alignment
Differential coding of perception in the world’s languages
Is there a universal hierarchy of the senses, such that some senses (e.g., vision) are more accessible to consciousness and linguistic description than others (e.g., smell)? The long-standing presumption in Western thought has been that vision and audition are more objective than the other senses, serving as the basis of knowledge and understanding, whereas touch, taste, and smell are crude and of little value. This predicts that humans ought to …
A case for systematic sound symbolism in pragmatics
Universal Principles in the Repair of Communication Problems
There would be little adaptive value in a complex communication system like human language if there were no ways to detect and correct problems. A systematic comparison of conversation in a broad sample of the world's languages reveals a universal system for the real-time resolution of frequent breakdowns in communication. In a sample of 12 languages of 8 language families of varied typological profiles we find a system of 'other-initiated repair…
Correlational Studies in Typological and Historical Linguistics
We review a number of recent studies that have identified either correlations between different linguistic features (e.g., implicational universals) or correlations between linguistic features and nonlinguistic properties of speakers or their environment (e.g., effects of geography on vocabulary). We compare large-scale quantitative studies with more traditional theoretical and historical linguistic research and identify divergent assumptions and…
Social Structure and Language Structure
Recent studies have taken advantage of newly available, large-scale, cross-linguistic data and new statistical techniques to look at the relationship between language structure and social structure. These ‘nomothetic’ approaches contrast with more traditional approaches and a tension is observed between proponents of each method. We review some nomothetic studies and point out some challenges that must be overcome. However, we argue that nomothet…
Correlational Studies in Typological and Historical Linguistics
We review a number of recent studies that have identified either correlations between different linguistic features (e.g., implicational universals) or correlations between linguistic features and nonlinguistic properties of speakers or their environment (e.g., effects of geography on vocabulary). We compare large-scale quantitative studies with more traditional theoretical and historical linguistic research and identify divergent assumptions and…
Cultural influences on word meanings revealed through large-scale semantic alignment
Prestige and content biases together shape the cultural transmission of narratives
Investigating environmental effects on phonology using diachronic models
Previous work has proposed various mechanisms by which the environment may affect the emergence of linguistic features. For example, dry air may cause careful control of pitch to be more effortful, and so affect the emergence of linguistic distinctions that rely on pitch such as lexical tone or vowel inventories. Criticisms of these proposals point out that there are both historical and geographic confounds that need to be controlled for. We take…
Explaining Mythical Composite Monsters in a Global Cross-Cultural Sample
Composite beings (“monsters”) are those mythical creatures composed of a mix of different anatomical forms. There are several scholarly claims for why these appear in the imagery and lore of many societies, including claims that they are found near-universally as well as those arguments that they co-occur with particular sociocultural arrangements. In order to evaluate these claims, we identify the presence of composite monsters cross-culturally …
Social Structure and Language Structure
Recent studies have taken advantage of newly available, large-scale, cross-linguistic data and new statistical techniques to look at the relationship between language structure and social structure. These ‘nomothetic’ approaches contrast with more traditional approaches and a tension is observed between proponents of each method. We review some nomothetic studies and point out some challenges that must be overcome. However, we argue that nomothet…
Correlational Studies in Typological and Historical Linguistics
We review a number of recent studies that have identified either correlations between different linguistic features (e.g., implicational universals) or correlations between linguistic features and nonlinguistic properties of speakers or their environment (e.g., effects of geography on vocabulary). We compare large-scale quantitative studies with more traditional theoretical and historical linguistic research and identify divergent assumptions and…
Universal Principles in the Repair of Communication Problems
There would be little adaptive value in a complex communication system like human language if there were no ways to detect and correct problems. A systematic comparison of conversation in a broad sample of the world's languages reveals a universal system for the real-time resolution of frequent breakdowns in communication. In a sample of 12 languages of 8 language families of varied typological profiles we find a system of 'other-initiated repair…
A case for systematic sound symbolism in pragmatics
Differential coding of perception in the world’s languages
Is there a universal hierarchy of the senses, such that some senses (e.g., vision) are more accessible to consciousness and linguistic description than others (e.g., smell)? The long-standing presumption in Western thought has been that vision and audition are more objective than the other senses, serving as the basis of knowledge and understanding, whereas touch, taste, and smell are crude and of little value. This predicts that humans ought to …
Chield
Language is one of the most complex of human traits. There are many hypotheses about how it originated, what factors shaped its diversity, and what ongoing processes drive how it changes. We present the Causal Hypotheses in Evolutionary Linguistics Database (CHIELD, https://chield.excd.org/), a tool for expressing, exploring, and evaluating hypotheses. It allows researchers to integrate multiple theories into a coherent narrative, helping to desi…
Cultural influences on word meanings revealed through large-scale semantic alignment
Prestige and content biases together shape the cultural transmission of narratives
Distinguishing selection pressures in an evolving communication system
Cross-signing—the emergence of an interlanguage between users of different sign languages—offers a rare chance to examine the evolution of a natural communication system in real time. To provide an insight into this process, we analyse an annotated video corpus of 340 minutes of interaction between signers of different language backgrounds on their first meeting and after living with each other for several weeks. We focus on the evolution of shar…
Explaining Mythical Composite Monsters in a Global Cross-Cultural Sample
Composite beings (“monsters”) are those mythical creatures composed of a mix of different anatomical forms. There are several scholarly claims for why these appear in the imagery and lore of many societies, including claims that they are found near-universally as well as those arguments that they co-occur with particular sociocultural arrangements. In order to evaluate these claims, we identify the presence of composite monsters cross-culturally …
Hey, You ! The Importance of Pragmatics in Localizations of Mass Effect in French and Spanish
The localization of video game dialog for diverse audiences is challenging because of differences in linguistic features between languages and pragmatic norms between cultures. For example, localizers must decide how to translate the English second-person singular pronoun “you” into languages that have a pragmatic distinction between formal and informal pronouns (e.g., “vous” and “tu” in French). These distinctions are used in social interaction …
Investigating environmental effects on phonology using diachronic models
Previous work has proposed various mechanisms by which the environment may affect the emergence of linguistic features. For example, dry air may cause careful control of pitch to be more effortful, and so affect the emergence of linguistic distinctions that rely on pitch such as lexical tone or vowel inventories. Criticisms of these proposals point out that there are both historical and geographic confounds that need to be controlled for. We take…
The Integration of Norse‐Derived Terms in English
Language change arising from language contact is a complex phenomenon. Peter Matthews encouraged researchers to consider it as firmly grounded in the behaviour of individual speakers. We apply this perspective to investigate the integration of Norse‐derived terms into medieval English, testing for the effect of their phonetic similarity to their English (pseudo)cognates. Controlling for etymology, meaning and textual attestation and using a novel…
The energy trilemma COP-out
Media coverage plays a crucial role in shaping public understanding of energy challenges and climate policy; robustly monitoring the way that energy challenges are depicted in news media is therefore important for understanding progress on meeting climate change goals. This study employs corpus linguistics methodology to analyze global media representations of the energy trilemma - the balance between accessibility, security, and environmental su…
Developing a discourse space for analysing online discourse
Understanding the dynamics of online discourse is crucial for dealing with disinformation, radicalisation and hate speech. However, there are few formal models of how commenters orient their messages to each other to create online discourse. We introduce the concept of a ‘discourse space’—a novel conceptual framework that serves as an abstract meta-representation of discourse. It provides an opportunity to quantify discourse and explore its dynam…
Not Gamers, Just Women Who Play Video Games
This study investigates the barriers to playing video games that women face. Despite gaming being a traditionally male-dominated pastime, 51% of women now game in some capacity compared to 53% of men. However, women are still less likely to play some genres and often face discrimination. A survey of 1000 people in the UK who identify as women and who play mobile games revealed that they experience negative emotions around playing video games: A t…
Using LLMs to identify discourse derailment as a potential cue for disinformation in social media posts
Identifying disinformation in online social media is important for addressing several risks to society. However, methods for automatically detecting possible disinformation still mostly rely on low-level lexical cues, which are increasingly outdated in a world with access to generative language models. We present a new approach to the automatic detection of disinformation based on measuring discourse ‘derailment’ – messages that try to force the …
Low-certainty modals not future tenses cause increased psychological discounting in English relative to Dutch
Linguistics (11 obras) · Psychology (11 obras) · Computer Science (9 obras) · Language and cultural evolution (8 obras) · Categorization, perception, and language (7 obras) · Social Psychology (6 obras) · Sociology (6 obras) · Language, Metaphor, and Cognition (5 obras) · Cognitive psychology (4 obras) · Linguistic Variation and Morphology (4 obras)