Helen Fraser
Biographic Data
| ID | 6346306 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Helen Fraser |
| GIVEN NAMES | Helen |
| FAMILY NAME | Fraser |
| SIGNATURE | FRASER H |
| AFFILIATIONS | The University of Melbourne |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-6143-5265 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 19 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 15 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 18 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 1 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1996 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
Spoken Word Recognition
Recognizing spoken words seems so simple in the everyday experience of L1 speakers, that it can be hard to appreciate that it is one of the most complex of all human skills. Understanding the nature of the complexity is crucial for many branches of applied linguistics, especially helping L2 learners acquire the skills of spoken word recognition. This short article starts by reviewing the key findings from a century's research into the nature of s…
Global maternal mortality associated with Sars-CoV-2 infection: A systematic review and meta-analysis
You’ve got the wrong Shorty!”: Further insights into the legal misconceptions that cause transcript injustice in forensic contexts
The Eastman transcripts: A case study calling Australian linguists to action against legal misconceptions about language in forensic evidence
This paper presents a new case study examining the use of police transcripts to assist the court in understanding poor-quality forensic audio admitted as evidence in criminal trials. The 1995 trial it studies was the first major Australian case to include extensive expert opinions about police transcripts provided by the prosecution. Despite the fact that experts on both sides noted serious problems with the police transcripts, the judge allowed …
A Framework for Deciding How to Create and Evaluate Transcripts for Forensic and Other Purposes
Transcripts are used successfully in many areas of contemporary society. However, some uses of transcripts show systemic problems, with significant negative consequences. The key to finding effective solutions in these areas is to determine which factors contribute most strongly to the problems – which may be different from those to which they are commonly ascribed. This systematic review offers a conceptual framework for understanding the nature…
Acoustic injustice: The experience of listening to indistinct covert recordings presented as evidence in court
Audio recorded by hidden listening devices can provide powerful evidence in criminal trials. Unfortunately these covert recordings are often indistinct, to the extent the court needs a transcript to understand the content. Australian law allows police to provide transcripts as ‘ad hoc experts’. Legal procedures incorporate safeguards intended to ensure the transcripts are not misleading. The problem is that these safeguards have been shown to be …
Forensic Transcription: How Confident False Beliefs about Language and Speech Threaten the Right to a Fair Trial in Australia
Everyday knowledge about language and speech, or ‘folk linguistics’, incorporates a number of false beliefs that have a negative effect in a range of areas, nowhere more so than in the criminal justice system. One lesser known area where false beliefs have a major impact is forensic transcription (interpretation of indistinct covert recordings used as evidence in criminal trials). Without consultation of the linguistic sciences, the law has devel…
The Power and Persistence of Contextual Priming: More Risks in Using Police Transcripts to Aid Jurors' Perception of Poor Quality Covert Recordings
A poor quality covert recording from an Australian murder case, along with the police transcript used in the trial but later shown to be inaccurate, are used to explore general issues regarding this increasingly common type of evidence. Two experiments were run, in which participants heard an excerpt from the audio, first with no transcript, then with suggested and alternative transcripts. In Experiment 1, they were given no contextual informatio…
Spoken Word Recognition
One of the most basic aspects of learning a language is learning its words, or vocabulary.
Language Analysis for the Determination of Origin (Lado)
Language analysis for the determination of origin (LADO) is a relatively new branch of applied linguistics. Generally considered a forensic application, it is used by governments to assess asylum seekers applying for refugee status.
Interpretation of a Crisis Call: Persistence of a primed perception of a disputed utterance
This article describes an experiment designed to explore the effects of ‘priming’ (i.e. being exposed to a suggested interpretation of an audio signal) on how juries perceive disputed utterances in poor quality recordings used as evidence in legal cases. Using the actual disputed utterance from a real case, the experiment tracks how participants’ perception of its content changes as evidence about the case is gradually revealed to them. At a cert…
The role of linguists and native speakers in language analysis for the determination of speaker origin: A response to Tina Cambier-Langeveld
Cambier-Langeveld (2010a) examines eight LADO case reports, attributing problems she finds in them to lack of native speaker competence on the part of the analysts, and uses the results to argue the legitimacy of a role for native speakers in LADO that is not currently allowed by the Guidelines (2004). The present article clarifies what the Guidelines say about analysts, and shows that the authors of the eight reports do not meet their requiremen…
The role of ‘educated native speakers’ in providing language analysis for the determination of the origin of asylum seekers
This paper speaks to a debate which has arisen across various branches of linguistics (see Eades, 2009) regarding the relative levels of responsibility that should be given to (a) qualified linguists with professional expertise in a particular language, and (b) ‘educated native speakers’ of the language, in conducting Language Analysis for the Determination of the regional or social Origin of asylum seekers (LADO). It reviews existing evidence fr…
Communicating about Communication: Intercultural Competence as a Factor in the Success of Interdisciplinary Collaboration
Many disciplines describe themselves as studying ‘communication’. However observation of interdisciplinary discussion suggests that ‘communication’ may be conceptualized in different ways by different disciplines. This paper aims to promote mutual understanding among disciplines, not by proposing a universally valid definition of communication to which all disciplines should subscribe, but by, first, offering a set of questions that can be used t…
Constraining abstractness: Phonological representation in the light of color terms
This paper offers a general analysis of what it means to say that a representation or concept is 'abstract', and then applies the analysis in two specific areas, namely colour terms research and phonological theory. Starting from acceptance of the widely agreed proposition that cognition involves categorisation of reality via mediating concepts, it follows the implications of this idea in metatheoretical analysis of the terms and concepts used in…
Issues in transcription: Factors affecting the reliability of transcripts as evidence in legal cases
This article considers the reliability of transcripts used as evidence in court, especially transcripts of poor recordings. Background information about human speech and speech perception is presented, and the implications of this information for the use of transcripts of different kinds in legal contexts is considered. Finally, recommendations are made to allow judgement of the reliability of existing transcripts, ensure that newly created trans…
Linguistic identification in the determination of nationality: A preliminary report
Phonology without tiers: Why the phonetic representation is not derived from the phonological representation
Guy-dance with pro-nun-see-ay-shon
A consideration of how the everyday spelling system can be used more effectively than phonetic symbols in English pronunciation guides
Linguistic identification in the determination of nationality: A preliminary report
Forensic Transcription: How Confident False Beliefs about Language and Speech Threaten the Right to a Fair Trial in Australia
Everyday knowledge about language and speech, or ‘folk linguistics’, incorporates a number of false beliefs that have a negative effect in a range of areas, nowhere more so than in the criminal justice system. One lesser known area where false beliefs have a major impact is forensic transcription (interpretation of indistinct covert recordings used as evidence in criminal trials). Without consultation of the linguistic sciences, the law has devel…
Communicating about Communication: Intercultural Competence as a Factor in the Success of Interdisciplinary Collaboration
Many disciplines describe themselves as studying ‘communication’. However observation of interdisciplinary discussion suggests that ‘communication’ may be conceptualized in different ways by different disciplines. This paper aims to promote mutual understanding among disciplines, not by proposing a universally valid definition of communication to which all disciplines should subscribe, but by, first, offering a set of questions that can be used t…
The Eastman transcripts: A case study calling Australian linguists to action against legal misconceptions about language in forensic evidence
This paper presents a new case study examining the use of police transcripts to assist the court in understanding poor-quality forensic audio admitted as evidence in criminal trials. The 1995 trial it studies was the first major Australian case to include extensive expert opinions about police transcripts provided by the prosecution. Despite the fact that experts on both sides noted serious problems with the police transcripts, the judge allowed …
The Power and Persistence of Contextual Priming: More Risks in Using Police Transcripts to Aid Jurors' Perception of Poor Quality Covert Recordings
A poor quality covert recording from an Australian murder case, along with the police transcript used in the trial but later shown to be inaccurate, are used to explore general issues regarding this increasingly common type of evidence. Two experiments were run, in which participants heard an excerpt from the audio, first with no transcript, then with suggested and alternative transcripts. In Experiment 1, they were given no contextual informatio…
Constraining abstractness: Phonological representation in the light of color terms
This paper offers a general analysis of what it means to say that a representation or concept is 'abstract', and then applies the analysis in two specific areas, namely colour terms research and phonological theory. Starting from acceptance of the widely agreed proposition that cognition involves categorisation of reality via mediating concepts, it follows the implications of this idea in metatheoretical analysis of the terms and concepts used in…
Guy-dance with pro-nun-see-ay-shon
A consideration of how the everyday spelling system can be used more effectively than phonetic symbols in English pronunciation guides
Phonology without tiers: Why the phonetic representation is not derived from the phonological representation
Issues in transcription: Factors affecting the reliability of transcripts as evidence in legal cases
This article considers the reliability of transcripts used as evidence in court, especially transcripts of poor recordings. Background information about human speech and speech perception is presented, and the implications of this information for the use of transcripts of different kinds in legal contexts is considered. Finally, recommendations are made to allow judgement of the reliability of existing transcripts, ensure that newly created trans…
Linguistic identification in the determination of nationality: A preliminary report
Constraining abstractness: Phonological representation in the light of color terms
This paper offers a general analysis of what it means to say that a representation or concept is 'abstract', and then applies the analysis in two specific areas, namely colour terms research and phonological theory. Starting from acceptance of the widely agreed proposition that cognition involves categorisation of reality via mediating concepts, it follows the implications of this idea in metatheoretical analysis of the terms and concepts used in…
The role of ‘educated native speakers’ in providing language analysis for the determination of the origin of asylum seekers
This paper speaks to a debate which has arisen across various branches of linguistics (see Eades, 2009) regarding the relative levels of responsibility that should be given to (a) qualified linguists with professional expertise in a particular language, and (b) ‘educated native speakers’ of the language, in conducting Language Analysis for the Determination of the regional or social Origin of asylum seekers (LADO). It reviews existing evidence fr…
Communicating about Communication: Intercultural Competence as a Factor in the Success of Interdisciplinary Collaboration
Many disciplines describe themselves as studying ‘communication’. However observation of interdisciplinary discussion suggests that ‘communication’ may be conceptualized in different ways by different disciplines. This paper aims to promote mutual understanding among disciplines, not by proposing a universally valid definition of communication to which all disciplines should subscribe, but by, first, offering a set of questions that can be used t…
Interpretation of a Crisis Call: Persistence of a primed perception of a disputed utterance
This article describes an experiment designed to explore the effects of ‘priming’ (i.e. being exposed to a suggested interpretation of an audio signal) on how juries perceive disputed utterances in poor quality recordings used as evidence in legal cases. Using the actual disputed utterance from a real case, the experiment tracks how participants’ perception of its content changes as evidence about the case is gradually revealed to them. At a cert…
The role of linguists and native speakers in language analysis for the determination of speaker origin: A response to Tina Cambier-Langeveld
Cambier-Langeveld (2010a) examines eight LADO case reports, attributing problems she finds in them to lack of native speaker competence on the part of the analysts, and uses the results to argue the legitimacy of a role for native speakers in LADO that is not currently allowed by the Guidelines (2004). The present article clarifies what the Guidelines say about analysts, and shows that the authors of the eight reports do not meet their requiremen…
Spoken Word Recognition
One of the most basic aspects of learning a language is learning its words, or vocabulary.
Language Analysis for the Determination of Origin (Lado)
Language analysis for the determination of origin (LADO) is a relatively new branch of applied linguistics. Generally considered a forensic application, it is used by governments to assess asylum seekers applying for refugee status.
The Power and Persistence of Contextual Priming: More Risks in Using Police Transcripts to Aid Jurors' Perception of Poor Quality Covert Recordings
A poor quality covert recording from an Australian murder case, along with the police transcript used in the trial but later shown to be inaccurate, are used to explore general issues regarding this increasingly common type of evidence. Two experiments were run, in which participants heard an excerpt from the audio, first with no transcript, then with suggested and alternative transcripts. In Experiment 1, they were given no contextual informatio…
Forensic Transcription: How Confident False Beliefs about Language and Speech Threaten the Right to a Fair Trial in Australia
Everyday knowledge about language and speech, or ‘folk linguistics’, incorporates a number of false beliefs that have a negative effect in a range of areas, nowhere more so than in the criminal justice system. One lesser known area where false beliefs have a major impact is forensic transcription (interpretation of indistinct covert recordings used as evidence in criminal trials). Without consultation of the linguistic sciences, the law has devel…
Acoustic injustice: The experience of listening to indistinct covert recordings presented as evidence in court
Audio recorded by hidden listening devices can provide powerful evidence in criminal trials. Unfortunately these covert recordings are often indistinct, to the extent the court needs a transcript to understand the content. Australian law allows police to provide transcripts as ‘ad hoc experts’. Legal procedures incorporate safeguards intended to ensure the transcripts are not misleading. The problem is that these safeguards have been shown to be …
A Framework for Deciding How to Create and Evaluate Transcripts for Forensic and Other Purposes
Transcripts are used successfully in many areas of contemporary society. However, some uses of transcripts show systemic problems, with significant negative consequences. The key to finding effective solutions in these areas is to determine which factors contribute most strongly to the problems – which may be different from those to which they are commonly ascribed. This systematic review offers a conceptual framework for understanding the nature…
The Eastman transcripts: A case study calling Australian linguists to action against legal misconceptions about language in forensic evidence
This paper presents a new case study examining the use of police transcripts to assist the court in understanding poor-quality forensic audio admitted as evidence in criminal trials. The 1995 trial it studies was the first major Australian case to include extensive expert opinions about police transcripts provided by the prosecution. Despite the fact that experts on both sides noted serious problems with the police transcripts, the judge allowed …
Spoken Word Recognition
Recognizing spoken words seems so simple in the everyday experience of L1 speakers, that it can be hard to appreciate that it is one of the most complex of all human skills. Understanding the nature of the complexity is crucial for many branches of applied linguistics, especially helping L2 learners acquire the skills of spoken word recognition. This short article starts by reviewing the key findings from a century's research into the nature of s…
Global maternal mortality associated with Sars-CoV-2 infection: A systematic review and meta-analysis
You’ve got the wrong Shorty!”: Further insights into the legal misconceptions that cause transcript injustice in forensic contexts
Linguistics (15 works) · Psychology (15 works) · Political science (8 works) · Computer Science (7 works) · Philosophy (7 works) · Law (6 works) · Linguistic Variation and Morphology (6 works) · Sociology (6 works) · Social Psychology (5 works) · History (4 works)