Behaviour regulation at the family dinner table. The use of and response to direct and indirect behaviour regulation in ten Swedish families

ABSTRACTThis study explores parents' and children's use of and response to direct or indirect behaviour regulation in a family context. Ten families with two children each were divided into two groups depending on the age of the children (6–7 and 10–11 years or 10–11 and 13–14 years). Video-recorded regulatory dinner talk was transcribed, coded and analysed with regard to directness or indirectness in relation to behavioural outcome. Dinner talk was predominantly direct, but younger children were addressed by direct regulators as two-thirds of all regulators, whereas the opposite was seen with older children. Though children also tended to be direct, younger children used three times as many direct regulators as older ones. Compliance appeared in two-thirds of all direct regulators, but almost one-half of all indirect regulators were not complied with. Differences between groups were furthermore distinguished by instances of compliance: those who were most non-compliant were the children in group 2.

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Regulatory talk and politeness at the family dinner table

Pragmatics ◽

10.1075/prag.16.2-3.06bru ◽

2006 ◽

Vol 16 (2-3) ◽

pp. 171-211 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Åsa Brumark

Keyword(s):

Family Structure ◽

Situational Factors ◽

Activity Regulation ◽

Intercultural Studies ◽

Family Dinner ◽

Dinner Table ◽

The Family ◽

Main Activity ◽

Families With Children ◽

The Impact

This study examined the use of regulatory talk at dinnertime in twenty Swedish families with children between the ages of four and seventeen years. The aim of the study was to explore activity regulation in the light of contextual factors, such as the age of the participating children, the number of participants and the different kinds of conversational contexts. Regulatory talk extracted from twenty videotaped dinner conversations was transcribed, coded and analysed within the framework of theories about the impact of context on control acts, indirect speech and politeness. Regulatory utterances, about 7 % of all utterances produced by all family members, were mostly formulated as direct requests and about 15 % of them were mitigated, softening the impact of coerciveness. Indirect regulators occurred, however, in nearly one half of the cases whereas hints were rather uncommon. Age of the children, as well as activity and conversational context had an obvious impact on the way regulatory utterances were performed. Most instrumental regulators (related to the dinner routine) were direct (somewhat more than 60 %) and most non-instrumental regulators were indirect (nearly 60 %). Furthermore, the intended goal i.e. what action was required from the addressee seemed to affect the use of regulators: Regulation at the dinner table mostly concerned nonverbal actions and requests for objects and was related to the main activity. Compared with the American and Israeli groups in Blum-Kulka’s study (1997), the Swedish parents together tended to be more indirect but less mitigating. However, in instrumental contexts i.e. when regulating routine actions relating to the meal, most parental regulators were direct (60 %) whereas about 75 % of the utterances were indirect in non-instrumental contexts. A comparison of these findings with the data from Blum-Kulka (1997) and with other similar intercultural studies leads to the conclusion that situational factors, such as family structure, conversational genres and communicative goals, might have more impact on regulatory talk than socio-cultural background.

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The Family Dinner Table: Implications for Children's Health and Wellbeing

PsycEXTRA Dataset ◽

10.1037/e693032011-001 ◽

2008 ◽

Keyword(s):

Children's Health ◽

Children’S Health ◽

Health And Wellbeing ◽

Family Dinner ◽

Dinner Table ◽

The Family

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Emotions Are Contagious

Character Lab Tips ◽

10.53776/tips-emotions-are-contagious ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Sigal Barsade ◽

Keyword(s):

Facial Expressions ◽

Positive Emotions ◽

Body Language ◽

Negative Effects ◽

Family Dinner ◽

Phone Calls ◽

Dinner Table ◽

The Family ◽

Improved Performance ◽

Tone Of Voice

You're at the family dinner table. Your spouse worries that a friend's business is struggling. Then your son complains about his math homework and your inability to help, and your daughter asks when she will see her friends again. As the meal progresses, you can feel everyone becoming more and more anxious. Emotions are contagious. We automatically mimic each other's facial expressions, body language, and tone of voice. Next, we actually feel the emotions we mimicked and begin to act on them. Without our realizing what's happening, feelings can escalate, as we “catch” them from other people, who catch them back from us, in an increasing spiral. While emotions spread more easily in person, they also get transmitted through social media, phone calls, emails, and video chats. In fact, negative emotions related to isolation may make us even more susceptible. Luckily, knowledge is a form of inoculation. Just being aware of emotional contagion can reduce its negative effects. And positive emotions transfer just as easily as negative ones. The spread of positive emotions leads to greater cooperation, less conflict, and improved performance.

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Are there just two people in a dyad? Dyadic configurations in multiparty family conversations

Swiss Journal of Educational Research ◽

10.24452/sjer.22.3.4590 ◽

2000 ◽

Vol 22 (3) ◽

pp. 535-558

Author(s):

Sabine Pirchio ◽

Claudia Pontecorvo ◽

Laura Sterponi

Keyword(s):

Cognitive Activity ◽

Dyadic Interaction ◽

Older Children ◽

Ongoing Activity ◽

Family Dinner ◽

Speech Event ◽

Dinner Table ◽

Conversational Structure ◽

Participation Frameworks ◽

Dyadic Exchange

Dyadic interaction does not necessarily imply that just two people are present. It is often possible to single out episodes of dyadic interaction in multiparty contexts that we analyse, such as family dinner table conversation. Within such a speech event, multiparty participation framework (variously organized) is the default conversational structure. Consequently, a groundwork(Goffman, 1964) is required for participants to gain space and exclusivity for a dyadic exchange. This paper shows how dyadic framework is made out of the multiparty default interactional structure of a family dinner. Furthermore, we analyze the resources participants deploy to protect the dyadic exchange from anothers intrusion and/or by the risk of desertion of one member of the dyad. Young and older children actively participate in that activity and learn to manage it through diverse dyadic settings. It is not the number of participants that unequivocally determines whether an interaction is dyadic or multiparty. Varying and complex participation frameworks, alliances, and challenges are built and transformed within family dinner conversation; it is in their locus of the interactive organization of ongoing activity in which children are socialized to a complex socio-cognitive activity.

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Salz, eine Brezel und der Weg zum Bahnhof. Strategien des Bittens in Varietäten des Deutschen und im Serbischen

Linguistik Online ◽

10.13092/lo.72.1971 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 72 (3) ◽

Author(s):

Elke Hentschel

Keyword(s):

Railway Station ◽

Family Dinner ◽

Address Forms ◽

Dinner Table ◽

The Family ◽

Verbal Strategies ◽

The Way

This paper examines the verbal strategies used by speakers of German in Germany and Switzerland and speakers of Serbian in Serbia in order to voice a request. The participants in the study were asked what they would say in the following three situations: Asking for the way to the railway station in a strange city, asking their younger brother to pass the salt at the family dinner table, and buying a pretzel at the local bakery. Subsequently, the use of downtoners like 'please' or special particles was analysed, as well as the frequency of non-indicative verbal modes (subjunctive or conditional), the occurrence an equivalent of excuse me at the beginning of the request, and the use of greetings and address forms. The results show surprising differences between the three groups.

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