The etymological substance of the Italian first- and second-person oblique clitic pronouns

The first- and second-person plural oblique pronuns in modern standard Italian are ci and vi; other varieties of Italo-Romance present ne (rarely ni) and ve. The pronominal clitics ci, ne and vi are often identified etymolo­gically with the local adverbs ci, ne and vi, reflecting Latin (*)hince, inde and ibi. According to a competing view only ci has an adverbial origin, whereas the pronominal clitics ne and vi reflect Latin nōs and uōs. In this study I present the material and analyse it historically. I conclude that the latter hypothesis is more plausible: it was precisely the accidental merger of pronominal ne and vi (from Latin nōs and uōs) with adverbial ne and vi (from Latin inde and ibi) that triggered the replacement of ne with ci (from Latin (*)hince).

Hvem er “vi” egentlig?

This article explores Paul’s use of first-person plural forms in Galatians (specifically Gal 2:15-16; 3:13-14; 3:23-29; 4:1-7 and 4:26 and 31). Proponents of the ‘Sonderweg perspective’ and of ‘the radical new perspective on Paul’ argue that Paul uses these forms as a rhetorical device. He seeks to identify himself with his non-Jewish audience without implying that he himself nor his fellow Jews share in ‘our’ (i.e., non-Jewish) experiences. In opposition to this view, this article presents a ‘new Pauline perspective’ understanding of Paul’s use of ‘we’/’our’. Instead of assuming that his ‘we’ should be construed as ‘you’, it is argued that it ought to be seen as an inclusive ‘we’. Throughout his argumentation in Galatians Paul actively alludes to experiences that he himself and his fellow Christ-believing Jews have partaken in, including the reception of the Spirit, adoption, and liberation from slavery of the flesh and from being ‘under the Law’.

Unbestimmte Subjekte: zur problematischen Äquivalenz von deutschem man und italienischem si

German sentences with man and Italian sentences with si impersonale or si passivante are often presented as equivalent in contrastive grammars. However, this functional equation proves to be problematic when Italian students refer with man to their own role as authors, such as in: “Darauf wird man aber im folgenden Kapitel eingehen”. Evidently, man cannot refer to the speaker role, while in the same context the Italian si is well suitable. Starting from this interference error, the paper examines the possible range of reference of the two pronouns. It turns out that the most common reading of man and si in both languages is the generic one, which can be paraphrased as “everyone”. Systematic divergences, on the other hand, occur in the particular reading, i. e. when referring to single unspecified subjects. While the German man characterizes the subject as anonymous and does never include listeners or speakers (e. g: Gestern hat man bei uns eingebrochen; man ≈ ‘jemand’, ‘somebody’), the Italian si, according to the verb class (transitive, unergative, unaccusative, etc.), can or must be read as speaker-exclusive (Mi si è raccontato che ...; si ≈ ‘qualcuno’, ‘someone’) or as speaker-inclusive (Ieri si è andati al ristorante; si ≈ ‘noi’, ‘we’). The speaker-inclusive reading also occurs when si is used in academic texts as a substitute for the established form of speaker (author) reference by means of the 1st person plural (noi, ‘we’). In addition to man and si, other forms of indeterminate subjects are examined, namely the non-anaphoric uses of German “sie (pl.)” (Sie haben schon wieder die Preise erhöht.) and of the Italian 3rd person plural null subject (Ti hanno cercato.) as well as the so-called impersonal passive form in German (Es wird gemurmelt.).

Gaze selects the next speaker in answers to questions pronominally addressed to more than one co-participant

Like many other languages, but unlike modern (standard) English, German has a distinct second person plural pronoun (ihr, ‘you guys’), contrasting with the second person singular pronoun (du). The second person plural pronoun addresses a turn to more than one, and possibly all co-present participants. This paper investigates turn-taking after such multiply addressed turns, taking as an example information-seeking questions, i.e., a sequential context in which a specific next action is relevant in the adjacent position. It might appear that in such a context, self-selection applies (Schegloff 1992: 122); more than one co-participant is addressed, but none selected as next speaker. In this paper, I show on the basis of spontaneous interactions recorded with mobile eye-tracking equipment that this is not the case and that TCU-final gaze is employed to select the next speaker. The participant not being gazed at TCU-finally is addressed, but not selected as the answerer in next position and may provide an answer in a sequential position after the first answer. The article demonstrates that gaze is an efficient way to allocate turns in the absence of verbal cues and thus contributes to our understanding of turn-taking from a multimodal perspective.

The Hungarian Hubris Syndrome

Powerful figures, such as politicians, who show a behavioural pattern of exuberant self-confidence, recklessness, and contempt for others may be the subject of the acquired personality disorder, the ’Hubris Syndrome’, which has been demonstrated to leave its mark on speech patterns. Our study explores characteristic language patterns of Hungarian Prime Ministers (PMs) with a special emphasis on one of the key indicators of Hubris, the shift from the first person ‘I’ to ‘we’ in spontaneous speech. We analyzed the ratio of the first-person singular (‘I’) and plural (‘we’) pronouns and verbal inflections in the spontaneous parliamentary speeches of four Hungarian PMs between 1998-2018. We found that Viktor Orbán during his second premiership (2010-2014) used first person plural relative to singular inflections more often than the other three PMs during their terms. Orbán and another Hungarian PM, Ferenc Gyurcsány, who were re-elected at some point showed an increased ratio of first person plural vs. singular inflections and personal pronouns by their second term, likely reflecting the process of getting drunk with power. The results confirm the hypothesis that extended periods of premiership and more specifically, re-elections increase hubristic behaviour in political leaders.

Do Words Matter? Detecting Social Isolation and Loneliness in Older Adults Using Natural Language Processing

Introduction: Social isolation and loneliness (SI/L) are growing problems with serious health implications for older adults, especially in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. We examined transcripts from semi-structured interviews with 97 older adults (mean age 83 years) to identify linguistic features of SI/L.Methods: Natural Language Processing (NLP) methods were used to identify relevant interview segments (responses to specific questions), extract the type and number of social contacts and linguistic features such as sentiment, parts-of-speech, and syntactic complexity. We examined: (1) associations of NLP-derived assessments of social relationships and linguistic features with validated self-report assessments of social support and loneliness; and (2) important linguistic features for detecting individuals with higher level of SI/L by using machine learning (ML) models.Results: NLP-derived assessments of social relationships were associated with self-reported assessments of social support and loneliness, though these associations were stronger in women than in men. Usage of first-person plural pronouns was negatively associated with loneliness in women and positively associated with emotional support in men. ML analysis using leave-one-out methodology showed good performance (F1 = 0.73, AUC = 0.75, specificity = 0.76, and sensitivity = 0.69) of the binary classification models in detecting individuals with higher level of SI/L. Comparable performance were also observed when classifying social and emotional support measures. Using ML models, we identified several linguistic features (including use of first-person plural pronouns, sentiment, sentence complexity, and sentence similarity) that most strongly predicted scores on scales for loneliness and social support.Discussion: Linguistic data can provide unique insights into SI/L among older adults beyond scale-based assessments, though there are consistent gender differences. Future research studies that incorporate diverse linguistic features as well as other behavioral data-streams may be better able to capture the complexity of social functioning in older adults and identification of target subpopulations for future interventions. Given the novelty, use of NLP should include prospective consideration of bias, fairness, accountability, and related ethical and social implications.

Linguistic and Psychological Features of Autogenous and Reactive Obsessions in Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder

Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is typically thought of as a single mental health disorder. More recently, internally-focused (autogenous) and externally-focused (reactive) subtypes have been proposed. This study examined the language used in describing these subtypes using anonymous posts from Reddit. The study used natural language processing software to look at differences in the use of the linguistic variables of first-person singular, first-person plural, third-person singular, and third-person plural as well as use of the psychological variables negative emotion, anger, anxiety, insight, causation, certainty, risk, religion, swear words, body, health, sexual, discrepancy, future, and death. A log likelihood ratio (G2) was calculated to determine the differences of usage rates in the two corpuses. The results showed a large effect size of the use of first-person singular pronouns in both the autogenous and reactive corpuses. The psychological variables of “insight” and “sexual” had the largest effect sizes in the autogenous corpus, while “health” and “body” had the largest effect sizes in the reactive corpus. The differences in the usage rates of the linguistic and psychological variables in the corpuses show the heterogeneity of OCD and the importance of understanding lesser known forms of obsessions such as those with repugnant themes. Clinical implications and future research recommendations are discussed.Keywords: reactive OCD, autogenous OCD, obsessive-compulsive disorder, LIWC, corpus linguistics

Does it matter whether we or I talk about us? Distinguishing we-talk in couples’ conflict discussions and partners’ private thoughts before and after conflict

According to extensive evidence, we-talk—couples’ use of first-person, plural pronouns—predicts better relationship quality and well-being. However, prior work has not distinguished we-talk by its context, which varies widely across studies. Also, little is known about we-talk’s consistency over time. To assess the stability and correlates of we-talk in private versus conversational contexts, 43 married couples’ language was captured during a marital problem discussion and in each partner’s privately recorded thoughts before and after conflict. Participants were asked to describe any current thoughts and feelings in the baseline thought-listing and to focus on their reaction to the conflict itself in the post-conflict sample. Couples repeated this protocol at a second study visit, approximately 1 month later. We-talk in baseline and post-conflict thought-listings was largely uncorrelated with we-talk during conflict discussions, but each form of we-talk was consistent between the two study visits. Their correlates were also distinct: more we-talk during conflict was associated with less hostility during conflict, whereas more baseline we-talk predicted greater closeness in both partners, as well as lower vocally encoded arousal and more positive emotion word use in partners after conflict. These novel data reveal that we-talk can be meaningfully distinguished by its context—whether language is sampled from private thoughts or marital discussions, and whether the study procedure requests relationship talk. Taken together, these variants of we-talk may have unique implications for relationship function and well-being.

“We” are in This Pandemic, but “You” can get Through This: The Effects of Pronouns on Likelihood to Stay-at-Home During COVID-19

We examine how first-person plural and second-person singular pronouns used in coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) communications impact people's likelihood to follow stay-at-home recommendations. A 2 (first-person plural [“we”] vs. second-person singular [“you”]) by continuous trait self-control between-subjects experiment ( N = 223) was used to examine individuals’ adherence to stay-at-home recommendations. Results suggest that “you”-based appeals may be more broadly effective in garnering stay-at-home adherence, whereas low self-control individuals are less responsive to “we” appeals. Implications for research and practice are discussed.