Circumstantial speech, also referred to as circumstantiality, is the result of a so-called "non-linear thought pattern" and occurs when the focus of a conversation drifts, but often comes back to the point. [1] In circumstantiality, apparently unnecessary details and seemingly irrelevant remarks cause a delay in getting to the point. [2]
If someone exhibits circumstantial speech during a conversation, they will often seem to "talk the long way around" to their point, which may be an attempt by the speaker to include pertinent details, that may contrast with the speech which is more direct, succinct, and to the point (the gist) even at the expense of more precise, accurate communication. [3] [4] Circumstantial speech is more direct than tangential speech in which the speaker wanders and drifts and usually never returns to the original topic, and is far less severe than logorrhea. [5]
A person with circumstantiality has slowed thinking and invariably talks at length about irrelevant and trivial details (i.e., circumstances). Eliciting information from such a person can be difficult since circumstantiality makes it hard for the individual to stay on topic. In most instances however, the relevant details are eventually achieved.
An example of circumstantial speech is that when asked about the age of a person's mother at death, the speaker responds by talking at length about accidents and how too many people die in accidents, then eventually says what the mother's age was at death. [1]
Treatment often involves the use of behavioral modification and anticonvulsants, antidepressants and anxiolytics. [6]
In spoken language analysis, an utterance is a continuous piece of speech, by one person, before or after which there is silence on the part of the person. In the case of oral languages, it is generally, but not always, bounded by silence. Utterances do not exist in written language; only their representations do. They can be represented and delineated in written language in many ways.
Conversation is interactive communication between two or more people. The development of conversational skills and etiquette is an important part of socialization. The development of conversational skills in a new language is a frequent focus of language teaching and learning. Conversation analysis is a branch of sociology which studies the structure and organization of human interaction, with a more specific focus on conversational interaction.
In sociolinguistics, an accent is a way of pronouncing a language that is distinctive to a country, area, social class, or individual. An accent may be identified with the locality in which its speakers reside, the socioeconomic status of its speakers, their ethnicity, their caste or social class, or influence from their first language.
A thought disorder (TD) is a disturbance in cognition which affects language, thought and communication. Psychiatric and psychological glossaries in 2015 and 2017 identified thought disorders as encompassing poverty of ideas, paralogia, word salad, and delusions—all disturbances of thought content and form. Two specific terms have been suggested—content thought disorder (CTD) and formal thought disorder (FTD). CTD has been defined as a thought disturbance characterized by multiple fragmented delusions, and the term thought disorder is often used to refer to an FTD: a disruption of the form of thought. Also known as disorganized thinking, FTD results in disorganized speech and is recognized as a major feature of schizophrenia and other psychoses. Disorganized speech leads to an inference of disorganized thought. Thought disorders include derailment, pressured speech, poverty of speech, tangentiality, verbigeration, and thought blocking. One of the first known cases of thought disorders, or specifically OCD as it is known today, was in 1691. John Moore, who was a bishop, had a speech in front of Queen Mary II, about "religious melancholy."
Deborah Frances Tannen is an American author and professor of linguistics at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. Best known as the author of You Just Don't Understand, she has been a McGraw Distinguished Lecturer at Princeton University and was a fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences following a term in residence at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey.
Circumstantial evidence is evidence that relies on an inference to connect it to a conclusion of fact—such as a fingerprint at the scene of a crime. By contrast, direct evidence supports the truth of an assertion directly—i.e., without need for any additional evidence or inference.
Conversation analysis (CA) is an approach to the study of social interaction that investigates the methods members use to achieve mutual understanding through the transcription of naturally occurring conversations from audio or video. It focuses on both verbal and non-verbal conduct, especially in situations of everyday life. CA originated as a sociological method, but has since spread to other fields. CA began with a focus on casual conversation, but its methods were subsequently adapted to embrace more task- and institution-centered interactions, such as those occurring in doctors' offices, courts, law enforcement, helplines, educational settings, and the mass media, and focus on multimodal and nonverbal activity in interaction, including gaze, body movement and gesture. As a consequence, the term conversation analysis has become something of a misnomer, but it has continued as a term for a distinctive and successful approach to the analysis of interactions. CA and ethnomethodology are sometimes considered one field and referred to as EMCA.
Policy debate is an American form of debate competition in which teams of two usually advocate for and against a resolution that typically calls for policy change by the United States federal government. It is also referred to as cross-examination debate because of the 3-minute questioning period following each constructive speech. Evidence presentation is a crucial part of policy debate. The main argument being debated during a round is to change or not change the status quo. When a team explains why their solvency is greater than the opposition's, they compare advantages. One team’s job is to argue that the resolution— the statement that we should make some specific change to a national or international problem —is a good idea. Affirmative teams generally present a plan as a proposal for implementation of the resolution. On the other hand, the Negative teams present arguments against the implementation of the resolution. In a single round of debate competition, each person gives two speeches. The first speech each person gives is called a “constructive” speech, because it is the speech when the first person of the team speaks positively, presenting the team's main idea without rebuttals that have not occurred, presents the basic arguments they will make throughout the debate. The second speech is called a “rebuttal”, because this is the speech where each person tries to rebut the arguments made by the other team, while using their own arguments to try to persuade the judge to vote for their team. The Affirmative has to persuade the judge to vote for the resolution, while the Negative has to persuade the judge the Negative's position is a better idea.
Ai Ogawa was an American poet and educator who won the 1999 National Book Award for Poetry for Vice: New and Selected Poems. Ai is known for her mastery of the dramatic monologue as a poetic form, as well as for taking on dark, controversial topics in her work. About writing in the dramatic monologue form, she's said: "I want to take the narrative 'persona' poem as far as I can, and I've never been one to do things in halves. All the way or nothing. I won't abandon that desire."
The mental status examination (MSE) is an important part of the clinical assessment process in neurological and psychiatric practice. It is a structured way of observing and describing a patient's psychological functioning at a given point in time, under the domains of appearance, attitude, behavior, mood and affect, speech, thought process, thought content, perception, cognition, insight, and judgment. There are some minor variations in the subdivision of the MSE and the sequence and names of MSE domains.
Vocabulary development is a process by which people acquire words. Babbling shifts towards meaningful speech as infants grow and produce their first words around the age of one year. In early word learning, infants build their vocabulary slowly. By the age of 18 months, infants can typically produce about 50 words and begin to make word combinations.
In social science generally and linguistics specifically, the cooperative principle describes how people achieve effective conversational communication in common social situations—that is, how listeners and speakers act cooperatively and mutually accept one another to be understood in a particular way.
Avoidance speech is a group of sociolinguistic phenomena in which a special restricted speech style must be used in the presence of or in reference to certain relatives, or in certain situations. Avoidance speech is found in many Australian Aboriginal languages and Austronesian languages as well as some North American languages such as Anishinaabe-mowin, Highland East Cushitic languages and Southern Bantu languages. Chinese naming taboo prohibits speaking and writing syllables or characters that appear in the names of esteemed people, such as emperors, parents, and ancestors.
Pressure of speech is a speech fast and frenetic, including some irregularities in loudness and rhythm or some degrees of circumstantiality; it is hard to interpret and expresses a feeling/affect of emergency. It is mainly a neuropsychological symptom of specific mental disorders, such as bipolar disorders, thought disorders, and stress-related disorders among others.
This glossary covers terms found in the psychiatric literature; the word origins are primarily Greek, but there are also Latin, French, German, and English terms. Many of these terms refer to expressions dating from the early days of psychiatry in Europe; some are deprecated, and thus are of historic interest.
Howard Giles' communication accommodation theory (CAT), "seeks to explain and predict when, how, and why individuals engage in interactional adjustments with others,” such as a person changing their accent to match the individual they are speaking with. Additionally, CAT studies “recipients’ inferences, attributions, and evaluations of, and responses to, them." This means when speakers change their communication style, listeners are interpreting such alterations. For example, when the speaker adjusts their accent to match the listener's, the recipient may interpret this positively, perceiving it as the speaker trying to fit in, or negatively—questioning whether they are mocking them.
Small talk is an informal type of discourse that does not cover any functional topics of conversation or any transactions that need to be addressed. In essence, it is polite and standard conversation about unimportant things.
In linguistics, an honorific is a grammatical or morphosyntactic form that encodes the relative social status of the participants of the conversation. Distinct from honorific titles, linguistic honorifics convey formality FORM, social distance, politeness POL, humility HBL, deference, or respect through the choice of an alternate form such as an affix, clitic, grammatical case, change in person or number, or an entirely different lexical item. A key feature of an honorific system is that one can convey the same message in both honorific and familiar forms—i.e., it is possible to say something like "The soup is hot" in a way that confers honor or deference on one of the participants of the conversation.
Tangential speech or tangentiality is a communication disorder in which the train of thought of the speaker wanders and shows a lack of focus, never returning to the initial topic of the conversation. It tends to occur in situations where a person is experiencing high anxiety, as a manifestation of the psychosis known as schizophrenia, in dementia or in states of delirium. It is less severe than logorrhea and may be associated with the middle stage in dementia. It is, however, more severe than circumstantial speech, in which the speaker wanders but eventually returns to the topic.
Turn-taking is a type of organization in conversation and discourse where participants speak one at a time in alternating turns. In practice, it involves processes for constructing contributions, responding to previous comments, and transitioning to a different speaker, using a variety of linguistic and non-linguistic cues.