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Human Cognition and Social Agent Technology is written for readers who are curious about what human (social) cognition is and whether and how advanced software programs or robots can become social agents. Topics addressed in 16 peer-reviewed chapters by researchers at the forefront of agent research include: Narrative intelligence and implementations of story-telling systems socially situated avatars and ‘conscious’ software agents cognitive architectures for socially intelligent agents agents with emotions design issues for interactive systems artificial life agents contributions to agent design from artistic practice and a Cognitive Technology view on living with socially intelligent agents. The book addresses both software and robotic agents. On the one hand justice is done to the scientific and technical aspects and on the other hand the reader will learn about pioneering technological developments which are necessary for a public discourse and critical evaluation on where social agent technology is leading us and how such a development can be shaped in order to meet the social cultural and cognitive needs of humans.

The book is suitable for students researchers and everyone interested in this emerging and quickly growing field it does not require any specialist background knowledge.

(Series B)

Linking recent advances in theoretical syntax and empirical research in language development the book claims that second language acquisition is not totally distinct from first language acquisition but rather is a replay a relearning of language. It argues that Universal Grammar is a template guiding acquisition of L1 while constraining acquisition of L2. Assuming that a syntactic distinction crucial for language and its acquisition is the division between lexical and functional categories it argues that the key to L2 as well as L1 acquisition of syntax is the mastery of morphological features and their linking to functional categories. It thus supports the availability of UG to the second language learner and the minimalist claim that cross-linguistic variation is morpholexical. Constructionism the hypothesis of L2A proposed in this account argues for a period of feature underspecification after loss of the L1 value followed by a progressive building of the L2 value through specific constructions.

New Zealand English is currently one of the most researched varieties of English world-wide. This book presents an up-to-date account of all the major aspects of New Zealand English by leading scholars as well as younger specialists in each of the major fields of enquiry. The book is authoritative in its range and represents not only a synopsis of past research but also new research in many areas of study. It is of interest not just to specialists in regional varieties of English but many of the chapters detail new approaches to the study of dialect phenomena. It contains an introduction describing the external history of New Zealand English and the development of the study of New Zealand English. It comes with a full bibliography of work on New Zealand English and is fully indexed. This book is a significant landmark in the study of English varieties and will prove indispensable for anyone who is a student of English and New Zealand English.<br xmlns="http://pub2web.metastore.ingenta.com/ns/"/>

This book describes an approach to lexis and grammar based on the concept of phraseology and of language patterning arising from work on large corpora. The notion of 'pattern' as a systematic way of dealing with the interface between lexis and grammar was used in Collins Cobuild English Dictionary (1995) and in the two books in the Collins Cobuild Grammar Patterns series (1996; 1998). This volume describes the research that led to these publications and explores the theoretical and practical implications of the research. The first chapter sets the work in the context of work on phraseology. The next two chapters give several examples of patterns and how they are identified. Chapters 4 and 5 discuss and exemplify the association of pattern and meaning. Chapters 6 7 and 8 relate the concept of pattern to traditional approaches to grammar and to discourse. Chapter 9 summarizes the book and adds to the theoretical discussion as well as indicating the applications of this approach to language teaching. The volume is intended to contribute to the current debate concerning how corpora challenge existing linguistic theories and as such will be of interest to researchers in the fields of grammar lexis discourse and corpus linguistics. It is written in an accessible style however and will be equally suitable for students taking courses in those areas.

This book explores the interpretation of grammar and turn-taking in Japanese talk-in-interaction from the perspective of conversation analysis. It pays special attention to the projectability patterns of turns in Japanese in comparison to English. Through qualitative and quantitative methods it is shown that the postpositional grammatical structure and the predicate-final orientation in Japanese regularly result in a relatively delayed projectability of the possible point at which a current turn may become recognisably complete in comparison to English. Prior to such points projectability is often limited to the progressive anticipation of small increments of talk. However participants are able to achieve smooth speaker transitions with minimal gap or overlap through the use of specific grammatical and prosodic devices for marking possible points at which a transition may become relevant.

This classroom-tested volume aspires to be a brief but technically and factually accurate exposition of linguistic description and history. Whether studied as prime subject or as background information it should help students understand the assumptions and reasoning that underlie the contents of their handbooks and etymological dictionaries.<br xmlns="http://pub2web.metastore.ingenta.com/ns/"/>This book should be a useful guide for anyone unfamiliar with (historical) linguistics who is studying the history of a language and also for those who are enrolled in courses devoted to reading texts in old languages.

What makes a ‘getting acquainted’ a recognizable conversational activity and how are interpersonal relationships established in a first conversation? This book presents a theoretical framework for the study of relationship management in conversation and an empirical study of a corpus of initial interactions. It provides detailed descriptions of the sequential resources unacquainted interlocutors use in order to:<br xmlns="http://pub2web.metastore.ingenta.com/ns/"/>– generate self-presentation<br/>– introduce topics<br/>– establish common contextual resources<br/>It is argued that these sequential patterns embody conventionalized procedures for establishing an interpersonal relationship involving some degree of:<br/>– solidarity (mutual rights and obligations)<br/>– familiarity (mutual knowledge of personal background)<br/>– mutual affect (emotional commitment)<br/>The sequential analysis is based on a conversation analytic approach while the interpretive framework consists of pragmatic theories of politeness conversational style and common ground.

Individual Differences in Conscious Experience is intended for readers with philosophical psychological or clinical interests in subjective experience. It addresses some difficult but important issues in the study of consciousness subconsciousness and self-consciousness. The book’s fourteen chapters are written by renowned pioneering researchers who collectively have published more than fifty books and more than one thousand journal articles. The editors’ introductory chapter frames the book’s subtext: that mind-brain theories embodying the constraints of individual differences in subjective experience should be given greater credence than nomothetic theories ignoring those constraints. The next five chapters describe research and theory pertaining to individual differences in conscious sensations — specifically individual differences in pain perception phantom limbs gustatory sensations and mental imagery. Then two succeeding chapters focus on individual differences in subconsciousness. The final six chapters address individual differences in altered states of self-consciousness — dreams hypnotic phenomena and various clinical syndromes.

(Series B)

This volume aims to raise awareness of the underlying complexities concerning student writing in the universities. The authors address a series of theoretical as well as practical questions regarding the literacies required of students in Higher Education from the perspective of both students themselves and of their tutors. The research described here intends to move beyond the narrow confines of current policy debates and the quick fix solutions of writing manuals to explore the epistemological cultural historical and theoretical bases of such writing. Issues addressed include the nature of competing epistemologies that underlie the writing process and the varying degrees of explicitness about what academic writing entails; ways of challenging the institutional marginalisation of academic writing as teaching learning and research practice; what counts as knowledge and how far it is mediated by the rhetorical conventions of one culture; to what extent the challenging of such rhetorical conventions is itself a crucial epistemological issue. Writing in this volume then is addressed in terms of academic literacy practices involving relations of power issues of identity and theories of knowledge.<br xmlns="http://pub2web.metastore.ingenta.com/ns/"/>