Differentiation and Integration: The Addressee Perspective-Taking Strategy in Three-Party Conversation

Abstract

In conversations, people take the perspectives of others when engaging in referential understanding. Previous studies have primarily focused on dialogues between two participants. However, as the number of conversational partners increases, the perspective-taking strategies may change. This study specifically investigated a situation in which the addressee faces two speakers who take turns giving referential instructions. In Experiment 1, the perspectives of Speaker 1 and the addressee participants were consistent, while the perspectives of Speaker 2 and the addressee participants were inconsistent. In Experiment 2, the perspectives of both speakers were consistent but differed from the addressee’s perspective. The results showed that, in Experiment 1, participants distinguished between the perspectives of the two speakers when interpreting noun reference, but no difference was found in Experiment 2. However, when comparing the results of Experiments 1 and 2, it was found that, despite the perspective of Speaker 2 remaining unchanged, participants in Experiment 1 were more egocentric than in Experiment 2 when interpreting Speaker 2’s discourse. The pattern of strategic change was aligned with the interpretation of Speaker 1. This suggests that participants, to some extent, integrate the perspectives of both speakers. The results were further discussed based on the consideration of their partner’s audience design strategies, use of a “Grounding by Proxy” strategy, or the calculation of a probabilistic weight of different perspectives.

Keywords: perspective-taking, Common Ground, three-party conversation, referential resolution, Mandarin