ELSEVIER Journal of Pragmatics 26 (I 996) 355--387

The conversational use of reactive tokens in

English, Japanese, and Mandarin ~
Patricia M. Clancy a, S a n d r a A. Thompson a,*, Ryoko Suzuki a, H o n g y i n Tao b

Department of Linguistics, University of California at Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA 93106, USA
h National University of Singapore

Received September 1994; revised version April 1995

Abstract
This paper investigates 'Reactive Tokens' in Mandarin Chinese, Japanese, and English.
O u r d e f i n i t i o n o f " R e a c t i v e T o k e n " ( = ' R T ' ) i s "a s h o r t u t t e r a n c e p r o d u c e d by an interlocutor
who is playing a listener's role during the other interlocutor's speakership'. That is, Reactive
Tokens will normally not disrupt the primary speaker's speakership, and do not in themselves
claim the floor. Using corpora of conversational interactions from each of the three languages
of our study, we distinguish among several types of RTs, and show that the three languages
differ in terms of the types of RTs favored, the frequency with which RTs are used in con-
versation, and the way in which speakers distribute their RTs across conversational units.

1. I n t r o d u c t i o n

Students of conversational language have noticed for some time that when one
speaker projects an extended turn, other speakers may produce small bits of vocal
behavior which exhibit an understanding that an extended tam is in progress on the
part of the first speaker (Orestr6m, 1983: 23--25; Sacks et al., 1974; Schegloff,
1982). In this paper we examine these small "reactive' turns in three languages:
Mandarin, Japanese, and American English. Referring to the speaker of the extended
turn as the "primary" speaker, we will suggest that 'reactive' turns play a role in a set
of culture-specific communicative strategies that include expectations about how

W e are g r a t e f u l t o t h e U n i v e r s i t y o f C a l i f o r n i a O f f i c e o f P a c i f i c R i m R e s e a r c h f o r f u n d i n g f o r t h i s
p r o j e c t . W e a r e p l e a s e d to a c k n o w l e d g e t h e a s s i s t a n c e o f L i l a F i s k f o r h e l p w i t h t h e E n g l i s h d a t a , K a w a i
Chui and Toshihide Nakayama for help with the graphical representations of the data, Tsuyoshi Ono for
help with the Japanese data, H.S. Gopal and Tsuyoshi Ono for advice on the interpretation of the quan-
t i t a t i v e r e s u l t s , a n d G e o r g e B e d e l l , S h o i c h i I w a s a k i , G e n e L e r n e r , C h a r l e s N. Li, J a c o b M e y , a n d a n
a n o n y l n o u s r e f e r e e f o r t h e J o u r n a l o f P r a g m a t i c ' s f o r v a l u a b l e c o m m e n t s . A l l r e m a i n i n g e r r o r s are o u r
responsibility. The research on this paper has been a thoroughly four-way collaborative matter; the
actual writing has been the responsibility of the first two authors.
* Corresponding author. E-mail: sathomps@humanitas.ucsb.edu

0378-2166/96/$15.00 Copyright © 1996 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved

356 P . M . Clan~ 3, et al. / Joto'nal o f P r a g m a t i c s 20 (1996) 355--387

much input a non-primary speaker will give, and where this input will occur with
respect to the primary speaker's turn.
There has developed a profusion of terlninology in the last two decades to
describe the tunas of non-primary speakers. Fries (1952: 49), looking at English con-
v e r s a t i o n s , w a s p e r h a p s t h e f i r s t t o g r o u p t o g e t h e r " t h o s e s i n g l e f r e e u t t e r a n c e s ...
that have as responses continued attention", including yes, Uh huh, Yeoh, 1 see,
Good, Oh, etc. Kendon (1967) called them 'accompaniment signals'. Yngve (1970)
proposed the term "backchannel communication" for all these non-primary turns.
Orestr6m (1983:23), following Yngve, divides "utterances" into ~'speaking-turns'"
and "'back-channel items", where the latter term includes both lexical and non-lexi-
cal "'listener responses", representing "'rather special functions where the listener
informs the speaker that his message has been received, understood, agreed to and/or
has caused a certain effect". Duncan (1974) and Duncan and Eiske (1977), however,
extended the term 'backchannel" to include sentence completions, requests for clari-
fication, brief statements, and non-verbal responses. Sehegloff (1982) marked a crit-
ical turning point in the study of 'non-primary" turns, being the first to demonstrate
that such turns do not form a single set, but must be analyzed in terms of their inter-
active functions. What he called 'continuers', in particular, especially uh huh, exhibit
the understanding t h a t a n o t h e r t u r n is s t i l l i n p r o g r e s s b y p a s s i n g a n o p p o r t u n i t y to
produce a full turn (p. 81). Jefferson (1984) proposed the term "acknowledgement
tokens' for the group of forms in English that includes yeah, mhm, and uh huh, and
suggested that functional and sequential distinctions exist among the members of
this group. This theme was pursued by Drummond and Hopper (1993a,b), with a
response by Zilnmernaan (1993). Goodwin (1986) nlade a further contribution to dis-
tinguishing among the several types of non-prinaary vocalizations by proposing an
important interactional distinction between continuers and assessments, which eval-
uate the primary speaker's contribution, such as Wow or Good.
Following several of these scholars, we consider the notion of "primary speaker-
ship" to be critical to the definition of this set of utterances. We also wish to main-
tain a distinction among several types of utterances produced by non-primary speak-
ers, though for the purposes of this paper, we will propose a different classification
based partly on their form and partly on their sequential function, and we will not be
comparing the sequential functions of the individual forms within each language, as
worthwhile a topic as that would be. We thus term the class of utterances made by a
non-primary speaker REACTIVE TOKENS, as indicated in our title. Our definition
o f " R e a c t i v e T o k e n " ( = " R T ' ) is "a s h o r t u t t e r a n c e p r o d u c e d b y a n i n t e r l o c u t o r w h o
is p l a y i n g a l i s t e n e r ' s r o l e d u r i n g t h e o t h e r i n t e r l o c u t o r ' s s p e a k e r s h i p ' . T h a t is, R e a c -
tive Tokens will normally not disrupt the primary speaker's speakership, and do not
in themselves claim the floor. If a short utterance served as the second pair part of
an adjacency pair (Sacks et al., 1974), for example as an answer to a question or a
response to an offer, it was not considered a Reactive Token. In section 4 below we
will characterize and exemplify the types of RTs found in our data.
Our study was partially inspired by earlier research showing that "backchannel"
use differs across languages, especially English and Japanese (Iwasaki, 1990; May-
nard, I986, 1987, 1989; White, 1989). These works suggested that Japanese speak-
 P . M . C l a n c y e t al. / J o u r n a l o f P r a g m a t i c s 26 ( 1 9 9 6 ) 3 5 5 - - 3 8 7 357

ers' use of 'backchannel' tokens, or aizuchi as they are called in Japanese, is more
f r e q u e n t t h a n is t h a t o f E n g l i s h s p e a k e r s . T a o a n d T h o m p s o n (1991), based on the
preliminary findings of the research project reported on in this paper, noted that
Mandarin speakers use "backchannels' much less frequently than do English speak-
ers. Mizuno (1988) suggested that Chinese speakers use backchannels less fre-
quently than do Japanese speakers. Liu (1987), in comparing the frequency of
backchannels, or aizuc'hi, of Chinese and Japanese speakers reacting to short pre-
pared 'discourses', found that Chinese speakers use aizt4c-hi less frequently than do
Japanese speakers.
In this study, we do not restrict ourselves to "backchannels', since there are other
important types of 'non-primary' t u r n t h a t o c c u r , a s w e w i l l s h o w , w i t h d i f f e r i n g tYe-
quencies across languages. Instead, we focus on a more inclusive range of 'non-pri-
mary" turns, or Reactive Tokens, and compare the way speakers from three typolog-
ically and genetically diverse languages, American English, 1 Japanese, and
Mandarin, use them in everyday interactions. We will provide a cross-linguistic
analysis of a variety of Reactive Tokens, and will relate the use of RTs to interac-
tional strategies peculiar to each culture.
We first outline the goals of this study (section 2), and then discuss our data and
our methodology (sections 3 and 4). In section 5 we present our findings, and in sec-
t i o n s 6 a n d 7, w e d i s c u s s t h e i m p l i c a t i o n s of these findings and the conclusions we
may draw from them.

2. Goals

The goals of this study are to examine the communicative strategies in each lan-
guage with respect to culture-specific expectations about the degree of interaction
that the non-primary speaker will engage in. There are two related aspects to these
expectations, what we might call 'frequency' a n d ' l o c a t i o n ' . T h a t is, w e w i l l ( I ) t e s t
a prediction arising from the earlier literature regarding frequency of RT use across
languages, and (2) demonstrate that the placement of an RT token with respect to the
primary speaker's t u r n is a c r i t i c a l p a r t o f t h e set o f e x p e c t a t i o n s . Results of these
analyses will provide a basis for proposing a preliminary characterization of the non-
primary speaker's role in each language.

3. Data

Our data are all from audiotaped face-to-face ordinary, non-argumentative con-
versations among friends. 2 By focusing on friends, we hope to eliminate the effects

From here on, when we say "English', we are referring to A m e r i c a n English.

2 F o r this project, we have restricted our hypotheses to verbal rather than n o n - v e r b a l Reactive Tokens.
Future research might extend our findings to include an analysis of n o n - v e r b a l tokens as well (see May-
nard, 1989. for findings on Japanese head m o v e m e n t s ) . The M a n d a r i n data are all from native speakers
of M a n d a r i n from m a i n l a n d China.
358 P.M. Clancy e t al. / J o u r n a l of Pragmatics 26 (1996) 355-387

of differential social status on use of Reactive Tokens; this is, of course, an interest-
ing topic for future study. Tables 1--3 summarize the data from each language (where
"IU' refers to 'intonation units', to be characterized below).

Table 1
Summary of English data

Transcript # of IUs Speakers Duration (rain.)

Farmtalk 204 2 M 6
Africa 200 2 F, 1 M 3
Hypochondria 228 2 F, 1 M 4
Car Sales 204 2 M 3
Lunch 105 3 F 7
Dinner 110 2 F, 2 M 7
Aesthetics 91 1 F, 1 M 7
Shulz 89 1 F~ 4 M 7
Total 1231 44

Table 2
Summary of Mandarin data

Transcript # of lUs Speakers Duration (min.)

Jiaoyu 250 2 1~, 1 M 6

Sunday 148 3 F 5
TKY 137 1 F, 1 M 2
TKY2 197 1 F, 1 M 4
HKPR 206 3 M 3
Shen 126 1 F, 2 M 1
Thai 112 1 F, 2 M 1
Tongji 126 2 M 1
Total 1302 23

Table 3
Summary of Japanese data

Transcript # of IUs Speakers Duration (rain.)

Fujikawa 157 ! F, 1 M 3
Gossip 215 1 F, 1 M 5
Hamada 237 2 M 5
Oyama 199 2 M 4
Girlfriend 121 1 F, 1 M 2
Party 113 2 F 1
Surprise 105 2 F l
Takando 128 1 M, 1 F 2
Total 1275 23
 P.M. Clancy et aL / J o u r n a l o f P r a g m a t i c s 26 (1996) 3 5 5 - 3 8 7 359

4. M e t h o d o l o g y

Our data were transcribed according t o t h e D u B o i s e t al. ( 1 9 9 3 ) t r a n s c r i p t i o n

system (see also Du Bois, 1991), which recognizes both turns and intonation units
as basic elements of conversational language. The data were then analyzed accord-
ing to a number of grammatical and interactional coding categories. Here we outline
those relevant to the issues we wish to discuss in this paper.

4.1. Speaker change

A speaker change was judged to have occurred at any point at which another
speaker took a recognizable turn, whether a full turn or a Reactive Token turn.
Laughter turns were counted separately, and will not be included in this dis-
cussion.

4.2. Reactive Tokens

We distinguish among several types of Reactive Tokens.

4.2.1. Backchannels
If the Reactive Token is a non-lexical vocalic form, and serves as a "continuer'
(Schegloff, 1982), display of interest, or claim of understanding, we consider it a
Backchannel. Typical Backchannel forms in each of the three languages found in our
data include those found in Table 4.

Table 4
T y p i c a l B a c k c h a n n e l s in J a p a n e s e , E n g l i s h and M a n d a r i n

Japanese English Mandarin

un (u=n, unun, etc.) hm uhm

a= huh a
ee oh ao
ha= mhrn ai=
ho= uh huh en=
hu=n eh
he = hum
mhm=/mh

4.2.2. Reactive Expressions

If the "non-primary" speaker utters a short non-floor-taking lexical phrase or word,
we coded that as a Reactive Expression. Typical Reactive Expressions, including
360 P . M . C l a n c y e t al. / J o u r n a l o f P r a g m a t i c s 2 6 ( 1 9 9 6 ) 3 5 5 3 8 7

assessments (Goodwin, 1986; Goodwin and Goodwin, 1987, 1992a,b), in the three
languages are those found in Table 5. ~

Table 5
T y p i c a l R e a c t i v e E x p r e s s i o n s in J a p a n e s e , E n g l i s h a n d M a n d a r i n

Japanese English Mandarin

sugoi "great'/'terrible" oh really/really z h e y a n g ha() " s u c h P R T "

h o n t o o "really" yeah jiushi a "indeed PRT"
s o o ' ( i t is) so" gee shi a " C O P PRT"
a s o o / s o o k a "(is t h a t ) s o ' o--kay dui "right'
ii n a = " ( t h a t ' s ) nice" sure dui dui/dui dui dui
hal "yes' exactly
all r i = g h t
man
shit
hell

4.2.3. Collaborative Finishes

When the non-primary speaker finishes a previous speaker's utterance, we coded
it as a Collaborative Finish (Lerner, 1 9 8 7 , 1 9 8 9 , 1 9 9 1 ). O f t h e t h r e e l a n g u a g e s in the
study, we found collaborative finishes only in English and Mandarin. See the Appen-
dix for a list of transcription symbols found in the examples.

( I ) English
A: .. when you say it happens for a reason,
.. it's like,
... it happened to get you off--
B: .. off my ass. (CARSALES)
(2) Mandarin
A: ... Yi ge jiao shenme de?
one CLF call what PRT
The one, what do you call it ?

3 We use tile f o l l o w i n g a b b r e v i a t i o n s f o r t h e g l o s s e s in o u r J a p a n e s e a n d M a n d a r i n e x a m p l e s .
2SG - - 2nd singular
CLF = classifer
COP = copula
GEN = genitive
NEG = negativc
NOM -- nominalizer
OBJ = object marker
PRT = final particle
Q = question marker
SUB = subject marker
TOP = topic marker
 P.M. Clancy et al. / J o u r n a l o f P r a g m a t i c s 20 (1996) 355--387 361

.. jiao=?
call
it is c a l l e d
.. haoxiang=,
seem
something like
.. jiao Guoji .... Sh- Shang=ye Xueyuan ba.
call international tra- trade college PRT
International Trade College.
... nei ge xuexiao,
that CLF school
That school
B: ... remer de.
hot PRT
is v e r y p o p u l a r .
C: .. zui=,
very
very
.. zui remer.
very hot
very popular. (JIAOYU)

4.2.4. Repetitions
If the non-primary speaker reacts by repeating a portion of the speech of the pri-
mary speaker, we coded it a s a R e p e t i t i o n :

(3) English
A: ,.. I g o t e v e r y t h i n g taken care of.
I got insurance on it too.
B: ... [ h o w m u c h <X it X>] --
A: ... [ u n d e r m y ] n a m e .
... e l e v e n hundred a year.
B: .. eleven hundred.
A: ... t h r e e hundred [dollars down],
B : [that's cheap] man, (CARSALES)

(4) Japanese
A: .. o t o t o i - - -
the: d a y : b e f o r e : yesterday
the day before yesterday- -
.. kinoo da,
yesterday COP
yesterday
.. denwa ga atte.
telephone SUB exist
there was a phone call.
362 P . M . C l a n c y e t al. / J o u r n a l o f P r a g m a t i c s 2 6 ( 1 9 9 6 ) 3 5 5 - - 3 8 7

B: .. kinoo.
yesterday
Yesterday. (GOSSIP)

(5) Mandarin
B : ... z h o n g z h u a n litou,
intermediate:college inside
Within the vocational schools
hai neng gai bao.
still possible change application
i t ' s O . K . to c h a n g e y o u r a p p l i c a t i o n .
... j i e g u o ,
then,
Then,
haishi mei ren bao.
still NEG person apply
even so nobody is i n t e r e s t e d in a p p l y i n g (to this type of school).
A: • .. a o ~

oh,
... mei ren bao gaozhong,
NEG person apply high:school
Even so nobody is i n t e r e s t e d in a p p l y i n g to s u c h s c h o o l s .
.. jinnian.
this :year
This year.
B: ... mei ren bao gaozhong.
NEG - person apply high:school
Nobody is i n t e r e s t e d in a p p l y i n g to s u c h s c h o o l s .
... h a = m e ,
then
So,
... z h e y a n g yi lai,
such once come
in s u c h a s i t u a t i o n , (JIAOYU)

4.2.5. Resumptive Openers

"Resumptive Openers' refer to a type of non-lexical element which is used at turn-
initial points. These forms would be coded as Backchannels if they weren't followed
by full turns. Although in our coding they were treated as a subcategory of Reactive
Token, they can be distinguished from both prototypical Reactive Tokens and proto-
typical contentful turns. No functional claims are intended by the term "resumptive"
in this label.
The characteristics of Resumptive Openers include the following:
1. T h e y a r e r e a l i z e d i n s h o r t ( t y p i c a l l y m o n o s y l l a b i c ) , non-lexical, vocalic forms.
2. T h e y t e n d t o a p p e a r a s a s e p a r a t e i n t o n a t i o n u n i t .
 P.M. Clancy et al. / Journal o f Pragmatics 26 (1996) 355--387 363

3. Normally only short pauses occur after a resumptive opener,

4. They appear at the beginning of a new turn.

(6) English
A : ... H o = w a r e y o u d o i n g w i t h t h e h o u s e .
B : ... O h ,
.. g o t i t a l l u h . . . p r i m e d ,
.. j u s t a b o u t ,
... e x c e p t t w o s i d e s [ o f i t ] .
A: [ O h y o u s h o o t a] p r i m e r stuff. (FARMTALK)

(7) Japanese
A : hyaku nanajuu= ne=,
hundred seventy PRT
( s h e ) is a h u n d r e d a n d s e v e n t y ( - s o m e centimeters) tall
B:
Wow
ii na=.
good PRT
how enviable/(l) envy (her) (FUJIKAWA)

(8) Mandarin
S : .. N i m e n ne ge fangzi,
2PL that CLF house
About the housing you have now,
... n e n g b u neng changqi zhu xiaqu ya?
can NEG can long:term live down PRT
Can you live there for long ?
T : ... ( 1 . 0 ) N a dangran keyi a=.
that of:course possible PRT
Sure it's possible.
... N i zhiyao ni y i z h i .. zhuce
2SG just 2SG continuously register
As long as you register (as a student).
... [ N a ni jiu keyi].
then 2SG then possible
you are fine.
S : [Ai=,
Oh,
.. n e ting hao de a=].
that very good PRT PRT
t h a t "s g r e a t . (TKY)

Resumptive Openers are hybrid in nature: they themselves do not constitute a new
turn, but they are Reactive Tokens that occur at the beginning of a tum. Thus they
364 P . M . C l a n c y et al. / J o u r n a l o f P r a g m a t i c s 26 (1996) 355--387

differ from the other Reactive Tokens in that their function is to acknowledge the
prior turn and commence a new turn, but not to pass a turn-taking opportunity, which
is what the other Reactive Tokens may be said to do. Our Resumptive Openers are
thus parallel to the "acknowledgement tokens" signalling "speakership incipiency'
discussed by Jefferson (1984), Drummond and Hopper (1993a,b), and Zimmerman
(1993).

4.2.6. Summary
In this subsection, we have offered a taxonomy of Reactive Tokens which has
proved useful in the comparison of the three languages of our study. In the next sub-
section, as background for our discussion of the location of Reactive Tokens in the
three languages, we will discuss our coding of possible conversational completion
points.

4.3. Complex Transition Relevance Places

One of our concerns was to determine whether the languages of our study differ
in where non-primary speakers tend to place their RTs. In particular, we wanted to
know if there are systematic differences as to whether speakers tend to utter RTs at
(1) points of possible transition from one speaker to another or (2) during another
speaker's turn. This issue in turn raises the question of how to define points of pos-
sible transition from one speaker to another.
Sacks et al.'s (1974) groundbreaking and highly influential paper on the system-
atic organization of turn-management in ordinary conversation first brought to the
attention of students of conversation the issue of conversational units, the units
which form the basis for turns. Sacks et al. proposed that turns can be constructed
from what they call "unit-types', or "turn-constructional units' (= TCU):

"'Unit-types for English include sentential, clausal, phrasal, and lexical constructions. Instances of the
unit-types so usable allow a projection o f the unit-type u n d e r way, and what, roughly, it will take for an
instance of that unit-type to be completed. U n i t - t y p e s lacking the feature of projectability m a y not be
usable in the same w a y . " (p. 702)

T h e e n d o f a T C U , t h e n , is w h a t S a c k s e t a l . t e r m a " t r a n s i t i o n - r e l e v a n c e place',
t h a t is, a p l a c e w h e r e a t r a n s i t i o n t o a n o t h e r s p e a k e r m i g h t o c c u r . E x a c t l y w h a t
d e f i n e s a T C U is l e f t o p e n i n t h e S a c k s e t a l . p a p e r , b u t it w a s a s s u m e d t h a t g r a m -
matical units play a major role.
Orestr6m (1983) and Ford and Thompson (to appear) take up Sacks et al.'s
challenge to linguists to participate in defining the character of TCUs and the
nature of transition-relevance places. Both studies find that these 'turn units' are
in fact best thought of as being complex, that is, that they include intonational and
pragmatic cues as to where they will end, as well as grammatical ones. Their data
show that intonational and pragmatic completion points select from among the
many more numerous grammatical completion points to form what we will call,
following Ford and Thompson (to appear), 'Complex Transition Relevance
Places' (CTRPs).
 P . M . C l a r i t y e t al. / J o u r n a l of Pragmatics 26 (1996) 355--387 365

In comparing our three languages for systematic differences in placement of RTs,

we found the concept of CTRP to be useful. We counted a Reactive Token as occur-
r i n g ' a t ' a C T R P i f it o c c u r r e d i n t h e c l e a r ( i . e . , n o t i n o v e r l a p ) i m m e d i a t e l y after the
CTRP. In what follows, we will briefly outline our criteria for determining the into-
national and grammatical boundaries for identifying CTRPs. 4

4.3.1. Intonational completion

Intonational completion was defined in terms of intonation units. Much previous
research has shown that intonation units play a major role in the shape of turn units
(of. C h a f e , 1 9 7 9 , 1 9 8 0 , 1 9 8 7 , 1 9 9 2 , 1 9 9 3 , 1 9 9 4 a n d D u B o i s et al., 1 9 9 3 ) . W e d e f i n e
"intonation unit" as:

"'a stretch of speech uttered u n d e r a single coherent i n t o n a t i o n c o n t o u r . " (Du Bois et al., 1993)

As discussed in Crystal (1969), Cruttenden (1986), Du Bois et al. (I 993), Schuetze-

Coburn (1992), (to appear), and Schuetze-fobum et al. (1991), numerous prosodic
cues have been identified which are used to determine intonation unit boundaries.
The perception of coherence in the pitch pattern is influenced by both the degree and
direction of pitch movement on a stressed syllable and by a change in pitch relative
to the speaker's preceding utterance (known as "pitch reset'). Timing cues often also
play a role in the perception of intonation units, including an acceleration in tempo
on initial unstressed syllables, prosodic lengthening of final syllables, and a notice-
able pause (0.3 second or greater) between intonation units. The identification of
intonation units is thus an auditory, perceptual matter.
In all of our examples, following the transcription system in Du Bois et al. (1993),
each line represents one intonation unit. Reactive Tokens generally constitute one
intonation unit.
Among the basic intonation unit types, there are two that are characterized as end-
ing in a contour which signals finality, designated by a period or a question mark in
the Chafe (1980), (1987), (1994), Du Bois et al. (1993), and Sacks et al. (1974) tran-
scription systems. 5 In contrast, non-final intonation contours are marked in all three
systems with commas, and dashes are used to mark intonation contours which break
off in mid-utterance.
Each of these four types of intonation unit has its characteristic acoustic realiza-
tions in a given language or dialect/variety (Du Bois et al., 1993). For American
English and many other languages, the period is realized primarily by a marked fall
in pitch at the end of the intonation unit, possibly accompanied by creaky voice. The
question mark is realized primarily by a marked high rise in pitch at the end of the

4 A l t h o u g h we have relied on just two o f the three criteria used by OrestriSm (1983) and Ford and
T h o m p s o n (to appear), n a m e l y g r a m m a t i c a l and intonational, there is reason to believe that these two
criteria capture most of the relevant information. See OrestrOm (1983) and Ford and T h o m p s o n (to
appear) for further d i s c u s s i o n of incorporating some n o t i o n of "pragmatic completion" into an a c c o u n t of
turn transition.
5 T h e s e two systems also recognize an e x c l a m a t o r y i n t o n a t i o n contour, m a r k e d with an e x c l a m a t i o n
point, which we will treat as a type of final c o n t o u r for this paper.
366 P.M. C l a n c y et al. / J o u r n a l o f Pragmati~'s 26 (1996) 3 5 5 - 3 8 7

intonation unit. The comma, or continuing, intonation unit type is typically realized
by a slight rise in pitch at the end of the intonation unit (beginning from a low or mid
level), a terminal pitch which remains level, or a terminal pitch which falls slightly
but not far enough to be considered final.
Further research will certainly lead to refinements in the specification of the rele-
vant prosodic properties; for the purposes of this project, however, we have taken
the intonation unit as a cross-linguistically valid, well-established auditory unit. We
divided each transcript into intonation units, either final or non-final, according to
the criteria just discussed. An English example can be seen in (9); as noted in the
Appendix, final intonation units are indicated by periods or question marks, and non-
t-real i n t o n a t i o n u n i t s a r e m a r k e d b y c o m m a s :

(9) English
A: and this la=dy,
... ( H ) n o b o d y k n o w s y e t w h y .
and most of us think,
she probably fainted.
... b u t s h e f e l l , (AFRICA)

Recall that the two characteristics of a Complex Transition Relevance Place for this
project are intonational completion and grammatical completion. What we have
shown so far is that for intonational completion, we counted intonation units with a
final contour.

4.3.2. Grammatical completion

We judged an utterance to be grammatically complete if, in its sequential context,
it c o u l d b e i n t e r p r e t e d a s a c o m p l e t e c l a u s e , i . e . , w i t h a n o v e r t o r d i r e c t l y r e c o v e r a b l e
predicate, without considering intonation. In the category of grammatically complete
utterances, we also included elliptical clauses and answers to questions.
A grammatical completion point, then, is a point at which the speaker could have
stopped and have produced a grammatically complete utterance, though not neces-
sarily one that is accompanied by intonational or interactional completion. As we
noted above, our grammatical completion points correspond in practice to what
Sacks et al. (1974) called 'transition-relevance places'. Our definition clarifies the
indeterminacy in their characterization, however, since they provide no criteria for
identifying one of these points. So a grammatical completion point will sometimes
be a word, sometimes a phrase, sometimes a clause, and sometimes a multi-clausal
unit, as illustrated in Sacks et al. (1974: 702, fn. 12). An example of an utterance
from our data containing a series of grammatical completion points (indicated here
by slashes) is the following:

(10) English
A: she should have gone/ho=me/ in= April./
.. a n d s h e d e c i d e d t o s t a y / u n t i l mugus=t,/
.. ( T S K ) a = n = d ,
 P.M. Clancy et al. / Journal o f Pragmatics 26 (1996) 3 5 5 - 3 8 7 367

t h e = y w e n t = .. o u t = , /
.. a c t u a l l y ,
t h e y j u s t w e n t o u t / to C h i s e r a = , /
.. t o g o o u t / t o t h e r i v e r . / (AFRICA)

In Japanese and Mandarin, we frequently find pragmatic particles following a

clause, an NP, and various other grammatical elements. In determining grammatical
c o m p l e t i o n , w e c o d e d b o t h the c l a u s e w i t h o u t a p a r t i c l e a n d w i t h t h e p a r t i c l e as
g r a m m a t i c a l l y c o m p l e t e (as i n d i c a t e d w i t h s l a s h e s in t h e e x a m p l e s b e l o w ) .

(1 1) J a p a n e s e
A: ichinichi yasumimashita/ yo./
one:day was:absent PRT
(1) t o o k a d a y off" (OYAMA)

(12) Mandarin
A : .. n i buyao dao Aomen/ qu/ la=./
2SG NEG to Macao go PRT
Don't go to Macao. (THAI)

A s c a n b e s e e n f r o m t h e s e e x a m p l e s , g r a m m a t i c a l c o m p l e t i o n is e v a l u a t e d i n c r e -
m e n t a l l y . T h a t is, a m a r k e r o f g r a m m a t i c a l c o m p l e t i o n d o e s n o t n e c e s s a r i l y i n d i c a t e
t h a t a c o m p l e t e g r a m m a t i c a l u n i t e x i s t s b e t w e e n it a n d t h e p r e v i o u s g r a m m a t i c a l
c o m p l e t i o n p o i n t ; r a t h e r , as is a s s u m e d in t h e c o n v e r s a t i o n a n a l y s i s l i t e r a t u r e , g r a m -
m a t i c a l c o m p l e t i o n is c a l c u l a t e d i n t e r m s o f its r e l a t i o n w i t h a p r e v i o u s p r e d i c a t e i f
o n e is a v a i l a b l e . T h u s , f o r e x a m p l e , in ( 1 0 ) , t h e r e is n o c l a i m t h a t t h e a d v e r b i a l
e x p r e s s i o n in A p r i l c o n s t i t u t e s a n i n d e p e n d e n t u n i t b y i t s e l f ; r a t h e r , it is u n d e r s t o o d
as b e i n g a third p o s s i b l e g r a m m a t i c a l completion point, the boundary after She
should have gone being the first, and that after She should have gone home being the
s e c o n d . B y t h e s a m e t o k e n , g r a m m a t i c a l i n c o m p l e t i o n is c a l c u l a t e d in t e r m s o f a p r o -
jected upcoming predicate.

4.3.3. Summary
W e h a v e o u t l i n e d t w o t y p e s o f c o m p l e t i o n , i.e., i n t o n a t i o n a l a n d g r a m m a t i c a l ,
which Orestrtim (1983) and Ford and Thompson (to appear) have shown to be rele-
v a n t in c h a r a c t e r i z i n g C o m p l e x T r a n s i t i o n R e l e v a n c e P l a c e s . W e will see in s e c t i o n
5 how the three languages of our study differ with respect to the occurrence of Reac-
t i v e T o k e n s at C T R P s .
We turn next to our findings.

5. F i n d i n g s

As noted above, we provide an analysis in terms of the various types of Reactive

T o k e n s as o u t l i n e d i n s e c t i o n 4 :
 368 P . M . C l a r l c y e t al. / .lourpzal o f P r a ~ m a t i c s 26 (1996) 355--387

-- B a c k c h a n n e l s
-- R e a c t i v e Expressions
- Collaborative
- Finishes
- Repetitions
-

-- Resumptive Openers
Since there was a substantial amount of variation from one conversation to another
within each language, it was not appropriate to pool the data from each language.
Accordingly, we are presenting our findings in the forin of graphs conaparing the
eight transcripts in each language.

5.1. Frequency (oC R e a c t i v e Tokens

In order to examine the overall frequency of Reactive Tokens, we consider the

ratio of all RTs to all Speaker Changes. That is, we want to ask what proportion of
all Speaker Changes serve to support the primary speaker rather than to take the
floor for a lull turn. 6 Since every RT was counted as a Speaker Change, the ratio of
RTs to Speaker Changes provides a tYequency measure that is relative to the overall
amount of all types of Speaker Change. In fact, the amount of Speaker Change per
total number of intonation units was quite similar in the three languages: 28.6% in
Japanese, 33.6cI~) in English, and 28_7% in Mandarin. 7 Fig. I shows the ratio of RTs
to Speaker Changes.
As shown i n F i g . 1, w i t h r e s p e c t to the overall frequency of Reactive Tokens, the
three languages of our study show clear differences. 8 These differences can be rep-
resented in the form of a hierarchy both in terms of the amount of variation across
the transcripts and in terms of the frequency with which RTs are used. This hierar-
chy is shown in (13):

(13) ENGLISH
JAPANESE > MANDARIN

Fig. 1 shows that both the range of variation and the ratio of Reactive Tokens to
Speaker Change are greater in English and Japanese as compared to Mandarin. The
range of variation in English, for example, is from 1.8% to 56.3%, while the range
of variation for Japanese is slightly greater, from 3.8% to 66.7%. But Mandarin
speakers in our data range from only 1.8% to 26.7% in the number of Speaker

O u r c a t e g o r y o f " R e s u m p t i v e O p e n e r " c o u l d b e s e e n a s p r o b l e m a t i c in t h i s r e g a r d , s i n c e it is f o l l o w e d
b y a full t u r n . N e v e r t h e l e s s , w e a r e c o u n t i n g t h e " R e s u m p t i v e O p e n e r " as a R e a c t i v e T o k e n a n d n o t a f u l l
t u r n , s i n c e in i t s e l f it d o e s n o t c o u n t as a f l o o r - t a k i n g t u r n , e v e n t h o u g h it is f o l l o w e d b y a T C U w h i c h
may take the floor.
7 T h e p e r c e n t a g e s o f S p e a k e r C h a n g e in e a c h l a n g u a g e i f R e a c t i v e T o k e n s a r e n o t i n c l u d e d is a l s o s i m -
i l a r : 1 7 . 8 % in J a p a n e s e , 2 6 . 0 % in M a n d a r i n , a n d 2 1 . 4 ~ in E n g l i s h .
s Standard statistical tests assume independent data points. Because our data points are not indepen-
d e n t , w e h a v e n o t f o u n d it a p p r o p r i a t e t o r u n s u c h t e s t s o n t h e r e s u l t s o f t h i s p r o j e c t . W e t h e r e f o r e r e f r a i n
from making any technical claims about "significance', but we do propose that the differences we have
f o u n d a r e i n t e r e s t i n g e n o u g h t o b e p r e s e n t e d as f i n d i n g s .
 P . M . C l a n c y e t hi. / J o u r n a l o f P r a g m a t i c s 2 6 ( 1 9 9 6 ) 3 5 5 - - 3 8 7 369

Ix]: Raw number of Reactive Tokens

Mandarin
TK - 6.3 131 Mean: 10.0"/o
TJ -~ 7.1 [21
TA -~ 8.5 [4]
12 ~ 8 . 7 141
~aJ 8 . 9 [41
d~¢ 12.0 t91
2e.7 [el

lip BB1.8 ili English

LN 18.2 [10]
Mean: 37.3=/°
22.4 [111
RR 40.0 [251
t~ 50.0 127]
CA 54.7 129]
AF 55.3 [211
i 56.3 [27]

Japanese
121 ,o.4 i01
GO 41_1 [23] Mean: 39.5%
HA 41.5 122]
PA 46.3 [191
9J 48.0 [12]
r
FU 57.9 [33j
TA G6.71 [ 2 2 ]
I i I t

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70

Fig. 1. Percentage of Speaker Changes that are Reactive Tokens.

Changes that are RTs, a relatively low percentage and only half the range of varia-
tion found in the Japanese and English transcripts. Another way of looking at these
f i n d i n g s i s t o c o n s i d e r t h e n u m b e r o f t r a n s c r i p t s in w h i c h a t l e a s t h a l f o f a l l S p e a k e r
Changes are Reactive Tokens: for English there are four such transcripts, and for
Japanese there are two. For Mandarin, however, there are no transcripts in which
more than half of the Speaker Changes are RTs.
Interestingly, although the range of variation is too great to rely solely on average
R T f r e q u e n c y i n c o m p a r i n g t h e t h r e e l a n g u a g e s , it i s w o r t h n o t i n g t h a t t h e a v e r a g e s
do support the hierarchy shown in (13), with English RTs comprising an average of
37.3% of the total number of Speaker Changes, Japanese 39.5%, and Mandarin, only
1 0 . 0 % . T h u s i n M a n d a r i n , w h e n a n e w p a r t i c i p a n t s p e a k s , it i s m o r e l i k e l y t o b e i n
order to take the floor than is the case in English and Japanese. Conversely, in Eng-
lish and Japanese, new speakers are more likely to be supporting the primary speak-
er's tum than is the case in Mandarin.
In sum, then, our data show a greater use of RTs in Japanese and English conver-
sations than in Mandarin. Japanese and English can be said to exhibit roughly twice
the frequency of RT use as Mandarin, and twice the amount of variation. These data
allow us to suggest that, based on the frequency of RT use, English and Japanese
non-primary speakers seem to play a more active role in supporting the primary
speaker, while Mandarin speakers play a less active role; essentially 90% of the
Speaker Changes in Mandarin, on the average, serve to take the floor, compared with
60--63% of the Speaker Changes in English and Japanese.
Now we consider the types of Reactive Tokens found in our data.
370 P.M. C l a n c y et al. / J o u r n a l o f P r a g m a t i c s 26 (1996) 3 5 5 - 3 8 7

5.1.1. Distribution of Reactive Token types

Although all RTs are by definition non-floor-taking devices, different languages
may utilize different strategies for implementing this support of the primary speaker.
Analysis of the different types of RTs allows us to investigate the range of variation
and the preferred strategies for supporting the primary speaker in each language.
W h e n w e c o n s i d e r t h e d i s t r i b u t i o n o f R T t y p e s in t h e t h r e e l a n g u a g e s , w e f i n d a n
interesting cross-linguistic similarity: while differences emerge in relative frequen-
cies, for all three languages Backchannels are the most frequent type of RT found in
conversation, and Reactive Expressions are the second most frequent. Table 6 pre-
sents the average percentages of the different types of Reactive Tokens, showing the
similarities and differences among the three languages of our study.

Table 6
Types of Reactive Tokens in English, Japanese, and Mandarin

Language Backchanneis Reactive Repetitions Resumptive Collaborative

Expressions Openers Finishes

Japanese 68,3 % 17.0% 2.2% 12.5 % 0

English 37.9c/o 34.2% !. 3% 10.4% 15.6%
Mandarin 47.2% 31.1% 5.8% 14.5 % 8.9%

While Backchannels are the preferred form of RT in all three languages, there are
striking differences in the relative frequencies of the two or three most frequent
types of RTs across the languages.
F o r J a p a n e s e s p e a k e r s , t h e o b v i o u s f a v o r i t e R T t y p e is t h e B a c k c h a n n e l ( t o b e d i s -
cussed in the next section); 68.3% of all RTs in Japanese are Backchannels. Reac-
tive Expressions and Resumptive Openers are a distant second and third, comprising
17% and 12.5% of all RWs, respectively.
English speakers have a much lower percentage of Backchannels, 37.9%. The
next most frequent type of RT, which is more frequent in English than in Japanese,
is t h e R e a c t i v e E x p r e s s i o n , c o m p r i s i n g 3 4 . 2 % o f a l l R T s . N e x t m o s t c o m m o n is t h e
Resumptive Opener, which constitutes a similar percentage of RTs as in Japanese
(10.4% vs. 12.5%, respectively).
The numbers in Mandarin are again too small to allow any strong claims, but we
can say that Mandarin speakers are similar to English speakers in their frequency of
Backchannels (47.2% of RTs) and Reactive Expressions (31.1%). (Mandarin speak-
ers, like English and Japanese speakers, use Resumptive Openers as their third most
f r e q u e n t t y p e ( 1 4 . 5 % ) , b u t t h e n u m b e r is o n l y 4 . )
W h a t w e c o n c l u d e f r o m t h e d a t a i n T a b l e 6, t h e n , is t h a t w h i l e r e l a t i v e f r e q u e n -
c i e s o f R T t y p e s d i f f e r f r o m o n e l a n g u a g e t o a n o t h e r , t h e r e is a s i m i l a r i t y a c r o s s t h e
languages in the types of RTs that are favored by speakers. Backchannels and Reac-
tive Expressions are the most frequent types of RTs in all three languages, suggest-
ing that future research should focus on the interactional functions served by these
 P . M . C l a n c y et al. / J o u r n a l of Pragmatics 26 (1996) 355--387 371

favored types. 9 At the same time, Table 6 also points up a striking difference
between Japanese, on the one hand, and Mandarin and English, on the other: Japan-
ese more strongly favors Backchannels (68% for Japanese, compared to about 42%
for Mandarin and English), while Mandarin and English make greater use of Reac-
tive Expressions than Japanese (about 30% each, compared to 17% for Japanese).
The distinction between Backchannels and Reactive Expressions will prove impor-
tant when comparing our findings on Japanese and English to those of previous
re s e a r c h e r s .

5.1.2. Backchannel use

As we have seen, overall RT use differs widely among the three languages of our
study. Thus, in order to understand the cross-linguistic differences in non-primary
speakership, it i s i m p o r t a n t t o c o n s i d e r t h e r a t i o o f B a c k c h a n n e l s to all Reactive
Tokens. The averages lor each language were given above in Table 6, which showed
that Japanese speakers greatly favored Backchannels over other RT types, although
Backchannels are the favorite RT type in all three languages. Fig. 2 shows the break-
down of Backchannels to Reactive Token ratios by transcript for each language.

[ x ] : F l a w number of Backchannels
I-P English
o
q7
CA
''m°l la.2 |2|
27.6 lal
M .... 379~.
RFI
AF 32.0 181 .2.9 191
D( 55.6 {151
LN
AS 800 [8~6.7 t181 Mandarin
TA 25.0 Ill Mean: 47.2%
JY
"rK 25.o 121 53.3 Ill
HK I I 44.4 4]
T2 ~5o.o Iel
rd 5o°
~lj 50,0
9-1 ioo [i

of Japanese
I°1 I
68.2 [15]
69.7 [231 Moan: 683°[0
9J 75.0 [OI
HA I I I I 773 117]
131_ 80+0 41
i I I I I 070 20]
PA i q i Im ~9.5 [17
lO 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 I00

Fig. 2. Percentage of Reactive Tokens that are Backchannels.

As shown in F i g . 2 , in J a p a n e s e , although t h e r e is o n e t r a n s c r i p t w i t h n o
Backchannels at a l l , f o r t h e s p e a k e r s i n t h e r e s t o f t h e t r a n s c r i p t s , m o r e t h a n t w o -
thirds of all RTs are Backchannels. In English, the range is between 0% and only
66.7%; in other words, except for the one transcript in each language with no
Backchannels, the English maximum percentage of Backchannels is just under the

9 Goodwin and Goodwin (1987), discussing the interactionat differences between continuers (which
are typically 'backchannels' in our terminology) and assessments (which are typically "reactive expres-
sions" for us), provides a promising place to start.
372 P . M . C l a n c y e t al. / J o u r n a l o f P r a g m a t i c s 2 6 ( 1 9 9 6 ) 3 5 5 - - 3 8 7

J a p a n e s e m i n i m u m . I n M a n d a r i n , t h e r a n g e is b e t w e e n 2 5 % a n d 1 0 0 % , b u t t h e n u m -
bers are so small as to make these figures nearly meaningless. (For example, in the
t r a n s c r i p t i n w h i c h 100°/~ o f t h e R T s a r e B a c k c h a n n e l s , the number of RTs is one.)
It is c l e a r , h o w e v e r , that a much higher percentage of all Reactive Tokens are
Backchannels in Japanese than in the other two languages.
F i g . 2 t h u s s u g g e s t s t h e h i e r a r c h y s h o w n in ( 1 4 ) :

(t4) JAPANESE > MANDARIN

ENGLISH

L e t us s u m m a r i z e o u r f i n d i n g s s o f a r . W e h a v e c h o s e n a n a r r o w e r d e f i n i t i o n o f
'Backchannel' than most previous studies, in order to tease out distinctions between
the way speakers use all Reactive Tokens and the way they use Backchannel forms.
Our data show that, with respect to tYequency of RTs, as measured against total
Speaker Changes, Japanese and English are comparable, with Mandarin RT use
being less frequent. Of all RTs, however, Japanese speakers favor Backchannels to a
greater extent than do English and Mandarin speakers.

5.2. Placement of Reactive Tokens

Given that Japanese and English speakers use Reactive Tokens with greater fre-
quency than do Mandarin speakers, our next question is whether there are important
differences among the three languages in where speakers choose to place these Reac-
tive Tokens with respect to the primary speaker's turn. When Reactive Tokens are
extremely frequent, for example, do they occur while the primary speaker is talking?
Recall that we are accepting the finding from previous research that the basic unit
o f t u r n - t a k i n g is c h a r a c t e r i z e d a s e n d i n g a t a C o m p l e x T r a n s i t i o n R e l e v a n c e P l a c e
(CTRP), here defined as a point of grammatical and intonational completion. For our
analysis of RT location, we will use the CTRP as a way of measuring where speak-
ers place their RTs with respect to the turn of the primary speaker. As with the fre-
quency of Reactive Tokens, the three languages of our study show strong differences
in the sequential placement of RTs.
In fact, we found that the extent to which speakers place their Reactive Tokens at
CTRPs yields the continuum shown in (15):

(15) MANDARIN > ENGLISH > JAPANESE

T h a t is, t h e t e n d e n c y t o p l a c e R T s a t C T R P s is s t r o n g e s t a m o n g t h e M a n d a r i n s p e a k -
ers, weaker among the English speakers, and weakest among the Japanese speakers,
a s s h o w n in F i g . 3.
Fig. 3 shows that nearly all the RTs, both in individual transcripts, as well as on
average, occur at CTRPs in Mandarin, ranging frona 44.4% to 100%, though we
must continually bear in mind that the numbers of RYs are extremely small. In Eng-
lish (not counting transcript HP, which had only one RT), RTs occurring at CTRPs
range from 30% to 66.7% of all RTs, which means that only two of the Mandarin
 P . M . C l a n c y e t al. / J o u r n a l o f P r a g m a t i c s 2 6 ( 1 9 9 0 ) 3 5 5 3 8 7 373

Japanese
[x]: Raw number o! R T s at C T R P s
Mean: 30,8%
12.1 [41
1 10, 2 [4]
i:~.t ! [41
=Tl I~.o ,3,
HA 36.4 lSl
(31- 40.0 12l
(3O
OY ~t~ fi "1Sl°j
O.O [11
HP English
Ib
LN 30,0 131
E~ 44.4 [1:21 Mean: 4 5 . 1 ~1o
AF 1147.6 [101
FH .] II I iii 48_0 I121 02.1 [10]
CA
~Z 63.6 17]
AS 60.7 116l
HK Mandarin
TK
T2
444 141 , 667 I~I 7s.o ~3, Mean: 79.5°,~,
~U f 75.0 [3)
JY I
TJ , g~6' PI loo 121
TA _ . . . . . i " ] [ I I zoo [41
~H I ~ I II I , I --p II --'1100 [11
10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100

Fig. 3. P e r c e n t a g e of Reactive Tokens at Complcx Transition Relevance Places (CTRPs).

t r a n s c r i p t s h a v e a s u f f i c i e n t l y l o w p e r c e n t a g e o f R T s at C T R P s t o o v e r l a p w i t h a n y
t r a n s c r i p t in t h e E n g l i s h r a n g e . F o r J a p a n e s e , t h e t r a n s c r i p t s r a n g e f r o m 1 2 . 1 % t o
5 0 . 0 % i n p e r c e n t a g e s o f R T s at C T R P s , w i t h n o t r a n s c r i p t r e a c h i n g t h e h i g h e n d o f
the English range or even the mid-range of the Mandarin frequency. Thus Fig. 3
s h o w s a c l e a r d e c r e a s e in p r e f e r e n c e f o r p l a c i n g R e a c t i v e T o k e n s at C T R P s , w i t h
Mandarin speakers exhibiting the strongest preference, English the next strongest,
a n d J a p a n e s e s p e a k e r s t h e l e a s t s t r o n g p r e f e r e n c e , j° W e w i l l s e e b e l o w h o w t h i s
s k e w i n g in p r e f e r r e d p l a c e m e n t o f R e a c t i v e T o k e n s w i t h r e s p e c t t o t h e i n t e r a c t i o n a l
s t r u c t u r e o f t h e c o n v e r s a t i o n r e l a t e s t o o v e r a l l s t r a t e g i e s in t u r n m a n a g e m e n t .
B u t t h e r e is a n o t h e r s k e w i n g w h i c h d e s e r v e s a t t e n t i o n . D e g r e e o f p r e f e r e n c e f o r
p l a c i n g R e a c t i v e T o k e n s at C T R P s m u s t b e u n d e r s t o o d i n t e r m s o f t h e t w o t y p e s o f
completion that constitute a Complex Transition Relevance Place, namely, intona-
tional completion and grammatical conapletion. As mentioned a b o v e , in a l l t h r e e o f
o u r l a n g u a g e s , t h e r e a r e m a n y m o r e g r a m m a t i c a l c o m p l e t i o n p o i n t s in o u r c o n v e r s a -
tional data than there are intonational completion points. The intonational comple-
tion points nearly coincide with CTRPs, but there are many grammatical completion
p o i n t s w h i c h d o n o t o c c u r at C T R P s ( s e e F o r d a n d T h o m p s o n , to appear and Table
7 below).
S o w e c a n a s k t o w h a t e x t e n t R e a c t i v e T o k e n s in t h e t h r e e l a n g u a g e s t e n d t o o c c u r
at p o i n t s o f g r a m m a t i c a l c o m p l e t i o n , regardless of intonation.

~0 Although our percentages are not directly comparable with those of Maynard (t989), they do
point in the same direction. Maynard reports that in her data 82.84~ of all backchannels in English
but only 5 1.02c7c in Japanese occur at points of grammatical completion. Maynard's definition of
"grammatical completion" is s i m i l a r t o o u r d e f i n i t i o n of CTRP i n t h a t it c o m b i n e s intonational (final
intonation) and grammatical criteria; however, Maynard does not define grammatical completion
incrementally, as we do.
374 P . M . Clan(ly et al. / J o u r n a l o f P r a g r n a t i c s 2 0 ( 1 9 9 6 ) 3 5 5 - 3 8 7

Ix]: Raw number of RTs at Grammatical Completion Points

TA Japanese
RJ Mean: 36.6*/.
PA
CL
HA [~Ol
47.A f111
OY

HJ
AF
CA
DI

AS 61
N [111
1101
TK
12

JY
3-3 121
TA 141
Ill
191
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100

Fig. 4. Percentage of Reactive Tokens at Grammatical Completion Points.

What Fig. 4 shows is that speakers of Mandarin and English strongly tend to place
R e a c t i v e T o k e n s at p o i n t s o f g r a m m a t i c a l c o m p l e t i o n , as shown in the hierarchy in
(16):

(16) ENGLISH
MANDARIN > JAPANESE

T h a t is, f u l l y 8 8 % o f M a n d a r i n R T s a n d 7 8 % o f E n g l i s h R T s o c c u r at p o i n t s o f
grammatical completion, as compared with only 36.6% of all Japanese RTs. We will
e x p l o r e t h e i m p l i c a t i o n s o f t h i s s k e w i n g in s e c t i o n 6 b e l o w .
Finally, let us consider the implications of the findings on grammatical completion
as compared with the results on CTRPs as sites for Reactive Tokens. If we compare
Figs. 3 and 4, we see that they are roughly similar for both Mandarin and Japanese.
Speakers of both Mandarin and Japanese treat grammatical completion points and
CTRPs essentially the same when using Reactive Tokens; that is, the number of
R e a c t i v e T o k e n s at C T R P s a n d at g r a m m a t i c a l completion p o i n t s is r o u g h l y t h e
same. But the data for English suggest a substantial preference (roughly twice as
g r e a t , w i t h a m e a n o f 7 8 . 0 % c o m p a r e d t o 4 5 . 1 % ) f o r p l a c i n g R e a c t i v e T o k e n s at
grammatical completion p o i n t s in t h e p r i m a r y s p e a k e r ' s t u r n o v e r p l a c i n g t h e m at
CTRPs. This implies that English speakers are more inclined to wait for the end of a
grammatical clause before using a Reactive Token than are speakers of Japanese,
and are somewhat less likely to wait for the end of a gramnaatical clause than are
speakers of Mandarin. But, unlike Mandarin speakers, who prefer to place Reactive
T o k e n s at t h e e n d s o f g r a m m a t i c a l c l a u s e s t h a t a l s o h a v e f i n a l i n t o n a t i o n ( i . e . , at
C T R P s ) , E n g l i s h s p e a k e r s o f t e n u s e R e a c t i v e T o k e n s at t h e e n d s o f c l a u s e s w i t h
non-final intonation contours as well.
 P . M . C t a n c y e t al. / J o u r n a l of Pragmatics 26 (1996) 355-387 375

While English speakers tend to use Reactive Tokens at the ends of clauses which
may or may not be intonationally complete, and Mandarin speakers tend to use them
at points of both grammatical and intonational completion, it is clear that Japanese
speakers must be using Reactive Tokens at points lacking either grammatical or into-
national completion. In Japanese, since only 30.8% of all Reactive Tokens occur at
CTRPs and only 36.6% at Grammatical Completion Points, the question arises:
where are the rest of the Reactive Tokens located? The answer is that more than half
of all Japanese RTs occur in the following non-final locations: 19.6% in the middle
of intonation u n i t s , tt a n d 3 3 . 3 % a t t h e e n d s o f i n t o n a t i o n u n i t s w h i c h l a c k g r a m m a t -
ical completion and which have non-final intonation contours (marked with commas
in our transcripts). Thus Japanese RTs are much more likely to occur 'midstream'
during the primary speaker's talk, while s/he is still in the process of constructing a
grammatical clause.
The following example, in which two co-workers are complaining about their
jobs, illustrates these two types of non-final Reactive Tokens in Japanese.

(1 7 ) J a p a n e s e
Y: wareware no ne=,
we GEN PRT
Obll"
H: un.
uh-huh
T : sofuto no ne~
software GEN PRT
on sofm,are
H." u n .
uh-huh
T: ... s h i g o t o ni taisuru hyoo[ka] ga,
work LOC towards recognition SUB
r e c o g n i t i o n o f the w,ork
H: [n].
uh-huh
T: ano hito he=,
that person PRT
that person
.. s h i t e n a i .
do not
d o e s n "t

~t Our findings on mid-IU Reactive Tokens are somewhat higher than those reported in Maynard,
1989: 171, who found that 11.48% of backchannels did not occur at or near Pause-bounded Phrasal
Units. This discrepancy may reflect different definitions of listener behavior (i.e., Reactive Tokens vs.
Backchannels), different units of analysis (IUs vs. PPUs), and the fact that since we required RTs "at" the
ends of IUs to be in the clear, some of the RTs we coded as 'mid-IU' would probably have been treated
as "near" a PPU boundary by Maynard.
376 P.M. Clancy et al. / J o u r n a l o f P r a g m a t i c s 20 (1996) 3 5 5 - 3 8 7

... h y o o k a o.
recognition OBJ
recognition
That person doesn't recognize our software work.

At the beginning of (17) we see a very typical pattern of RTs after non-final into-
nation units in the Japanese data. Following Y's first two intonation units, each of
which consists of a noun, casemarker and pragmatic particle, H produces a
backchannel. Then, in the less frequent "midstream' pattern, H backchannels during
Y's third intonation unit, in the middle of the noun hyooka "evaluation'. Clearly, H
has established a steady rhythm of backchanneling at or near the end of each intona-
tion unit as T produces it; the fact that the final backchannel precedes the end of the
intonation unit may reflect the predictability of the word hyooka 'recognition' in this
context, especially after the first syllable has been produced, as well as its crucial
role in completing the noun phrase 'evaluation of our software work'.12 But since all
three backchannels a r e p r o d u c e d b e f o r e Y c o m p l e t e s a s i n g l e c l a u s e , H is n o t r e a c t -
ing to a full proposition per se, even though he may be able to anticipate the direc-
tion of Y's thoughts.
In (18) we see a "midstream' Reactive Token that involves a rather extensive
overlap. H and T have been talking about T's father (H's former teacher), who unex-
pectedly went off to sleep somewhere during H's visit; H has asked who slept
where.

( 18 ) J a p a n e s e
H : chanto=,
properly
properly
T: un.
uh-huh
H : a,
oh
okita [ 1 karaheiki 1] [ 2 datta2] n da.
got :up because all:right was NOM COP
h e g o t u p s o it w a s a l l r i g h t .
T: [1 o k i t e k i t a 1]
get:up came
(he) got up
[ 2 u n . 2]
uh-huh

~2 This n o u n is repeated after the next two intonation units, probably because current speaker T has
used the wrong casemarker, the subject particle ga, instead of the object particle o.
 P.M. Clancy et al. / J o u r n a l o f P r a g m a t i c s 26 (1996) 3 5 5 ~ 8 7 377

After H begins the answer to T's question, T immediately produces a partial repeti-
t i o n in o v e r l a p w i t h h e r , a n d t h e n c o n t i n u e s t o o v e r l a p w i t h a b a c k c h a n n e l . T h i s t y p e
o f r a t h e r l o n g o v e r l a p p i n g R e a c t i v e T o k e n h a s a l s o b e e n d o c u m e n t e d in J a p a n e s e b y
H a y a s h i ( 1 9 8 8 ) , w h o f o u n d m o r e t h a n t w i c e as m u c h s i m u l t a n e o u s talk among
J a p a n e s e as a m o n g A m e r i c a n c o n v e r s a t i o n a l i s t s . A l t h o u g h r a t h e r c o m m o n in J a p a n -
ese, in E n g l i s h a n d M a n d a r i n the p r o d u c t i o n o f R T s after n o n - f i n a l i n t o n a t i o n units
o r " m i d s t r e a m ' d u r i n g i n t o n a t i o n u n i t s is e x t r e m e l y r a r e .
In this section, then, we have seen that speakers of the three languages of our
s t u d y d i f f e r in t h e e x t e n t t o w h i c h t h e y p l a c e R T s a t p o i n t s o f g r a m m a t i c a l a n d i n t o -
n a t i o n a l c o m p l e t i o n , i.e., w h a t w e a r e c a l l i n g C T R P s . W e f o u n d t h a t t h e t e n d e n c y t o
p l a c e R T s a t C T R P s is s t r o n g e s t a m o n g t h e M a n d a r i n s p e a k e r s , w e a k e r a m o n g t h e
E n g l i s h s p e a k e r s , a n d w e a k e s t a m o n g t h e J a p a n e s e s p e a k e r s , as s h o w n i n F i g . 3
above.
We also found that speakers of Mandarin and Japanese treat grammatical comple-
tion points and CTRPs essentially the same when using Reactive Tokens, while the
d a t a f o r E n g l i s h s u g g e s t a s u b s t a n t i a l p r e f e r e n c e f o r p l a c i n g R e a c t i v e T o k e n s at
g r a m m a t i c a l c o m p l e t i o n p o i n t s i n t h e p r i m a r y s p e a k e r ' s t u r n o v e r p l a c i n g t h e m at
C T R P s , a s s h o w n in F i g . 4 a b o v e .
I n s e c t i o n 6 w e w i l l d i s c u s s o u r f i n d i n g s o n t h e p l a c e m e n t o f R e a c t i v e T o k e n s in
t e r m s o f o v e r a l l s t r a t e g i e s in t u r n m a n a g e m e n t . B u t t h e r e is o n e f i n a l i s s u e t o b e
resolved before turning to the implications of our findings.

5.3. Behavior of the non-primary speaker at boundary points

Thus far we have been analyzing the treatment of various boundary points, such
as C T R P s a n d p o i n t s o f g r a m m a t i c a l c o m p l e t i o n , in t e r m s o f t h e p e r c e n t a g e o f R e a c -
t i v e T o k e n s at e a c h p o i n t . B e f o r e w e c o n s i d e r t h e i m p l i c a t i o n s o f o u r f i n d i n g s o n
R T s f o r i n t e r a c t i o n a l s t r a t e g i e s , it is i m p o r t a n t t o h a v e a n o v e r v i e w o f h o w t h e d i f -
f e r e n t b o u n d a r y p o i n t s a r e h a n d l e d in c o n v e r s a t i o n w i t h i n e a c h l a n g u a g e . I n T a b l e 7,
t h e r e f o r e , w e s u m n a a r i z e the b e h a v i o r o f the n o n - p r i m a r y s p e a k e r at f o u r d i f f e r e n t
b o u n d a r y p o i n t s in o u r d a t a : C T R P s ( p o i n t s o f g r a m m a t i c a l a n d i n t o n a t i o n a l c o m -
pletion), grammatical completion points (the ends of complete grammatical clauses),
intonational completion points (points of final intonation), and non-final intonation
u n i t s (i.e., p o i n t s m a r k e d b y c o m m a s in o u r t r a n s c r i p t i o n s y s t e m ) . W e c o n s i d e r t h r e e
p o s s i b l e m o v e s o f the n o n - p r i m a r y s p e a k e r : (1) p r o d u c e a R e a c t i v e T o k e n , (2) t a k e
a f u l l t u r n , ( 3 ) n o v e r b a l r e a c t i o n ( i n d i c a t e d b y 0 in T a b l e 7 ) .
A s t h e f i g u r e s in t h e l a s t r o w o f T a b l e 7 s h o w , t h e m o s t f r e q u e n t r e a c t i o n o f t h e
n o n - p r i m a r y S p e a k e r at e a c h o f t h e s e b o u n d a r y p o i n t s is s i m p l y t o c o n t i n u e l i s t e n -
i n g , w i t h n o v e r b a l r e s p o n s e . T h e r e is a s t r i k i n g d i f f e r e n c e b e t w e e n t h e p o i n t s o f
n o n - f i n a l i n t o n a t i o n , h o w e v e r , a n d t h e o t h e r b o u n d a r i e s : as m i g h t b e e x p e c t e d , m u c h
l o w e r r a t e s o f R e a c t i v e T o k e n s a n d S p e a k e r C h a n g e o c c u r at t h e e n d s o f n o n - f i n a l
i n t o n a t i o n u n i t s t h a n at t h e b o u n d a r i e s i n v o l v i n g g r a m m a t i c a l and/or intonational
completion. Only 8% or fewer non-final intonation units elicit either a Reactive
Token or Speaker Change, with Mandarin conversationalists being the most likely to
c o n t i n u e l i s t e n i n g in s i l e n c e ( 9 4 % o f t h e t i m e ) .
378 P . M . C l a n c v e t al. / J o u r n a l ()¢'Pra~matics 26 (1996) 355--387

Table 7
N o n - p r i m a r y S p e a k e r B e h a v i o r at B o u n d a r y P o i n t s

CTRPs triton, compl. G r a m . compl. N o n - f i n a l inton.

J E M J E M J E M J E M

RT 0.08 0.14 0.05 0.09 0.15 0.04 0.05 0.11 0.03 0.08 0.07 0.008
Turn 0.29 0.39 (/.39 0.28 0.38 0.39 0.16 0.21 0.23 0.03 0.08 0.06
0 0.63 0.48 0.56 0.63 0.46 0.57 0.79 0.69 0.74 0.89 0.85 0.94

At the three major completion points in Table 7, the non-primary speaker in all
three languages is m o r e l i k e l y t o t a k e a f u l l t u r n t h a n to g i v e a R e a c t i v e T o k e n . A t
CTRPs and points of intonational completion, English and Mandarin non-primary
speakers take a turn almost 40% of the time, Japanese non-primary speakers almost
30% of the time. Reactive tokens are provided about 5--15% of the time at these
boundaries, with English showing the highest and Mandarin the lowest rates of RTs.
Points of grammatical completion show the same pattern, but with somewhat lower
rates of Speaker Change and Reactive Tokens.
I n s u m , w h a t t h e f i g u r e s i n T a b l e 7 a l l o w u s to d o is to c o m p a r e the use of RTs in
the three languages against a different measure from that used for Figs. 3 and 4, Figs.
3 and 4 considered RT placement in terms of percentages of all RYs, while Table 7
considers RT placement in terms of all boundary points. These data taken together
indicate, then, that although the rates of RT use at various boundary points may be
high, as shown in Figs. 3 and 4, when we consider RT use in terms of the four types
of boundary points, we can see that the ratio of RTs per boundary point may be very
low. For example, while 80% of Mandarin speakers' RTs occur at CTRPs (Fig. 3),
this is by no means the same as saying that 80% of CTRPs have RTs uttered after
them. Indeed, only 5% of Mandarin CTRPs are followed by an RT (Table 7). And
although 33.3% of Japanese RTs occur at the ends of non-final intonation units (see
p. 375), this constitutes only 8% of the total number of these units. Table 7 thus clar-
ifies the relationship between RT use and boundaries in the primary speaker's talk.

5.4. Summary

We have seen that, in terms of both frequency and placement of Reactive Tokens,
our Japanese, Mandarin, and English data show clear and interesting differences.
First, Japanese and English speakers use Reactive Tokens more than three times as
frequently as Mandarin s p e a k e r s ( F i g . 1), w h i c h w e r e p r e s e n t e d by the hierarchy in
(13):

(13) ENGLISH
JAPANESE > MANDARIN

Second, in terms of ratio of Backchannel responses to total RTs, Japanese (68,3%)

outranks Mandarin (47.2%) and English (37.9%) (Fig. 2), as shown in (14):
 P . M . C l a n c y e t al. / J o u r n a l o f P r a g m a t i c s 2 6 ( 1 9 9 6 ) 3 5 5 - - 3 8 7 379

(14) JAPANESE > MANDARIN

ENGLISH

Third, Mandarin speakers place a higher percentage of their Reactive Tokens at

Complex Transition Relevance Places than English speakers, who in turn favor
CTRPs more than Japanese speakers (Fig. 3), as shown in the hierarchy in (15):

(15) MANDARIN > ENGLISH > JAPANESE

Finally, Mandarin and English speakers place higher percentages of RTs at points of
grammatical completion than do Japanese speakers (Fig. 4), producing the hierarchy
in ( 16):

(16) ENGLISH > JAPANESE

MANDARIN

Summary profiles of these findings by language are given in Table 8.

Table 8
S u m m a r y profiles of the n o n - p r i m a r y speaker in Japanese, M a n d a r i n and E n g l i s h

Japanese Mandarin English

High Reactive T o k e n ratio Low Reactive T o k e n ratio High Reactive T o k e n ratio

High B a e k c h a n n e l ratio Low B a c k c h a n n e l ratio Low B a c k c h a n n e l ratio
Low R T at C T R P High R T at C R T P Moderate R T at C T R P
Low R T at gram. compl. High R T at gram. compl. High R T at gram. compl.

In the next section, we interpret these results in terms of differences in overall

turn-management strategies among the three languages.

6. I m p l i c a t i o n s

Our findings with respect to Reactive Token use in these three languages provide
a new type of evidence for the observation that what it means to be a "polite' or "co-
operative" conversational partner (Brown and Levinson, 1978; Grice, 1975) is a cul-
ture-specific matter, as suggested in Keenan (1976), Rosaldo (1982), and Wierzbicka
(1985), among others.
We are well aware that there must be other factors which influence RT use which
we have not examined. Our data consist of conversations among friends of the same
social status, so they do not allow us to generalize about the role of social status in
RT use. Similarly, gender may well play a role; there are no clear indications of this
in our data, but we did not control for gender in our research design, so our data sim-
ply leave us agnostic on this point. Finally, we readily acknowledge that there will
almost certainly be individual differences among speakers within a given language
380 P_M_ C l a r i t y et o1_ / J o u r n a l of Pragmati¢'s 26 (1996) 355-387

arising from the content and setting of the conversation. Investigating the role of
t h e s e v a r i o u s f a c t o r s is a t a s k f o r c o n t i n u e d r e s e a r c h .
The findings which we have summarized on the use of Reactive Tokens suggest
that t h e y are p a r t o f a d i s t i n c t set o f t u r n - m a n a g e m e n t strategies for each language.
T h a t is, t h e f r e q u e n c y , t y p e s , a n d p l a c e m e n t o f R e a c t i v e T o k e n s a r e p a r t o f a n i n t e r -
a c t i o n a l s y s t e m w h i c h c o m p e t e n t l a n g u a g e u s e r s k n o w a n d w h i c h g i v e s rise to c l e a r
c u l t u r a l e x p e c t a t i o n s a b o u t w h a t s p e a k e r s a n d l i s t e n e r s a r e d o i n g in o r d i n a r y t a l k ,
s i m i l a r to the c o n v e n t i o n a l i z e d styles documented for various cultural subsets of
A m e r i c a n s p e a k e r s in T a n n e n ( 1 9 8 1 a , b , c , 1 9 8 2 , 1 9 8 4 , 1 9 8 7 ) . I n w h a t f o l l o w s w e
w i l l t r y t o o u t l i n e w h a t o u r s t u d y s h o w s a b o u t i n t e r a c t i v e s t r a t e g i e s in e a c h o f t h e
three languages we have investigated.

6. I. Japanese

T h e r e is a r e l a t i v e l y s u b s t a n t i a l l i t e r a t u r e s u g g e s t i n g t h a t i n t e r a c t i o n a l a n d a f f e c -
t i v e c o n s i d e r a t i o n s p l a y a l a r g e r r o l e in J a p a n e s e c o n v e r s a t i o n s t h a n t h e y d o i n E n g -
lish. I n J a p a n e s e l a n g u a g e t e a c h i n g , h o w to t e a c h the a p p r o p r i a t e f o r m s , f u n c t i o n s ,
a n d u s e o f R e a c t i v e T o k e n s is a v e r y i m p o r t a n t i s s u e ( H o r i g u c h i , 1 9 8 8 ; M a t s u d a ,
1988; Mizutani, 1983, 1984, 1988). The use of aizuchi " b a c k c h a n n e l s " is a m a t t e r o f
e v e r y d a y d i s c u s s i o n a m o n g J a p a n e s e p e o p l e ; it is c o m m o n t o c o m m e n t o n o t h e r
people's over- or under-use of aizuchi. Furthermore, there are many anecdotal
reports by native speakers of Japanese and English suggesting that a higher rate of
Reactive Token use tends to characterize Japanese conversation.
O u r f i n d i n g s a r e c o n s i s t e n t w i t h p r i o r r e s e a r c h in t h a t J a p a n e s e s h o w s a h i g h f r e -
quency of Reactive Tokens, but we did not find that this frequency was significantly
h i g h e r t h a n in E n g l i s h . In c o n t r a s t , M a y n a r d ( 1 9 8 9 ) , b a s e d o n 3 - m i n u t e s e g m e n t s o f
conversation among 20 Japanese and 20 American pairs, found a total of 871 Japan-
ese "backchannels', occurring roughly one per every 2.42 Pause-bounded Phrasal
Unit, compared with only 428 American 'backchannels'. In our data, which are
based on fewer, though somewhat longer stretches of conversation, we found
r o u g h l y e q u i v a l e n t f r e q u e n c i e s o f R e a c t i v e T o k e n s in J a p a n e s e a n d E n g l i s h ( 3 9 . 5 %
a n d 3 7 . 3 % o f all S p e a k e r C h a n g e s , a n d 1 0 . 8 % vs. 1 0 . 9 % o f all I n t o n a t i o n u n i t s ,
respectively). When we consider only Backchannels, since a higher percentage of
J a p a n e s e R e a c t i v e T o k e n s a r e B a c k c h a n n e l s , w e f i n d a g r e a t e r d i f f e r e n c e : in J a p a n -
e s e , 2 9 . 9 % o f all S p e a k e r C h a n g e s w e r e B a c k c h a n n e l s , w h i l e o n l y 1 5 . 9 % o f all
S p e a k e r C h a n g e s w e r e B a c k c h a n n e l s in E n g l i s h .
A n o t h e r i m p o r t a n t d i f f e r e n c e in o u r J a p a n e s e v s . E n g l i s h d a t a is t h e l o c a t i o n o f
R e a c t i v e T o k e n s . A s n o t e d a b o v e , A m e r i c a n s p l a c e 4 5 . 1 % o f t h e i r R T s at C T R P s
a n d 7 8 . 0 % at G r a m m a t i c a l C o m p l e t i o n p o i n t s , in c o n t r a s t t o J a p a n e s e s p e a k e r s , w h o
i n s t e a d p l a c e m o r e t h a n h a l f o f all t h e i r R T s in t h e m i d d l e o f t h e p r i m a r y s p e a k e r ' s
I U o r at t h e e n d o f n o n - c l a u s a l I U s . T h u s o u r J a p a n e s e s p e a k e r s a r e m u c h m o r e
l i k e l y t o g i v e t h e i r R e a c t i v e T o k e n s w h i l e t h e p r i m a r y s p e a k e r is ' i n p r o g r e s s " r a t h e r
than waiting for a completion point. Regardless of relative frequency, this unex-
pected placement of RTs could lead Americans to feel that their Japanese interlocu-
tors are using Reactive Tokens much more than anticipated.
 P . M . C l a n c y et al. / J o u r n a l o f P r a g m a t i c s 2 6 ( 1 9 9 6 ) 3 5 5 - 3 8 7 381

I n a n a l y z i n g t h e i m p l i c a t i o n s o f s u c h d i f f e r e n c e s f o r i n t e r a c t i o n , it is i m p o r t a n t t o
k e e p in m i n d t h a t c u l t u r e - s p e c i f i c i n t e r p r e t a t i o n s o f t h e s a m e p h e n o m e n o n o f t e n v a r y
r a d i c a l l y . O u r d a t a s u g g e s t t h a t A m e r i c a n s e x p e c t t o h e a r R e a c t i v e T o k e n s at G r a m -
matical Completion points; from a semantic/pragmatic point of view, these are pre-
s u m a b l y p o i n t s at w h i c h a full p r o p o s i t i o n h a s b e e n uttered. I f the l i s t e n e r d o e s n o t
wait to hear a complete clause before giving a Reactive Token, this may sound dis-
m i s s i v e ( " Y e a h , y e a h , I a l r e a d y k n o w w h a t y o u m e a n " ) , a n d m a y be d i s r u p t i v e to
t h e s p e a k e r , w h o is n o t a c c u s t o m e d t o p r o c e s s i n g a r e a c t i o n f r o m t h e l i s t e n e r w h i l e
f o r m u l a t i n g a c l a u s e . I n t h i s l i g h t it m a k e s s e n s e t h a t i f R T s a r e t o b e p r o d u c e d w h i l e
t h e s p e a k e r is i n p r o g r e s s , a s i n J a p a n e s e , t h e i r m o s t c o m m o n f o r m s h o u l d b e t h e
Backchannel, which presumably places the least burden on the primary speaker,
s i n c e it d o e s n o t r e q u i r e a n y s y n t a c t i c / s e m a n t i c a n a l y s i s , a n d is t a k e n a s a c o n t i n u e r
(Schegloff, 1982).
On the other hand, from the Japanese perspective, Reactive Tokens that occur
w h i l e t h e s p e a k e r is in p r o g r e s s r a t h e r t h a n f i n i s h e d w i t h a g r a m m a t i c a l o r i n t o n a -
tional unit may be ideally suited for providing emotional support; to the extent that
R T s d o n o t o c c u r at the e n d s o f p r o p o s i t i o n s , t h e y are u n l i k e l y to b e i n t e r p r e t e d as
providing support for the speaker's point, which has not yet been made. Mizutani
(1984, 1988) and Maynard (1989) suggest that the Japanese turn-management strat-
egy could be characterized as follows: speakers use a highly conventionalized
affect-laden interactional style, with frequent inviting and accepting of involvement
o n t h e p a r t o f all p a r t i c i p a n t s . T h u s , J a p a n e s e s p e a k e r s u s e R T s as o n e w a y o f s h o w -
ing interactional support (see, e.g., Horiguchi, 1988; Mizutani, 1983). Matsuda
( 1 9 8 8 ) p o i n t s o u t t h a t this c h a r a c t e r i z a t i o n m a y b e r e l a t e d to a J a p a n e s e c u l t u r a l c o n -
cern for harmony and co-operation.
Our data provide support for this description, and suggest that Reactive Tokens
which occur frequently and are distributed throughout another speaker's turns and
c l a u s e s r a t h e r t h a n at p o s s i b l e c o m p l e t i o n p o i n t s m a y c o n s t i t u t e a n e s p e c i a l l y a p p r o -
p r i a t e m e a n s o f p r o v i d i n g a n d r e c e i v i n g i n t e r a c t i o n a l s u p p o r t in c o n v e r s a t i o n . T h e
n o n - p r i m a r y s p e a k e r is e x p e c t e d t o s h o w c o n c e r n f o r t h e p r i m a r y s p e a k e r ' s s e n s e o f
s e c u r i t y in h o l d i n g t h e f l o o r ; a n e m p a t h e t i c c o n v e r s a t i o n a l partner provides this
sense of security by giving RTs during the primary speaker's turn.

6.2. Mandarin

In s h a r p c o n t r a s t to the r e s e a r c h t r a d i t i o n in J a p a n e s e , t h e r e h a s b e e n n o s y s t e m -
atic w o r k d o n e o n R e a c t i v e T o k e n s in M a n d a r i n or a n y o t h e r C h i n e s e l a n g u a g e . T h i s
b y i t s e l f is a n i n t e r e s t i n g f a c t , s u g g e s t i n g t h a t R e a c t i v e T o k e n u s e is n o t p e r c e i v e d a s
a predominant feature of Chinese language use. The literature discussed above
(Mizuno, 1988, and Liu, 1987) does suggest that Chinese speakers use aizuchi
('backchannels') less frequently than do Japanese speakers. Our findings confirm
these results for Backchannels and Reactive Tokens in general, and indicate a quite
different turn-management strategy than for Japanese (or English). First, the use of
R e a c t i v e T o k e n s is s t r i k i n g l y l o w i n c o m p a r i s o n w i t h J a p a n e s e a n d E n g l i s h . S e c o n d ,
w h e n t h e M a n d a r i n s p e a k e r d o e s r e a c t , s / h e t e n d s t o d o it at a C o m p l e x T r a n s i t i o n
382 P . M . Clan~\v et al. / J o u r n a l o f ' P r a g m a t i c s 2 6 ( 1 9 9 6 ) 3 5 5 ~ 8 7

R e l e v a n c e P l a c e a n d n o t in t h e m i d d l e o f t h e p r i m a r y s p e a k e r ' s c l a u s e . A n d w h e n a
R e a c t i v e T o k e n is u s e d , it is m u c h m o r e l i k e l y t o b e l e x i c a l l y c o n t e n t f u l t h a n a r e
Japanese Reactive Tokens; this places no special burden on the primary speaker,
w h o h a s p r e s u m a b l y c o m p l e t e d h i s / h e r c l a u s e , a n d is f r e e t o p e r f o r m a n y s y n t a c -
tic/semantic analysis required.
Based on informal observations from several bilingual Mandarin speakers, our
s p e c u l a t i o n is t h a t M a n d a r i n i n t e r a c t i o n a i s t y l e f a v o r s c o n v e r s a t i o n a l p a r t i c i p a n t s n o t
infringing on the other's "rum space'. RT use, particularly without waiting for a tran-
s i t i o n p o i n t , is s e e n a s p r e s u m p t u o u s , i n t r u s i v e , a n d e v e n r u d e o r i m p o l i t e . A n i n t e r -
e s t i n g parallel c a n be f o u n d in the w o r k o f P h i l i p s ( 1 9 8 3 : 52--67), w h o r e p o r t s that
in t h e W a r m S p r i n g s c o m m u n i t y , N a t i v e A m e r i c a n l i s t e n e r s i n d i c a t e t h e i r a t t e n t i o n
to the s p e a k e r b y v e r y s u b t l e m o v e m e n t s o f the m u s c l e s a r o u n d the e y e s , a n d use
f e w e r b a c k c b a n n e l s t h a n A n g l o A m e r i c a n s . T h i s l i s t e n e r b e h a v i o r is p a r t o f a " n o n -
coercive cultural orientation' that places high value on personal autonomy and
avoids putting oneself above others; listeners avoid behaviors that might imply an
a t t e m p t to c o n t r o l the s p e a k e r or to i n d i c a t e that t h e y are l i s t e n i n g m o r e a t t e n t i v e l y
t h a n o t h e r s . T h u s a v o i d a n c e o f b a c k c h a n n e l i n g is i n t e r p r e t e d a s r e f l e c t i n g a n a p p r o -
priate stance of non-interference toward the speaker. For Japanese listeners, failing
t o p r o v i d e R T s f o r t h e p r i n a a r y s p e a k e r m a y b e i n t e r p r e t e d as u n c o o p e r a t i v e a n d
l a c k i n g in e m p a t h y -- a f a i l u r e t o c a r e f o r t h e s p e a k e r ' s n e e d s -- w h i l e in M a n d a r i n ,
eschewing RTs shows an appropriate respect for the primary speakers" right to for-
mulate and produce their talk undisturbed. This interpretation of our results shows an
i n t r i g u i n g p a r a l l e l w i t h n o t i o n s d i s c u s s e d in t e r m s o f p o l i t e n e s s , e . g . R . Lakoff's
(1973) "rules of politeness' which specify an opposition between non-
imposition/freedom ('Don't impose" and 'Give options') and camaraderie ('Make A
feel good- be friendly') and Brown and Levinson's (1987: 67) distinction between
" n e g a t i v e face" (the w i s h f o r o n e ' s a c t i o n s to be u n i m p e d e d b y o t h e r s ) a n d " p o s i t i v e
f a c e " ( t h e w i s h f o r o n e ' s w a n t s t o b e d e s i r a b l e , i.e., t h e w i s h t o b e a p p r e c i a t e d ) .
These speculations must await further study; for now we merely note that the use of
R e a c t i v e T o k e n s in c o n v e r s a t i o n m a y p r o v e t o b e h i g h l y c o n s i s t e n t w i t h s u c h c u l -
t u r e - s p e c i f i c i n t e r a c t i o n a l p h e n o m e n a as p o l i t e n e s s strategies.

6.3. English

In very broad terms, English could be said to occupy a position between Japanese
and Mandarin with respect to Reactive Token use. The relatively high frequency of
Reactive Tokens suggests a strongly interactional style with numerous reactions on
t h e p a r t o f t h e n o n - p r i m a r y s p e a k e r . R e a c t i v e T o k e n s a r e f r e q u e n t mad o f t e n o c c u r
within another speaker's turn. But the American interactive style differs from the
J a p a n e s e in that s p e a k e r s d o n o t u s u a l l y p r o v i d e R e a c t i v e T o k e n s until a p o i n t o f
g r a m m a t i c a l c o m p l e t i o n ; it d i f f e r s f r o m t h e M a n d a r i n in t h a t A m e r i c a n s d o n o t n e c -
e s s a r i l y w a i t u n t i l a C T R P h a s b e e n r e a c h e d b e f o r e t h e y r e a c t . R e a c t i v e T o k e n s in
our English data are often contentful, requiring a certain minimal amount of linguis-
tic p r o c e s s i n g , b u t t h e f a c t t h a t t h e y a r e u s u a l l y p r o d u c e d at p o i n t s o f g r a m m a t i c a l
c o m p l e t i o n m i n i m i z e s a n y p o t e n t i a l d i f f i c u l t y in p r o c e s s i n g t h e m .
 P . M . C l a n c y et al. / J o u r n a l o f P r a g m a t i c s 2 6 ( 1 9 9 6 ) 3 5 5 ~ 8 7 383

Based again on purely anecdotal accounts, we note that Americans are indeed
caught in the middle with respect to Japanese and Mandarin Reactive Tokens: they
tend to find Japanese RTs disruptive and even annoying, but the Mandarin paucity of
RTs somewhat unnerving, leaving them wondering what the listener is thinking.
Americans are not accustomed to Japanese-style 'midstream' affective support, but
miss the punctuating of a large number of their propositions, even non-final ones,
with a Reactive Token from the listener. Thus American non-primary speakers are
more actively involved than their Mandarin counterparts, but are nevertheless
expected to refrain from infringing on the primary speaker's on-going task of for-
mulating propositions. In terms of interactive style, then, Americans may stand at a
point somewhere between the high rapport of Japanese and the respectful deference
of Mandarin interactants.

7. C o n c l u s i o n s

In this study we have shown how a close examination of one interactional device,
the Reactive Token, can shed light on possible cross-linguistic differences in com-
municative strategies. A major finding is that differences from one conversation to
another in our data could be as great as differences across languages. Yet when these
differences are taken into account, we can still see patterns of usage which charac-
terize each language as opposed to the others.
We see our study as a first step towards a more systematic understanding of the
extent of possible variation from one language to another in the way people carry on
everyday conversations. One obvious question for further research relates to the fac-
tors underlying the variation in RT use across conversations within one language.
For example, what is it about the English 'HYPO" or the Japanese "OYAMA" con-
versations that leads to such a relatively low use of RTs? Since all the conversations
were among friends, relative status is not a likely factor; we speculate that a variety
of factors might be found to relate to differential use of RTs, such as content, num-
ber of speakers, or ethnic or regional 'style', as discussed in Tannen (1981a,b,c,
1982, 1984, 1987), but studies attempting to determine the role of such factors have
yet to be done.
Since our analysis has been primarily quantitative, we have not carried out the
type of detailed case-by-case analysis of RTs in a given language that would estab-
lish the sequential and organizational properties that almost certainly affect their fre-
quency and distribution, as suggested and demonstrated in, e.g., Goodwin (1986),
Goodwin and Goodwin (1992b), Jefferson (1984), and Schegioff (1982). We recog-
nize, of course, that such in-depth analyses are critical for an understanding of the
way RTs work in interaction and hope that our current project will provide partial
guidance for future research in this area. Thus starting from our results, we might ask
what sequential properties of conversations in these three languages could help
account for the more global differences suggested by our findings. For example, do
certain types of conversational sequences occur with different frequencies in differ-
ent cultures? Does conversation involving similar topics and participants exhibit dif-
384 P . M . C l a n c y e t al. / J o u r n a l o f P r a g m a t i c s 2 6 ( 1 9 9 6 ) 3 5 5 - 3 8 7

ferent sequential organization in different cultures? We hope that our quantitative

approach will soon be complemented by more qualitative case-by-case analyses of
Reactive Tokens across different cultures.
We also anticipate further research to determine the range of functions that RTs
serve from one language to another, including the types of functions that have been
discussed as 'assessments' (C. Goodwin, 1986; M. Goodwin, 1980; Goodwin and
Goodwin, 1987, 1992a,b), and 'continuers' (Schegloff, 1982). And we would wel-
come further research showing how such findings could be incoporated into our
understanding of the ways in which languages are learned and taught.
What we hope to have shown is that such cross-linguistic comparisons are feasi-
ble and can begin to open new lines of inquiry into conversational strategies. While
our cross-cultural interpretations of the data await confirmation from further
r e s e a r c h , it i s c l e a r t h a t c r o s s - l i n g u i s t i c a n a l y s i s o f R e a c t i v e T o k e n s c a n m a k e a
valuable contribution to our understanding of conversational interaction.

Appendix: Symbols for discourse transcription from Du Bois (1991) and Du

B o i s e t al. ( 1 9 9 3 )

Units
Intonation unit {carriage return]
Truncated intonation unit
Word ~space "
Truncated word

Speakers
S p e a k e r i d e n t i t y / t u r n start
Speech overlap [ ]*

Transitional continuity
Final
Continuing
Appeal

Lengthening

Pause
Long
Short ° °

Vocal noises
Vocal noises ()
Alveolar click (TSK)
Inhalation (H)

Quality
QuaLity <Y Y>
 P . M . C l a n c y et al. / J o u r n a l o f P r a g m a t i c s 2 6 ( 1 9 9 6 ) 3 5 5 - - 3 8 7 385

T r a n s c r i b e r "s p e r s p e c t i v e
Uncertain hearing <X X>

* Certain brackets are indexed with numbers to clarify which speech overlaps with which.

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