AF ([info]autumnreverie) wrote in [info]linguaphiles,
@ 2008-10-05 15:20:00
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Language Change Survey
Final edit: Thanks to all who participated. I got some good data and some great feedback from you all that will help me in preparing the official survey for the full research venture. I'll keep you posted. :)

Hey everyone! I'm currently taking a seminar on language change in progress at NYU. We have to do a research project on emerging changes in a language (not necessarily English). Mine is actually going to focus on a new lexical item that I've heard cropping up among a number of English speakers.

I need to do a pilot study survey to see if my topic is viable, so would some of you mind taking a short survey to help me out? It's only like 10 questions and shouldn't take more than 5 minutes. You'll just be judging the acceptability of a few sample sentences.

Because it's a pilot, I just need about 12-18 participants, and I'm looking for people of all ages**, but specifically 30+* because I don't have many contacts in that age range hehe. I would appreciate your help! And I will definitely post again with the final results of my project in around December, if it ends up being a good study. :) Thanks guys!

*Edit: Thanks to all who have taken it so far! Now... any 40-and-over people willing to contribute? ;)

**Edit: I really appreciate everyone taking the survey, but at this point I would like to ask only people age 40 or over to take the survey. For those of you who are younger, just watch out for the full survey once I get the project going! :)

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[info]callunav
2008-10-05 07:53 pm UTC (link)
I took it. I thought it was an interesting and well-constructed survey overall, better than seems average for student work - not that I have a great deal of experience.

For at least one question, I regretted not having an option, "I would not know how to interpret this/I would not know what this meant/I don't know what someone would mean if they said/wrote this."* I chose the 'would not use, don't think others would use' option in those cases. However, I find that people often say things, especially in informal internet or TM settings, which I find confusing, so that wasn't exactly what I meant.

Good luck. I'm glad I was able to proved a 30+ response for you.


* Slash-marks included just for you.

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[info]autumnreverie
2008-10-05 08:05 pm UTC (link)
Thanks so much! Not only for taking the survey but for commenting. :) Apparently in the time I took to have some lunch after posting the link, about 16 people took it XD Awesome!

I appreciate your feedback on the available responses. I did kind of expect that that might happen, but your answer is fine and I will take that into account when reviewing the data. :)

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[info]glitteringlynx
2008-10-05 08:08 pm UTC (link)
Yeh, there was at least one instance where I thought, "That doesn't even make sense!"

So I decided the "I wouldn't use and don't think others would, either" option was best suited.

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[info]philena
2008-10-05 08:01 pm UTC (link)
I have one problem with the survey: sometimes you write "slash" and sometimes you write "/". There is no possible way to evaluate whether anyone would use that in spoken language. It's like asking if someone would ever say, "He's a *&%$@ idiot." It does not compute.

If you were trying to capture the difference between using "slash" and "/" in written language, perhaps you should make sure that the options involving speaking are marked "n/a" in questions using "/". Otherwise, you might confound your data because some people might interpret "/" as the same thing as "slash," and you'd lose the distinction between using the symbol and the word in written language.

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[info]tekalynn
2008-10-05 10:18 pm UTC (link)
That was my main concern. If you could clarify that, perhaps in a revised survey, I think that could really help your results.

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[info]glitteringlynx
2008-10-05 08:06 pm UTC (link)
I love quizzes, so I've gone ahead and answered. Unfortunately I'm just shy of 30, but I hope it will be of use, nontheless.

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[info]doire
2008-10-05 08:19 pm UTC (link)
I was confused. Was the "slash" meant to stand for a name and the "/" for the word pronounced, for me, depending on context, slash, stroke, div, or or?

Edited at 2008-10-05 08:20 pm UTC

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[info]ticktockman
2008-10-05 09:29 pm UTC (link)
I'm 48, and filled out the survey. Like some of the responders above, I had trouble deciding whether you meant to ask if a speaker would speak the word "slash" and if a writer would write the word "slash".

There were a few examples where the slash mark would be incorrect punctuation but I'd be perfectly happy seeing and using a colon.

*daha*

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[info]pauamma
2008-10-05 09:33 pm UTC (link)
Do technicalities count? (ie, I'm a straight male, so I don't picture myself saying anything about having a boyfriend, and I might use "and or" but not "and/or".)

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[info]autumnreverie
2008-10-05 09:35 pm UTC (link)
Haha good point. No, I probably should have asked if you would use the *construction* of the given sentences, not necessarily the contexts. :P

(Reply to this) (Parent)

[info]eve_prime
2008-10-06 02:59 pm UTC (link)
I take it you don't need any more over 40s.

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