The Use and Effect of Coherence Markers in Presidential Debates.
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2020-06-08
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en
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Abstract
Presidential debates can be pivotal to the outcome of the presidential election in the USA. For candidates a good performance calls for sound argumentation and coherent speech in order to
persuade the audience. Coherence can be created and supported by the use of connectives.
Very few studies have analysed the role of coherence markers, or connectives in political
debates. This study investigates whether individual politicians differ in their use of
connectives and whether there is a relation between the outcome of the debate and connective
use. A corpus of six (vice-)presidential debates was compiled from the years 2004, 2012 and
2016. 12 speakers were analysed. Results revealed individual differences in connective use
between speakers. Specifically, Barack Obama and Dick Cheney used significantly more
connectives than some of the other speakers, but not all. The distribution of connective types
showed that Paul Ryan used relatively less conjunction connectives (and, also, as well) and
relatively more cause (because, so, for) and synchronous connectives (as, before, then).
However, no significant differences were found between winners and losers of the debates. In
conclusion, some politicians can differ in connective use, but no relation was found between
winning a debate and connective use.
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Faculteit der Letteren