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Types of strategies expressing negation

2.3 Negation Strategies of Mandarin-speaking Children 16

3.3.2 Types of strategies expressing negation

While children voice their inability to show their physical incapability, they deliver epistemic negation to express their lack of certain kinds of knowledge.

Excerpt 7 is an instance of epistemic negation found in our data.

Excerpt 7.

*MOT: 你們班每個小朋友都已經會打電話了嗎?

‘ Do all your classmates know how to make a phone call? ’

*YOU: 不知道. 

‘ I don’t know. ’

3.3.2 Types of strategies expressing negation

We have found ten types of strategy that children used to convey negation. Six types are adopted from the schema of Eisenberg and Garvey 1981, and three types are from previous study of Taiwanese children (Wang 2007 and Wu 2010). One new strategy, appealing, was added in the present study in order to serve for diversified semantic meanings of negation. The strategies are grouped into two divisions: direct and indirect. Direct strategies include direct negation and insistence, and indirect strategies are account, nonverbal, correction, temporizing, challenge, countering move, partial agreement, and appealing.

1. Direct negation

This type of negation is usually short and concise in that it only contains obvious negative words and keyword(s) that are necessary for the perceiver to know.

Excerpt 8.

*MOT: 那你去會不會怕怕的?

‘ Are you afraid of being in the Ferris wheel? ’

*KUO: 不會. 

‘ No. ’

Sometimes children would repeat their direct negation within one negation turn, as demonstrated in the following excerpt.

We would code such data as the repetition of direct negation, and interpret it as direct negation with an aggressive position.

2. Insistence

This type of response functions as supporting children’s original plan or goals through emphasizing their own wants or desire. It may be a repetition of the speaker’s former direct negation (exactly or by paraphrasing it without increasing or decreasing directness) or may strengthen it with a simple yes or no (Eisenberg, 1981). Since this strategy simply repeats children’s direct negation in their last negation turn as a reply to the mother’s re- request, insistence and direct negation are both categorized as direct strategy.

Excerpt 10.

This type of negation supplies a related reason or explanation to support the children’s claim or stance.

This type of negation contains children’s winning or typical body languages that delivered negation like head shaking or sticking out one’s tongue.

Excerpt 12. utterances to be wrong, but also gives information the child believed to be true or correct. This type of strategy sometimes leads by 我說 wo shuo ‘I said…’, or 我 是說 wo shi shuo ‘What I said is…’.

Excerpt 13.

*LEE: 我們好有創意喔.

‘ We are very creative. ’

‘ It is you claiming yourself as being creative. ’

*LEE: <我說> [<] 我們兩個都有很創意. 

‘ I said “both of us” are creative. ’

6. Temporizing

This type of negation procrastinates the immediateness of carrying out certain action. evidence for it, while at the same time implying the inaccuracy of the previous view (Lin 1999, Muntigl & Turnbull 1998).

previous utterance, and usually having a very similar structure to it.

Excerpt 16.

*MOT: 唷 -: 你是真的看的懂 [= 時鐘] 嗎?

‘ Wow, do you truly know how to interpret the clock? ’

*QIN: 假的. 

‘ Fake. ’

9. Partial agreement

This type of negation is given when the child does not fully agree or disagree with the preceding proposition or proposal.

Excerpt 17. excerpt from a child using this strategy to express being physically incapable to take Lego apart.

Excerpt 18.

*QIN: /eh/ # 媽媽 [% standing up and walking to MOT].

‘ Hey, mom. ’

*MOT: 嘿 # 怎麼樣?

立 政 治 大 學

N a tio na

l C h engchi U ni ve rs it y

‘ What’s up? ’

*QIN: 你幫我 [% handing his mom a toy]. 

‘ Help me with that. ’

Figure 1. The framework of negation strategies analysis

Negation strategies

Direct strategies Indirect strategies

Direct negation Insistence

Account Nonverbal Correction Temporizing

Challenge Countering move Partial agreement

Appealing

In this chapter, children’s expression of negation is examined. Firstly in section 4.1, children’s negation meanings, forms, and the mappings of these two variables are displayed and analyzed with supportive excerpts. In section 4.2, the negation of female children and male children are compared.

4.1 Children’s expression of negation

The following subsections will present and analyze all negation meanings children delivered (section 4.1.1), all strategic forms found in children’s negation (section 4.1.2), and the mappings between meanings and forms (section 4.1.3).

4.1.1 Semantic meanings of children’s negation

We identified 812 negations from four target children in 8 hours of observation, averaging 101.5 negations per hour. The distribution of their negation in each semantic meaning is presented in Table 4.

Table 4. The frequency of use of each semantic meaning in the total sample.

Negative functions Number of tokens Percentage (%)

Denial 389 47.9%

Among seven negation meanings, denial is the most common negation in our data base (n= 389, 47.9%), and rejection takes half of the rest (n= 233, 28.7%). Epistemic

comprised 7% of all negative utterances, prohibition 4.9%, inability 4.7%, non-occurrence 3.8%, and nonexistence 3%.

Being the majority of children’s negation, denial can be found in many kinds of contexts in which the mother and the child have disagreements about things. In our data, the disagreement may be mother’s comments (both negative and neutral comments), or matters of fact. When this happened, the mother usually would not compromise at first. In excerpt 1, the mother asserted the fact that the child ate all the bread up the previous day. Although the child denied this in the following turn, the mother further gave reason to support her original assertion. Then even though the child denied it for the second time, the mother repeated the cause again. It was not until the third time of the child’s denial that the mother got out of the argument by dropping the issue.

Excerpt 1. (MOT: the mother, QIN: the child)

*MOT: 可是家裡沒有麵包.

‘But we don’t have any bread at home.’

*QIN: 有 [= shouting] ! 

children’s subjective experiences, such as assumptions about children’s knowledge, feelings, plans decisions, or children’s imaginary world, children’s denial seems to be more acceptable to mothers. For instance, in excerpt 2, when the child was playing with his bricks and built an item, the mother began to guess what the child had made.

Her first guess was a flower, which the child denied with a simple no. The mother did not provide any further reason to support her original assertion, but gave up on her original assertion and made other guesses. In our excerpt, children’s single direct negations were even accepted three times, which is rare in our data of denial.

Excerpt 2. (MOT: the mother, QIN: the child)

*MOT: 一朵花.

Rejection is the second most occurring negative function in our data. Children may reject their mother when she inquires about their willingness to do certain actions or assumes their need for something. In excerpt 3, the mother saw the child

rummaging in chests and drawers for a tire of his toy car, and suggested the child turn the lights on so that he could see more clearly. But the child turned down his mother’s

advice with a single direct negation, and then insisted on searching without the lights on.

Excerpt 3. (MOT: the mother, QIN: the child)

*MOT: 你要不要開燈看比較清楚?

‘Do you want the lights turned on so that you can see more clearly?’

*QIN: 不要. 

Rejection also appears after mother’s directives in which children are requested to perform an action, confronted by things they dislike, or after being threatened. In the following excerpt, the mother and child were having noodles and soup for their lunch.

Since the girl kept watching television and lingered over her noodles, she was warned that if she does not eat faster, the mother would drink up her soup before she finished her noodles. To oppose her mother’s threats, the girl whined over her grievance.

Excerpt 4. (MOT: the mother, LEE: the child)

*MOT: 快一點啦.

‘Eat faster.’

*MOT: 你吃太慢等一下那碗就給我喝.

‘If you keep eating slowly, I will drink up your soup in advance.’

*LEE: /hm/ -: [= Expressing her grievance with whining]! 

Epistemic occurs when children are aware of their lack of certain knowledge.

Sometimes it may be led by their mother’s inquiry about whether the child possesses some specific knowledge or not. In our data we also found that if the child admits not possessing some kind of knowledge, the mother usually gives hints to channel the child to the correct answer. In excerpt 5, the mother and the child were sand painting together but they ran out of white sand. The mother came up with an idea which was to use salt as a substitute and provided inklings on the shape, size, and the context of using salt.

Excerpt 5. (MOT: the mother, LEE: the child)

*MOT: 啊我知道了白色不夠可以拿甚麼?

‘I got it! What can we use to substitute for white sand?’

*LEE: 不知道. 

‘Small particles of white color, what is it?’

我煮飯在用的阿.

‘I add it when I’m cooking.’

是甚麼?

‘What is it?’

Prohibition and Inability account for 10% of our data. Prohibition takes place as a merely preventive exhort. It emerges mostly when the child hears the mother

立 政 治 大 學

N a tio na

l C h engchi U ni ve rs it y

announce bringing about an action that the child did not want, or saw the mother act as if she were about to carry out an unwanted action. There were also fragmentary occurrences of prohibition when the mother asked the target child for permission to perform some actions. Inability was expressed when the child failed to achieve goals of herself or her mother. Sometimes it is also led by the mother’s inquiry about whether the child possesses a certain kind of ability. The less occurring semantic meanings are nonexistence and non-occurrence. These categories usually occur after children find an unfulfilled action or the disappearance of someone or something, mostly here and now.

4.1.2 Meaning-form mappings of children’s negation

Table 5 displays the frequency of the number of strategies children used in one negation.

Table 5. Frequency of the number of strategies in one response of negation

Number of strategies N %

One 684 84.2%

Two 118 14.5%

Three 10 1.2%

Total 812 100.00%

Most of the negations involved the use of only one strategy in a response (n= 684, 84.2%) while only 15.8% (n= 128) of whole samples were composed of the

combination of two to three different strategies. These results showed that children’s negations tend to be simple and short, which accords with the previous studies (e.g.

Wu, 2010; Yang, 2003; Jong, 2012). In the following two subsections, we’ll look at the single negation strategy first, then the minority, combination.

Table 6 below listed the number and frequency of direct and indirect strategy in children’s single negation.

Table 6. The distribution of children’s direct and indirect strategy

Types Total %

Direct strategy 335 49.0 %

Indirect strategy 349 51.0 %

Total 684 100.00%

In children’s one-strategy negation, indirect strategy is the majority (n= 349, 51

%), but direct strategy also took a quantity of it (n= 335, 49%). That is, in mother-child interaction, children quite evenly use direct and indirect strategy;

indirect strategy was used only slightly more than direct strategy. Comparing this proportion of indirect strategy to direct strategy with previous study examining peer interaction, children of this age seem to convey their negation differently when facing different interactants. In previous research (Jong, 2012) that examined 5-year-old Mandarin children in peer interaction, children tend to use indirect strategy (n= 172, 67.45 %) instead of direct strategy (n= 83, 32.55%) when refusing peers. Table 7 presents all direct and indirect strategies children applied in their one-strategy negation.

Table 7. Frequency of Children’s single negation strategy

Types Total %

立 政 治 大 學

N a tio na

l C h engchi U ni ve rs it y

Temporizing 43 6.3%

Countering move 40 5.8%

Challenge 26 3.8%

Appealing 25 3.7%

Partial agreement 23 3.4%

Total 684 100.00%

Among children’s single strategy, one direct strategy, direct negation, was frequently chosen (n= 277, 40.5%). Children used direct negation to express all kinds of negation meanings, and over half of children’s direct negation were clustered in denial and rejection (n= 169, 61 %), which is shown in the next table. Except for direct negation, two types of indirect strategy were rather common in children’s negation as well; namely, nonverbal (n= 71, 10.4%) and account (n= 64, 9.4%). Then were one direct strategy and one indirect strategy, insistence (n=58, 8.5%) and

correction (n=57, 8.3%). However, children’s usage of strategies varied remarkably in semantic meanings of negation. Table 8 on the next page unfolds all types of single strategy in denial, rejection, epistemic, inability, non-occurrence, prohibition, and nonexistence respectively.

立 政 治 大 學

N a tio na

l C h engchi U ni ve rs it y

Table 8. Distribution of the semantic meanings of children’s negation served by single strategy Meaning

Strategy Denial Rejection Epistemic Inability Non-

occurrence Prohibition Non-

existence Total Direct negation 108 (35.5) 61 (29.2) 31 (58.5) 19 (51.4) 25 (83.3) 16 (59.3) 17 (70.8) 277 (40.5)

Insistence 21 (6.9) 35 (16.7) 2 (7.4) 58 (8.5)

Direct strategy 129 (42.4) 96 (45.9) 31 (58.5) 19 (51.4) 25 (83.3) 18 (66.7) 17 (70.8) 335 (49) Nonverbal 23 (7.6) 38 (18.2) 7 (13.2) 1 (2.7) 1 (3.7) 1 (4.2) 71 (10.4)

Account 22 (7.2) 29 (13.9) 2 (3.8) 6 (16.2) 1 (3.3) 4 (14.8) 64 (9.4)

Correction 54 (17.8) 1 (0.5) 2 (7.4) 57 (8.3)

Temporizing 10 (3.3) 31 (14.8) 1 (1.9) 1 (3.7) 43 (6.3)

Countering move 34 (11.2) 6 (2.9) 40 (5.8)

Challenge 18 (5.9) 7 (3.3) 1 (3.7) 26 (3.8)

Appealing 11 (20.8) 8 (21.6) 6 (25.0) 25 (3.7)

Partial agreement 14 (4.6) 1 (0.5) 1 (1.9) 3 (8.1) 4 (13.3) 23 (3.4) Indirect strategy 175 (57.6) 113 (54.1) 22 (41.5) 18 (48.6) 5 (16.7) 9 (33.3) 7 (29.2) 349 (51)

Total 304 (100.0) 209 (100.0) 53 (100.0) 37 (100.0) 30 (100.0) 27 (100. 0) 24 (100.0) 684 (100.0)

Comparing direct and indirect strategy in each negation meaning, we can see that denial and rejection were the only two meanings that were conveyed with more indirect strategy. These two meanings shared the same set of strategies, although in a fairly different distribution.

When delivering the meaning of denial, children occasionally give a single ‘no’

directly (n= 108, 35.5%). In our observation, direct negation in denial was less likely to be questioned or requested for a reason than in rejection (only one exception out of 108 occurred in our data). In other instances, they also correct their mother’s assertion (n= 54, 17.8%) or give the opposite of their mother’s assertion (n= 34, 11.2%). Note that correction and countering moves are different in that the former one is a more flexible and open-ended response while the latter one is one or the other and the exact opposite from the mother’s assertion. Excerpt 6 demonstrates children’s countering move in denial. At the beginning the child tried to flatten a pile of folded towels and kept pressing it, and then the mother told him to stop since it was already flat. The child then gave a countering move by copying the structure of his mother’s previous utterance and replacing the adjective into a contrary one, which is the basic structure of children’s countering move.

Excerpt 6. (MOT: the mother, QIN: the child)

*QIN: 我把他壓平一點啊.

‘I was pressing it to make it flatter.’

*MOT: 不用壓 [= laughing].

Correction was only utilized in rejection, denial, and prohibition, and it was very

concentrated in denial (n= 54, 94.7%). In accord with previous findings, correction in our data corrects the mother’s wrong (from the perspective of the child) inference, comment, cognition towards something, or slip of the tongue. Along with that, we have found some interesting usage of this strategy in children’s negation. Sometimes, it serves for children’s sophistry for themselves. As in excerpt 7, the mother

prohibited YOU from playing on the computer, but YOU debated with the correction that it is playing chess (on the computer, of course) instead of playing on the

computer.

Excerpt 7. (MOT: the mother, YOU: the child)

*MOT: 不可以玩電腦.

‘ You can’t play on the computer. ’

*YOU: 那不叫玩電腦那叫下棋. 

‘ It is not playing on the computer, it’s playing chess. ’

*MOT: 是 [% nodding].

‘ It is playing on the computer. ’

*YOU: 不是.

‘ No. ’

Other times, children don’t really mean to correct what their mother had said, and are just using this strategy to play tricks with language instead.

Excerpt 8. (MOT: the mother, LEE: the child)

*MOT: 快點.

Besides direct negation, correction, and countering moves, children also used their body language (n= 23, 7.6%) and explanation (n= 22, 7.2%) to deny. Children’s nonverbal strategies in denial mostly were head shaking following their mother’s yes-no question or tag question, and they would give a reason or explanation when facing their mother’s assertion or suspicion. While direct negation was the most frequently used strategy of children’s denial (n= 108, 35.5%), the other direct strategy, insistence, only took 6.9 % (n= 21) of children’s denials, and it always occurred when mothers tried to convince and persuade their children to agree with some fact or assumption. Challenge and partial agreement shared a small part of children’s denial (n= 32, 10.5%), but children used these two strategies even less in other negation meanings.

As for rejection, children seldom reject their mother by saying ‘no’ directly (n=

61, 29.2 %). Unlike direct negation in denial, if children reject their mother with single direct negation, sometimes they would be asked for a reason. In excerpt 9, mother asked LEE to put away the yugioh cards after they played it for several rounds.

The request was rejected with a single direct negation by LEE, which drew the mother to request a reason. Instead of providing an appropriate reason, LEE persisted in her original response by giving another simple no, and brought her mother to stick to her request for a reason as well.

Excerpt 9. (MOT: the mother, LEE: the child)

*MOT: 遊戲王卡收一收啦.

‘ Put away yugioh cards. ’

*MOT: 好不好?

‘ Ok? ’

*LEE: 不好.

Besides, we also found that with children’s direct negation of rejection, sometimes mitigated devices were added -- both physically (i.e. pouting) or linguistically. In the following excerpt, KUO and her mother were dressing a toy doll. The dress and decorations were almost done, and then the mother asked KUO for advice about which shoes to put on the toy doll. Instead of voicing her subjective rejection of putting shoes on the doll in language such as 我不要穿鞋鞋 wo bu yao chuan xie xie

‘ I don’t want to put shoes on her ’ , she said 我們不要穿鞋鞋 wo men bu yao chuan xie xie ‘ Let’s not put shoes on her ’ to make it sounds less self-willed.

Excerpt 10. (MOT: the mother, KUO: the child)

*MOT: 她這件是配什麼鞋鞋?

At other times, they show their rejection by shaking their head or shoulders, whining, kicking at random, or doing what their mother has forbid them to do (n= 38, 18.2 %).

This strategy had the second largest pool of children’s negation in our data, and it mainly appeared in rejection. In previous research, it is commonly seen that children reject with nonverbal strategies such as whining, shaking their head, or sticking out their tongue. In our study, we found that children also deliberately undertake actions to deliver their rejection of taking orders. In the following excerpt, the child left his seat and put a cup back in the cupboard while having lunch. He was thought to keep on having his meal after he put it back, but the boy began to put other cups in order instead. His mother at first urged the child to finish what he had been doing and get back to the dining table, but the boy deliberately slowed his action. Then his mother suggested him to stop since the cups were fine, but the child did not stop until the fifth time of his mother’s hustle.

Excerpt 11. (MOT: the mother, YOU: the child)

*MOT: 快點.

Insistence appeared nearly as frequently as nonverbal strategy does in rejection (n= 35,

16.7 %). This direct strategy that gives the mother her own wants and needs is

different from the other direct strategy in that it only took 8.5% of children’s negation.

It was used to express denial and prohibition, but mainly occurred to deliver rejection.

Hsieh (2009) states that “both self-repeats and other-repeats can be used to double up the illocutionary force, i.e., to do emphasis or to do persuasion, by means of repeating the linguistic form….The increase of the form adds up to the increase of the

Hsieh (2009) states that “both self-repeats and other-repeats can be used to double up the illocutionary force, i.e., to do emphasis or to do persuasion, by means of repeating the linguistic form….The increase of the form adds up to the increase of the