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Article published In: Pedagogical Linguistics
Vol. 4:2 (2023) ► pp.195–227

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The modal particle elicitation test

 | University of Münster
Published online: 4 March 2022
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https://doi.org/10.1075/pl.21018.rei
Abstract
German modal particles (MPs) show semantic, pragmatic, and syntactic peculiarities which make them specifically interesting for research on language processing. However, so far, there are no tests available that reliably elicit MPs in order to study their production in different groups of speakers. This paper presents the Modal Particle Elicitation Test – MoPET. Based on simple contexts and black and white drawings, it is the first test that elicits a wide range of MPs by incorporating the semantic, pragmatic, and syntactic peculiarities of MPs. The goal of this paper is to evaluate whether the test reliably elicits MPs in adult German L1 speakers, in order to use it for research on different speakers (e.g., patients and L1/L2 learners) in the future. Results of a pilot study with 27 adult native speakers of German demonstrate that the test reliably elicits a wide range of nineteen different MPs and a wide range of different sentence types that are strongly interconnected with the use of MPs. Crucially, each of the twelve critical scenes of the test elicited at least one MP, and each participant produced at least one MP, which also makes the test suitable for diagnostic purposes.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Background on modal particles
    • 2.1Semantic, pragmatic, and syntactic peculiarities of MPs
    • 2.2Existing tests in particle research and why they don’t meet the needs
      • 2.2.1Selection tests
      • 2.2.2Elicitation tests
  • 3.The Modal Particle Elicitation Test (MoPET)
    • 3.1Participants
    • 3.2Materials
      • 3.2.1The story
      • 3.2.2The pictures and the written context
      • 3.2.3The story completions (critical scenes)
    • 3.3Procedure
  • 4.Results
  • 5.Discussion and conclusions
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
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