Wednesday, October 28, 1998 at 02:13:33

I really am enjoying your fprc site. it is nice to know that others are interested in the subject. Personally, I would like to know what the most common fp's are. Do you know where I could find this information?

- EC

To be honest the answer to your question is relatively straightforward.  So straightforward, in fact, that little attention has actually been paid it by pause researchers. When it comes to unlexicalized FPs, what I call the 'open' form (i.e., 'uh') is by far the most common.  Even if you include all other types of hesitation phenomena (i.e., False Starts, Repeats, Self-corrections, etc.), Open Unlexicalized FPs come out on top.  However, this dominance may be slightly exaggerated by experimental design.  Few researchers count Lexicalized FPs ('well', 'you know' , 'like'), and even those who do count them conservatively (since not all instances of these expressions truly constitute filled pauses:  some are discourse markers, others are social interaction devices such as empathizers). However, even still, LFPs make up only a small fraction of all hesitation phenomena.  Some typical words in addition to the three previously noted which are often counted as LFPs are 'and', 'so', 'but' (these three often appearing with UFPs), 'say', 'really', and so on...  Some unobtrusive observation of your friends may reveal *many* more.  In fact, let me know if you notice some interesting ones!

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