The Book of Tells (Peter Collett)[unlocked]

THE BOOK OF TELLS
to eliminate the effects of any number of yielding signals. 9
Turn-holding Tells
In order to hold on to the floor the speaker needs to give
the impression that he or she has lots more to say. This can
be done in several ways. It often involves the eyes. In a
two-person conversation the listener usually looks more
intently at the speaker than the speaker does at the listener.
One reason why speakers are less visually attentive than
listeners is because they need to marshal their thoughts
while they're talking, and they find it more difficult to do
this when they're faced with the distracting sight of the
listener. The other reason is that looking serves as a turnyielding
cue. So for the speaker who wants to continue
talking it's better not to look at the listener too much - it
might give the false impression that the speaker is about to
give up the floor.
From the speaker's point of view, the end of each
sentence represents a potential 'completion point' which
the listener may construe as the end of their turn. To continue
talking, the speaker needs to produce additional
signals to show that the end of the sentence doesn't mean
the end of the turn. The Dutch psychologist, Johanneke
Caspers, has discovered that speakers use speech melody
to indicate that they want to continue talking. To signal this
intention the speaker raises the pitch on the final stressed
syllable and maintains the pitch at this level until the next
pause. 10
The speaker can reinforce the impression that he intends
to continue talking by producing narratives in the form of
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