A Comparative Study On Topical Potential In Decision-Making Argumentative Discourses In Medical And Family Domains

Decision-making argumentative discourse refers to the interlocutor’s critical discussion of existing problems according to certain standards to find the optimal solution to the problem.This kind of discourse is often found out in medical domain and family domain.The former often involves the decision-making of the surgical plan,and the latter is present in the planning of family activities.In the argumentation stage,which topic the two sides choose to achieve the best decision-making effect is worth exploring.However,medical argumentation is relatively institutionalized while family argumentation is not subject to institutional conditions.There may be differences in topical potential in the argumentation stage in two domains on the macro-level.Based on James Paul Gee’s theory of the "seven building tasks" of language,this dissertation divides different types of topics into practice(activity),identity,politics,relationship,connection,and significance,sign system and knowledge and explores the similarities and differences of topical potential in the argumentation stage in family and medical domains.Reasons accounting for the similarities and differences from multiple perspectives are given and discussed.The specific subjects of and the distribution of different types of topics in the two domains are the main research purposes.The research questions are as follows:(1)what topics are in the argumentative conversations of decision-making in family and medical domains?(2)What are the similarities and differences in the distribution of different types of topics?Qualitative analysis is carried out to find specific subjects under different types of topics used in the argumentation stage in the two domains.Family discourses and medical discourses come from American sitcoms Modern Family and Grey the Intern respectively.Although argumentative dialogues are taken from the two sitcoms,they are highly close to real-life communication.Quantitative analysis is employed to discover the distribution of each type of topics.Types of topics in the two corpora are annotated based on theoretical framework first and then significant difference of each type is examined via Chi-square test.Discussions are given according to the results.Research shows practice(activity)type of topic is demonstrated from the decision-making and implementation of medical treatment and notification of medical matters in medical domain while the behaviors and choices on family activities in family domain;identity deals with the identity of doctors and patients in medical domain while the identity of parents and children in family domain;politics concerns doctors’ value and morality in medical domain but code of conduct in society and social values in in family domain;relationship lies in the doctor-patient relationship in medical domain while parent-child relationship in family domain;connection refers to personal experiences in both domains;significance refers to topics portrayed as important such as patients’health condition in medical domain while children’s emotion in family domain.Quantitative research has shown that practice(activity)and politics type of topics are used most in the two domains.The chi-square test results show that there is a significant difference in the distribution of practice(activity)type and relationship type in the two domains with the number of practice(activity)type higher and relationship type lower than those in family domain.Discussions are made in terms of three aspects:activity type,communicative domain and interlocutors’ social roles.This study points out that activity type,argumentative domain,and interlocutors’social role in the two domains are the factors that influence the strategic choice of topical potential by interlocutors.Therefore,it has theoretical significance for the study of strategic maneuvers in different contexts.At the same time,the research has enriched the quantitative research related to the pragma-dialectics.