Diachronic Change of Title in New Media Platform from the Perspective of Speech Accommodation Theory

Abstract

Speech Accommodation Theory, as a social psychological model of studying linguistic variation, has proposed by Howard Giles and his associates. Speech strategies in this theory consists of two components, namely, speech convergence and speech divergence. This study, as an empirical research, focuses on the diachronic change of title in new media platform. The results can be concluded as follows. First, the style of title in new media platform obeys the rules of upward convergence, especially when reader-preferences change rapidly. Second, readers’ language patterns do affectlanguage habits of new media, and administrators choose upward convergence strategies as feedbacks. Third, the convergenceis asymmetrical, with new media platforms struggle to adapt to readers language patterns whilereadersmaintain their language habits.