["... and the green watch again"--on the effect of the partner on completeness of recalled object names].

Abstract

Overspecified referential descriptions of objects contain attributes necessary for unambiguous object identification by a listener as well as additional attribute specifications. In a re-analysis of location data and a naming experiment it was demonstrated that approximately 50% of first-reference descriptions are overspecified, whereas follow-up descriptions of the same object tend to be shorter. There a lower degree of overspecification and a higher percentage of non-discriminative referential expressions was found. An influence of partner characteristics on the elaboration of noun phrases for first and follow-up reference could only be found with regard to non-discriminative expressions: There are significantly less secondary object references which do not contain sufficient information for children than for adults.