Fact · Dictation
In a corpus of task-oriented conversations, disfluency rates were higher when speakers discussed abstract figures, which the authors read as an increase in planning difficulty.
Checked against its source on October 16, 2026
In the source's own words
“disfluency rates were higher both when speakers acted as directors and when they discussed abstract figures, confirming that disfluencies are associated with an increase in planning difficulty”
Disfluency rates in conversation: effects of age, relationship, topic, role, and gender, Bortfeld H et al., Language and speech, 2001, Abstract.
Open the original (DOI 10.1177/00238309010440020101)- What it measures
- Pairs of speakers took part in a referential communication task. The corpus also varied age, task role, topic domain, the relationship between speakers and gender.
- What it does not show
- Conversation, not dictation or writing, so it is an analogy for dictated speech. The paper reports rates in its corpus, not a figure to apply to any particular dictated text.