Training of literature students in determining number of levels of perspective in a sentence
What is it about?
Perspective embedding ("I went to the store" is zero, "She thought I went to the store" is one, etc.) is an important aspect of literature. Our earlier work showed that more embedding (1-5) results in more reading time (except for 0, which was between 3 and 4). The judgments of level were ours; are those judgments reliable? We trained 12 literature students to make those judgments. Overall, there was excellent agreement. The differences, and the reasons for them, were also of interest. Perspective embedding can thus be treated as another aspect of literature for study.
Why is it important?
The amount of perspective embedding differs across authors and genres. Understanding this aspect of literature can help us understand why it is that fiction engages us.