An Exploration of the Diversity of Natural Argumentation in Instructional Texts

Instructional texts consist of sequences of instructions designed in order to reach an objective. The user must follow step by step the instructions in order to reach the results expected. In this short paper, we explore the different facets of natural argumentation used in such texts. Our study is based on an extensive corpus study, and within a language generation perspective. 1 General typology of instructional texts Instructional texts, also equivalently called procedural texts, consist of a sequence of instructions, designed with some accuracy in order to reach an objective (e.g. assemble a computer). Procedural texts explain how to realize a certain goal by means of actions which are at least partially temporally organized. Another feature is that procedural texts tend to minimize the distance between language and action. Plans to realize a goal are made as immediate and explicit as necessary, the objective being to reduce the inferences that the user will have to make before acting, and therefore potential errors or misunderstandings. Texts are thus oriented towards action, they combine instructions with icons, images, graphics, etc. In our perspective, procedural texts range from apparently simple cooking receipes to large maintenance manuals (whose paper versions are measured in tons e.g. for aircraft maintenance). They also include documents as diverse as teaching texts, medical notices, social behavior recommendations, directions for use, do-it-yourself and assembly notices, itinerary guides, advice texts, savoir-faire guides, etc. The diversity of procedural texts, their objectives and the way they are written is the source of a large variety of natural arguments. We briefly present them in this paper. This paper basically relates the structure of instructional texts as they are in French. English translations of examples are just glosses, they are given when space constraints permit. We believe that besides language realization variants, most of the characteristics we present here are language neutral. This study is based on a extensive corpus study, within a language production perspective. This approach allows us to integrate logical, linguistic (e.g. (Moschler, 1985), (Anscombre et al. 1981)) and philosophical views of argumentation. It is basically linguistic and conceptual. 2 Procedural texts and argumentation 2.1 General considerations Procedural texts are specific forms of discourse, satisfying constraints of economy of means, accuracy, etc. They are in general based on a specific discursive logic, made up of presuppositions, causes and consequences, goals, inductions, warnings, anaphoric networks, etc., and more psychological elements (e.g. to stimulate a user). The goal is to optimize a logical sequencing of instructions and make the user feel safe and confident with respect to the goal(s) he wants to achieve (e.g. clean an oil filter, learn how to organize a customer meeting). Procedural texts, from this point of view, can be analyzed not only just as sequences of mere instructions, but as efficient, one-way (i.e. no contradiction, no negotiation) argumentative discourses, designed to help a user to reach a goal, making the best decisions (see e.g. (Amgoud et al. 2001, 2005)). This type of discourse contains a number of facets, which all are associated in a way to argumentation. Procedural discourse is informative, narrative, explicative, descriptive, injunctive and sometimes figurative. Given a certain goal, it is also of much interest to compare or contrast the means used by different authors, possibly for different audiences. Producing explanations is a rather synthetic activity whose goal is to use the elements introduced by knowledge explicitation mechanisms to induce generalizations, subsumptions, deductions, relations between objects or activities and the goals to reach. Explanation, a form of argumentation, does provide a motivation and an internal coherence to procedural text. This is particularly visible in the lexical choices made and in the choice of some constructions, including typographic: procedural discourse is basically interactive: it communicates, teaches, justifies, explains, warns, forbids, stimulates, evaluates. 2.2 The art of writing efficient procedural texts The author of procedural texts must consider three dimensions (Donin et al., 1992): (1) cognitive: notions referred to must be mastered and understood by the target users, (2) epistemic: take into account, possibly to deny them, the beliefs of those users, and (3) linguistic: use an appropriate language, adjust accuracy, technical level, complexity of sentences and paragraphs, visual and typographic structure of the text. The tonality of the text must be adjusted, depending on style and the domain: didactic, polemic, with a moral dimension, etc. The producer of procedural texts starts from a number of assumptions or presuppositions about potential users, about their knowledge, abilities and skills, but also about their beliefs, preferences, opinions, ability to generalize and adapt (to adapt instructions to their own situation, which is never exactly the one described in the procedure), perception of generic situations, and ability to follow discursive processes. The producer of procedural texts has then, from this basis, to re-enforce or weaken presuppositions, to specify some extra knowledge and know-how, possibly beliefs or opinions. He has to convince the reader that his text will certainly lead to the success of the target goal, modulo the restrictions he includes. Procedural texts are in general highly structured and modular. They exhibit a particularly rich micro-rhetorical structure integrated into the syntactic-semantic structures of instructions. Procedural texts are a difficult exercise to realize. For example the must make linear, because of language constraints, actions which may have a more complex temporal or causal structure. Connectors and referents contribute to implement this linearity. Texts are also expected to be locally and globally coherent, with no contradictions, and no space for hesitation or negotiation. In most types of procedural texts, in particular social behavior, communication, etc. Procedural discourse has two dimensions: an explicative component, constructed around rational and objective elements, and a seduction component whose goal is (1) to encourage the user, (2) to help him revise his opinions, (3) to enrich the goals and the purposes, by outlining certain properties or qualities or consequences of a certain action or prevention. Another important feature, which is rather implicit, is the way instructions or groups of instructions are organized and follow each other, and both the logic (objective aspect) and the connotations (subjective aspects) that underlie this organization (sequential, parallel, concurrent, conditional, etc.). 3 A discursive analysis of procedural texts