Turnertype

Turnertype is a framework used to classify the different kinds of turns that occur in social interaction and interactive systems. The term is applied across fields such as sociolinguistics, discourse analysis, and human–computer interaction to describe how control of a conversation or task is managed and transferred between participants or agents.

Core categories commonly associated with turnertype include: initiating turns, which start topics or solicit responses; responding turns, which answer or react to a prior turn; backchannel turns, brief signals of attention or understanding like “okay” or “uh-huh”; clarifying turns, which seek or provide precision about what was said; continuing or elaborating turns, which expand on previous content; topic-shifting turns, which move the discussion to new topics; and interrupting turns, which seize the floor from another speaker to take control. Some analyses also distinguish closing turns that signal the end of a contribution or a transition to the next speaker.

Turnertype is typically identified through transcripts or interaction logs, using features such as duration, overlap, prosody, discourse markers, and syntactic structure. In practice, researchers apply turnertype to study conversational dynamics, collaboration patterns, and the design of dialogue systems. In user interfaces and voice assistants, recognizing turn types helps teams program more natural turn-taking behavior and reduce miscommunication.

Although widely used in various disciplines, turnertype is not a single standardized taxonomy; definitions and labels can vary by theoretical approach and application. See also turn-taking, conversation analysis, discourse markers, and dialogue systems.