Ladder Instant Messages: Voice Messages The data for the Ladder Voice Messages corpus belongs to the LADDER web project and was collected in 2023 as a task of the CertIt exam in Rome. The corpus consists of voice messages in Italian from learners of Italian. Along with the messages, metadata were also registered giving sociolinguistic information about the informant (age, gender, place of birth, native language, profession, etc.). The voice messages were collected as part of the CERTIT (Italian language certificate for foreigners) examinations at level B1 at the University Roma Tre. All the participants that scored at least 60% of the summed score in the reading, listening and writing section and at least 60% of the score in the speaking section have proven to have reached level B1 according to the CEFR. However, it should be noted that participants who have reached a very high score might already exceed level B1. Moreover, participants who failed the exam might still have reached 60% of the score in the speaking section, and consequently the level of their speaking skills can differ from their reading, listening and writing skills. The voice messages for non native speakers were elicited with the help of three DCTs (discourse completion tasks) that prompt different speech acts: refusal, cancellation and excuse. The refusal is directed at a boss (high social distance), the cancellation at a friend (low social distance) and the excuse at a superior (high social distance). In a second step, the recorded voice messages were transcribed according to a simplified system based on the conventions by Jefferson (2004). The transcripts of the collected voice messages amount to 14,322 tokens. The prompts were presented in Italian as follows: Scenario 1: Ricevi dal/la tuo/a superiore un messaggio. Dice che domani c'è una scadenza importante e chiede se per caso saresti in grado di restare oggi in ufficio oltre l'orario. Non vuoi restare in ufficio oltre il normale. Cosa dici?  Engl. Translation Scenario 1: You receive a message from your boss. It says that there is an important deadline tomorrow and he/she asks if by any chance you would be able to stay in the office today beyond your regular working hours. You don't want to stay in the office beyond normal hours. What do you say? Scenario 2: Cinque giorni fa hai promesso ad un/a amico/a che questa sera sareste andati/e al cinema assieme. Però hai cambiato idea. Cosa dici?  Engl. Translation Scenario 2: Five days ago you promised a friend that tonight you would go to the movies together. However, you changed your mind. What do you say? Scenario 3: Tra un’ora hai un colloquio importante con un tuo superiore. Ti accorgi che non potrai essere puntuale. Cosa dici?  Engl. Translation Scenario 3: In an hour you have an important interview with one of your superiors. You realize you won't be able to be on time. What do you say? The voice messages for native speakers were elicited with the online Software Gorilla in 2022: The following promts (Italian followed by English Translation): 1. Italian: Sei in Erasmus in Italia. Avete creato una chat con 10 compagni di corso. Hai perso la tua tessera della biblioteca e vuoi chiedere se qualcuno ti può aiutare perché ti serve un libro entro domani...per esempio prestandoti la sua. Cosa dici? English: You are on an Erasmus exchange in Italy. You have created a chat with 10 classmates. You have lost your library card and want to ask if anyone can help you because you need a book by tomorrow...for example by lending you theirs. What do you say? 2. Italian: Ricevi questo messaggio da un amico/a che fa un seminario con te: "Ciao, sono a corto di tempo. Ho visto che hai preso 30 all'esame. Potresti darmi una mano e restare con me in biblioteca oggi?" Non vuoi aiutare il tuo amico. Come reagisci? English: You receive this message from a friend who is attending a seminar with you: "Hi, I'm short on time. I saw that you got a 30 on the exam. Could you give me a hand and stay with me in the library today?" You don't want to help your friend. How do you respond? 3. Italian: Cinque giorni fa hai promesso ad un/a amico/a che questa sera sareste andati al cinema assieme. Però hai cambiato idea. Cosa dici? English: Five days ago, you promised a friend that you would go to the cinema together tonight. But you have changed your mind. What do you say? 4. Italian: Tra un‘ora hai un appuntamento al cinema con un amico/un‘amica. Ti accorgi che non potrai essere puntuale. Cosa dici? English: In an hour, you have a movie date with a friend. You realize you won't be on time. What do you say? 5. Italian: Un/‘amico/a ti invita a cena a casa sui sabato prossimo. Ti dice che ci sarà una persona che tu non vuoi incontrare. Cosa dici? English: A friend invites you to dinner at their house next Saturday. They tell you that there will be someone there you do not want to meet. What do you say? 6. Italian: Sei al lavoro e hai smarrito il documento elettronico per entrare nel parcheggio. Sei nuovo in questo gruppo di lavoro e hai solo il numero del tuo diretto superiore. Gli mandi un messaggio per chiedergli se ti può aiutare. Cosa dici? English: You are at work and have lost the electronic document to enter the parking lot. You are new in this workgroup and only have the number of your direct supervisor. You send them a message asking if they can help you. What do you say? 7. Italian: Ricevi questo messaggio dal/la tuo/a superiore. "Gentile collega, domani c'è una scadenza importante. Per caso sarebbe in grado di restare oggi in ufficio oltre l'orario?" Non vuoi restare in ufficio oltre il normale. Cosa dici? English: You receive this message from your superior. "Dear colleague, there is an important deadline tomorrow. Would you be able to stay in the office beyond working hours today?" You do not want to stay in the office longer than usual. What do you say? 8 Italian: Cinque giorni fa hai promesso al/la tuo/a superiore che oggi saresti andato a una cena di lavoro. Però devi disdire. Cosa dici? English: Five days ago, you promised your superior that you would go to a work dinner today. But you have to cancel. What do you say? 9 Italian: Tra un‘ora hai un colloquio importante con un tuo superiore. Ti accorgi che non potrai essere puntuale. Cosa dici? English: In an hour, you have an important interview with your superior. You realize that you won't be on time. What do you say? For the transcriptions, a simplified version of the Jefferson system (see list) was adopted, which is frequently used in conversation analysis. (excerpt from KIParla): http://kiparla.it/il-corpus/#costruzione , Ascending intonation . Descending intonation : Prolonged sound (.) Brief pause >hello< Faster pronunciation Slower pronunciation [hello] Overlapping speech (hello) Text of difficult comprehension (transcriber's hypothesis) (xxx) Incomprehensible text ((laughs)) Non-verbal behavior = Prosodically joined units Reference  Jefferson, Gail (2004). Glossary of transcript symbols with an introduction. In Gene H. Lerner (Ed.), Conversation Analysis: Studies from the first generation (pp. 13–31). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.   Contact: Nicola.Brocca@uibk.ac.at Metadata Creator: Nicola Brocca, Elena Nuzzo, Diego Cortés Velásquez Research Discipline: Linguistics, Language Education, Second Language Acquisition Subject: Corpus of Computer-Mediated Communication for the Analysis of the Acquisition of Pragmalinguistic Competences in L1 and L2 Related Collections: Ladder Mail corpus, Ladder Written Messages corpus, DisDir corpus Available Since: 2024 Time of Data Collection: 2023