Abstract:

The paper discusses the aspects of stress observed and examined on students' speeches delivered in students' mother tongue, Slovak. The research maps the intensity of stress during the performances, i.e. in the initial, medial and final phases. Generally, it seems that at the beginning of speech, speakers are usually under greater stress than at the end of the speech. The paper also identifies the intensity of prosodic features (voice and tempo of the speech) and somatic features (eye contact, gestures, postures and touches) and states which elements are affected the most. We study the topic from two points of view, comparing and discussing evaluation of students' performances (evaluations by their classmates) and students' self-evaluation (evaluation by speakers themselves). The differences in evaluation and self-evaluation confirm our assumptions that students are more critical to their own performances than to their classmates' ones. It also shows that there exists a different attitude to stress by listeners and speakers. For example, according to listeners' evaluation, the stress intensity in speakers' performances declines; on the contrary, following speakers' self-evaluation results, stress does not decline during speakers' performances, not even in the final phase of speech. The fact that speakers cannot cope with stress during their performances successfully indicates that students are not professional speakers, and there is much work for teachers in this area. Moreover, students are worried of any 'threat' situation during their speech (e.g. verbal failure, visible stress displays) and at the end of their speech they want to compensate their deficiencies to make a good impression on their listeners.

Keywords:

Stress aspects, speech, evaluation, self-evaluation, verbal features, non-verbal features.