<?xml version="1.0" standalone="yes"?>
<Paper uid="W94-0321">
  <Title>Recognizing Digressive Questions During Interactive Generation *</Title>
  <Section position="2" start_page="0" end_page="0" type="abstr">
    <SectionTitle>
i
Abstract
</SectionTitle>
    <Paragraph position="0"> In expository discourse, people sometimes ask questions that digress from the purpose of the discussion.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="1"> A system that provides interactive explanations and advice must be able to distinguish pertinent questions from questions that digress. It must also be able .to recognize questions that are incoherent. These types of questions require different treatment. Pertinent questions must be answered to achieve the discourse ~ phr~ ~ pose. If the user asks a digressive question, the sys-* tem may need to shift the focus of the discussion back ' to the original-purpose. Incoherent questions signal a more serious misunderstanding that requires clarification and repair.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="2"> The Interactive Discourse Planner (IDP) is designed to plan text to describe and/or justify a domain plan interactively. As a testbed, IDP plans text to discuss driving routes. IDP uses questions from the user to recognize how to extend its own text plan in a way that both satisfies its listener and achieves the system's discourse goal. In the process of recognizing ways to expand its own text plan, IDP can detect three types of digressions that the user can initiate with a question.</Paragraph>
  </Section>
class="xml-element"></Paper>