# Conversational Markers of Constructive Discussions

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/1604.07407 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/1604.07407/

## Key facts

- Cited by 17 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- First posted on arXiv 25 Apr 2016.

## Built on by (most cited first, 17 of 17)

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- [Measuring Conversational Uptake: A Case Study on Student-Teacher Interactions](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2106.03873/) (2021)
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- [I Beg to Differ: A study of constructive disagreement in online conversations](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2101.10917/) (2021)
- [Do Differences in Values Influence Disagreements in Online Discussions?](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2310.15757/) (2023)
- [An LLM Feature-based Framework for Dialogue Constructiveness Assessment](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2406.14760/) (2024)
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- [Revisiting Contextual Toxicity Detection in Conversations](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2111.12447/) (2021)
- [How to disagree well: Investigating the dispute tactics used on Wikipedia](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2212.08353/) (2022)
- [How Did We Get Here? Summarizing Conversation Dynamics](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2404.19007/) (2024)
- [Towards a Perspectivist Turn in Argument Quality Assessment](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2502.14501/) (2025)
- [What makes you change your mind? An empirical investigation in online group decision-making conversations](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2207.12035/) (2022)
- [Conversations Gone Awry, But Then? Evaluating Conversational Forecasting Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2507.19470/) (2025)
- [Time is On My Side: Dynamics of Talk-Time Sharing in Video-chat Conversations](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2506.20474/) (2025)
- [DeliChess: A Multi-party Dialogue Dataset for Deliberation in Chess Puzzle Solving](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2606.04987/) (2026)
- [Who Plays Which Role When? Communication Role Dynamics for Peer Recognition and Team Performance Prediction](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2606.28544/) (2026)
- [Adapting from Downturns: Prediction of Long-Term Conversational-Skill Development in Mental-Health Crisis Counselors](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2609.04350/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Group discussions are essential for organizing every aspect of modern life, from faculty meetings to senate debates, from grant review panels to papal conclaves. While costly in terms of time and organization effort, group discussions are commonly seen as a way of reaching better decisions compared to solutions that do not require coordination between the individuals (e.g. voting)---through discussion, the sum becomes greater than the parts. However, this assumption is not irrefutable: anecdotal evidence of wasteful discussions abounds, and in our own experiments we find that over 30% of discussions are unproductive. We propose a framework for analyzing conversational dynamics in order to determine whether a given task-oriented discussion is worth having or not. We exploit conversational patterns reflecting the flow of ideas and the balance between the participants, as well as their linguistic choices. We apply this framework to conversations naturally occurring in an online collaborative world exploration game developed and deployed to support this research. Using this setting, we show that linguistic cues and conversational patterns extracted from the first 20 seconds of a team discussion are predictive of whether it will be a wasteful or a productive one.