The current dataset is used in a methodological study on the use of distributional latent-variable modeling in ordinal language data analysis:



Sönning, Lukas, Fabian Vetter & Manfred Krug. 2026. Distributional latent-variable modeling of ordinal language data.


 

Description

This dataset contains information on the usage preferences of speakers of Maltese English with regard to 63 pairs of lexical expressions. These pairs (e.g. truck-lorry or realization-realisation) are known to differ in usage between BrE and AmE (cf. Algeo 2006). The data were elicited with a questionnaire that asks informants to indicate whether they always use one of the two variants, prefer one over the other, have no preference, or do not use either expression (see Krug and Sell 2013 for methodological details). Usage preferences were therefore measured on a symmetric 5-point ordinal scale. Data were collected between 2008 to 2023, as part of a larger research project on lexical and grammatical variation in varieties of English. The current dataset, which informs a methodological study on modeling strategies for ordinal data, include 777 speakers and 47,666 ratings in total. It also provides information about a number of socio-demographic variables, including gender and age. 

 

Questionnaire administration

The questionnaire used for data elicitation, which is included in this post ("lexical_questionnaire.pdf"), was administered in printed form and filled in with a pen. Data were mostly gathered by German university students, who approached (potential) informants and asked if they were willing to take part in an anonymous survey that would be used for scientific purposes only; no financial compensation was offered. Once informants gave their verbal consent to participate in the study, they would either fill in the questionnaire on their own, or they were assisted by the data collector. Participants were predominantly recruited in the streets of Malta, i.e. in various public places (e.g. parks, busses, university campus, etc.) as part of several field trips (between 2008 and 2023), each in connection with a university-level seminar on the varieties of English spoken and written in Malta. Prior to data acquisition, students received basic instructions on how to avoid (or handle) potentially problematic sitations, e.g. ensuring that respondents understood the task and the relevant meaning of lexical expressions (see "Explanation/comment" column in questionnaire), allowing informants to withhold sensitive biographical information, etc. 

 

Data and file overview



malta_lexical_distributional_LVM.tsv  tab-separated data table containing the ratings provided by the 777 informants

item_labels.tsv  tab-separated data table with information about the full set of 68 item pairs in the questionnaire

lexical_questionnaire.pdf  questionnaire used for data elicitation


 

Data-specific information for: item_labels.tsv

UTF-8-encoded, tab-separated data table with 69 rows and 5 columns. The columns represent the following variables:



item  item pair ID (links to file "malta_lexical_data_mixfabOF.tsv", which includes the rating data)

AmE_variant  the more/exclusively/traditionally American English variant

BrE_variant  the more/exclusively/traditionally British English variant

AmE_short  short(er) label for American English variant, used for plotting

BrE_short  short(er) label for British English variant, used for plotting


 

Data-specific information for: malta_lexical_distributional_LVM.tsv

UTF-8-encoded, tab-separated data table with 48,951 rows and 7 columns. The columns represent the following variables:



id  anonymized participant ID

year  year of data collection

age  age of participant in years

gender  self-reported gender of participant ("f", "m", "non-binary")

ratio  proportion of life spent in Malta

item  item pair ID

rating  numeric version of the rating provided by the participant



+2  I always use this (British English) expression

+1  I use this (British English) expression more often

0  I have no preference

-1  I use this (American English) expression more often

-2  I always use this (American English) expression




 

References

Algeo, John. 2006. British or American English: A handbook of word and grammar patterns. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Krug, Manfred & Katrin Sell. 2013. Designing and conducting interviews and questionnaires. In Manfred Krug & Julia Schlüter (eds.), Research methods in language variation and change, 69–98. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.