Name The Culprit

Name The Culprit tasks

In this task you have to answer the question:

Does the phrase highlighted in orange refer to an entity (person or other object) that has been mentioned before in this text?

If you think so, you should use your mouse to select the closest phrase(s) referring to that object. But note that some phrases do not refer at all, and some do not refer to persons/objects, but to properties of these entities; you should mark those interpretations as explained below if that's the case.

Phrases not mentioned before

This is the case when the phrase introduces in the text a new entity (person, object) not mentioned before. Read through the text for an earlier mention of the same entity. If you can't see one then the phrase should be classified as 'not mentioned before'. For example, suppose you're seeing the first sentence of a text:

Sherlink Holmes went to the shop.

Because this is the first sentence, you will not have seen any previous mention of the person "Sherlink Holmes", so you should click:

Phrase mentioned before

If, however, you think that the phrase refers to an entity that has been mentioned before, then you should use your mouse to select the most recent mention. For instance, if you're now seeing a bit more of the story in the previous example:

Sherlink Holmes went to the shop. It was closed.

and the phrase "it" is highlighted in orange, and you think that "it" refers to the same object as the earlier phrase "the shop", you should click on "the shop" to select it.

Note that the same entity may be mentioned several times. For instance, if the story above continues with:

Sherlink Holmes went to the shop. It was closed. It had a sign saying "Back in five minutes".

and this time the game asks you to interpret the second "it," there will be two earlier mentions of the shop to choose from, "the shop" and the first "It". In these cases, you should select the mention that is closest to the highlighted phrase (i.e., the first "It" in this case).

Note also that many phrases refer to more abstract 'entities' than persons or physical objects. For instance, in the following example:

Sherlink Holmes went to a party. It started at 6pm and went on for hours.

the phrase "it" refers to the party, which is an event rather than a concrete object.

You should be aware that the most recent mention of a person or an object may be 'nested' inside another phrase. Suppose you are seeing the following story:

Sherlink Holmes' favourite shop is Harrods. Yesterday he went there to buy some marmite, but it was closed.

In this text the phrase "Sherlink Holmes" is nested inside the phrase "Sherlink Holmes' favourite shop". If you click on the phrase "Sherlink Holmes," you'll see a pop-up menu appear, allowing you to choose between "Sherlink Holmes" and the phrase "Sherlink Holmes' favourite shop". Again, you should choose the appropriate phrase by clicking on it.

Finally, in some cases a (typically, plural) phrase refers to a set of objects that have been introduced separately. Consider for instance the following example:

Sherlink Holmes met the Queen. They chatted for an hour.

This phrase refers to both Sherlink Holmes and the Queen. In such cases, you should select two phrases: "Sherlink Holmes" and "the Queen".

In all these cases you make your selection in the text, then click on:

Non-referring phrases

Some phrases do not refer to anything, and are therefore called non-referring, for example:

It Rains!

"It" has no semantic content; it's there just because in English sentences have to have a subject. Another example would be:

There are lots of children here!

Again, the phrase "There" has no semantic content, and the sentence could be rewritten as "Lots of children are here!". Only the words "it" and "there" can be non-referring in this way, so watch out for them!

Phrases that are a property

Some phrases are not used to refer to an entity, but to provide additional information about an entity referred to by another noun phrase. For example, in the sentence:

Jon, the postman, delivered the letter

The phrase "the postman" is used to specify a property of Jon (his profession) rather than to indicate an object. Contrast the use of the very same phrase in the sentence where it is used to refer to a person:

The postman delivered the letter.

Other examples of phrases used to specify a property (type) of an entity rather than a separate entity include:

George is a man.

Jon was hired as a lecturer.

Many people think of their house as their castle.

Examples of phrases that are NOT used to specify a property of other entities include:

Jon has a cat.

Note that here we are talking about two different entities: the person Jon and his cat.

Massimo has a bad hip.

In this sentence "a bad hip" is a part of Massimo but doesn't specify what type of individual Massimo is therefore we consider these two distinct things.