Jove
Visualize
Contact Us
JoVE
x logofacebook logolinkedin logoyoutube logo
ABOUT JoVE
OverviewLeadershipBlogJoVE Help Center
AUTHORS
Publishing ProcessEditorial BoardScope & PoliciesPeer ReviewFAQSubmit
LIBRARIANS
TestimonialsSubscriptionsAccessResourcesLibrary Advisory BoardFAQ
RESEARCH
JoVE JournalMethods CollectionsJoVE Encyclopedia of ExperimentsArchive
EDUCATION
JoVE CoreJoVE BusinessJoVE Science EducationJoVE Lab ManualFaculty Resource CenterFaculty Site
Terms & Conditions of Use
Privacy Policy
Policies

Related Experiment Videos

Case matching and relative clause attachment.

B Hemforth1, L Konieczny, H Seelig

  • 1Center for Cognitive Science, Freiburg University, Germany. barbara@cognition.iig.uni-freiburg.de

Journal of Psycholinguistic Research
|March 21, 2000
PubMed
Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

Related Concept Videos

You might also read

Related Articles

Articles linked to this work by shared authors, journal, and citation graph.

Sort by
Same author

Substance use disorders in outpatients with bipolar disorder and pain complaints.

Journal of affective disorders·2025
Same author

Three scenarios for amyloid transformation in the context of the funnel model.

Computational and structural biotechnology journal·2025
Same author

Dissecting heterogeneity in cortical thickness abnormalities in major depressive disorder: a large-scale ENIGMA MDD normative modelling study.

bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology·2025
Same author

Clinical decision making in prostate cancer care-evaluation of EAU-guidelines use and novel decision support software.

Scientific reports·2024
Same author

Comparative analysis of anticholinergic burden scales to explain iatrogenic cognitive impairment and self-reported side effects in the euthymic phase of bipolar disorders: Results from the FACE-BD cohort.

European neuropsychopharmacology : the journal of the European College of Neuropsychopharmacology·2023
Same author

Longterm course of neuropsychological symptoms and ME/CFS after SARS-CoV-2-infection: a prospective registry study.

European archives of psychiatry and clinical neuroscience·2023
Same journal

Cognitive Individual Differences in Multilingualism: Language Aptitude and Working Memory in L3 Learners.

Journal of psycholinguistic research·2026
Same journal

Grasp Motor Representations Facilitate Conceptual Preparation in Speech Production.

Journal of psycholinguistic research·2026
Same journal

The Lexical Tone Partially Depends on Segments: Evidence from Visual-World Eye Tracking.

Journal of psycholinguistic research·2026
Same journal

Unearthing Perfectionism and L2 Speaking Performance among Iranian EFL Learners: The Moderating Role of Cultural Collectivism.

Journal of psycholinguistic research·2026
Same journal

Child Bilingual Acquisition of Spanish Dative (Non-)clitic Doubling Structures: A Case Study Approach to Home and Community Input Conditions.

Journal of psycholinguistic research·2026
Same journal

Using Eye Tracking to Examine Effects of Overt Localization on Referential Processing in German Sign Language Sentence Processing.

Journal of psycholinguistic research·2026
See all related articles

This study investigated relative clause attachment, comparing case-matching and attachment-binding theories. Results support attachment binding, showing a preference for attaching clauses to the most prominent noun phrase, regardless of case.

Area of Science:

  • Psycholinguistics
  • Computational Linguistics
  • Cognitive Science

Background:

  • Two competing theories explain relative clause attachment: case-matching and attachment-binding.
  • Case-matching favors attachment to noun phrases (NPs) with matching grammatical case.
  • Attachment-binding favors attachment to the most salient NP (NP1).

Purpose of the Study:

  • To empirically test the case-matching hypothesis against the attachment-binding dualism.
  • To determine the primary factor influencing relative clause attachment preferences.
  • To investigate how grammatical case and NP prominence interact in attachment decisions.

Main Methods:

  • Conducted two off-line studies: a sentence completion task and a magnitude estimation experiment.

Related Experiment Videos

  • Utilized subject (nominative) and object (accusative) relative clauses.
  • Designed stimuli with complex subject or object NPs, allowing attachment to NP1 or NP2.

    • Main Results:

    • Both experiments consistently favored attachment to NP1, supporting the attachment-binding theory.
    • Attachment preferences were observed across different grammatical cases and NP structures.
    • Evidence against the case-matching hypothesis was found, as case did not consistently predict attachment.

    Conclusions:

    • Attachment binding, prioritizing NP salience, is a more robust predictor of relative clause attachment than case-matching.
    • The findings contribute to understanding syntactic ambiguity resolution in language processing.
    • Future research could explore cross-linguistic variations and the role of other linguistic factors.