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Related Experiment Videos

The parser doesn't ignore intransitivity, after all.

Adrian Staub1

  • 1Department of Psychology, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA 01003, USA. astaub@psych.umass.edu

Journal of Experimental Psychology. Learning, Memory, and Cognition
|May 2, 2007
PubMed
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This study investigated how readers process noun phrases after verbs. Findings suggest parsing difficulty is not due to ignoring verb restrictions but comma absence in clauses.

Area of Science:

  • Psycholinguistics
  • Computational Linguistics
  • Cognitive Science

Background:

  • Previous research explored whether parsers initially assign noun phrases following intransitive verbs as direct objects.
  • Conflicting evidence exists regarding the parser's initial analysis and its adherence to verb subcategorization restrictions.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate the initial analysis of noun phrases following intransitive verbs.
  • To determine if processing difficulty arises from syntactic misanalysis or other factors like punctuation.
  • To re-evaluate the role of verb subcategorization restrictions in early parsing.

Main Methods:

  • Three eye-tracking experiments were conducted.
  • Experiment 1: Examined reading difficulty with intransitive verbs, even when direct objects are prohibited.

Related Experiment Videos

  • Experiment 2: Investigated the role of comma absence at clause boundaries.
  • Experiment 3: Assessed processing difficulty with implausible direct objects in relative clauses.

    • Main Results:

    • Reading difficulty was observed even with intransitive verbs prohibiting direct objects (Experiment 1).
    • This difficulty was linked to missing commas at clause boundaries, not syntactic misanalysis (Experiment 2).
    • Processing difficulty occurred with optionally transitive verbs but not strictly intransitive ones (Experiment 3).

    Conclusions:

    • The findings challenge the claim that the parser initially ignores verb subcategorization restrictions.
    • Processing difficulties are influenced by factors beyond initial syntactic analysis, such as punctuation and clause structure.
    • Reader's parsing strategies adapt based on verb transitivity and syntactic context.