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The effects of adjacent and nonadjacent collocations on processing: Eye-tracking evidence from "nested" collocations
Manuel F Pulido1, Marijana Macis2, Suhad Sonbul3
1Department of Spanish, Italian and Portuguese, Center for Language Science, Pennsylvania State University.
Journal of Experimental Psychology. Learning, Memory, and Cognition
|February 18, 2025
Summary
This study shows that both adjacent and nonadjacent collocations, including nested ones, facilitate sentence processing. Nonadjacent verb collocations may even have a stronger effect than adjacent adjective collocations.
Area of Science:
- Psycholinguistics
- Cognitive Science
- Computational Linguistics
Background:
- Priming effects are well-established for adjacent collocations in sentence processing.
- Limited research exists on nonadjacent collocations and their interaction with surrounding context.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate priming effects of nonadjacent collocations.
- To examine the interplay between adjacent and nonadjacent collocations, termed 'nested' collocations.
- To explore potential syntactic primacy effects in collocational processing.
Main Methods:
- An eye-tracking experiment was conducted with native English speakers.
- The study manipulated the collocational status of adjacent adjectives and nonadjacent verbs preceding a noun.
- Nested collocations were introduced to assess cumulative priming effects.
Main Results:
- Adjacent collocational priming effects were replicated.
- Evidence for facilitation from nonadjacent collocations was found.
- Preliminary evidence suggests a syntactic primacy effect favoring verb-noun collocations.
- Cumulative facilitation was observed in nested collocations.
Conclusions:
- Collocational priming extends beyond single, adjacent word pairs.
- Nonadjacent collocations, particularly verb-noun, significantly contribute to sentence processing ease.
- Nested collocations demonstrate additive benefits, enhancing processing efficiency.
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