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Resolution of Null and Overt Pronouns in Catalan: An Eye Tracking Study
Aurora Bel1, Ernesto Guerra2,3, Nadia Ahufinger4
1Departament de Traducció i Ciències del Llenguatge, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Roc Boronat, 138, 08018, Barcelona, Spain. aurora.bel@upf.edu.
Journal of Psycholinguistic Research
|January 10, 2026
Summary
This study on Catalan pronoun resolution shows null pronouns favor subjects, while overt pronouns depend on context and mention order. Positional prominence, especially in non-canonical sentences, influences how pronouns are understood.
Area of Science:
- Linguistics
- Psycholinguistics
- Cognitive Science
Background:
- Pronoun resolution is complex, influenced by linguistic and cognitive factors.
- Null-subject languages like Catalan offer unique insights into pronoun processing.
- Previous research suggests a division of labor between null and overt pronouns (Position of Antecedent Hypothesis).
Purpose of the Study:
- Investigate subject pronoun resolution in Catalan.
- Examine the roles of gender, pronoun type (null vs. overt), syntactic function, and mention order.
- Compare pronoun resolution in canonical (SVO) and non-canonical (OVS) sentence structures.
Main Methods:
- Eye-tracking using the Visual World Paradigm (VWP).
- Experiments with canonical (SVO) and non-canonical (OVS) sentences in Catalan.
- Analysis of factors including gender, pronoun type, syntactic role, and antecedent mention order.
Main Results:
- Gender aids early resolution, primarily for first-mentioned antecedents.
- Null pronouns strongly prefer subject antecedents.
- Overt pronouns show context-dependent preferences, favoring first-mentioned subjects in ambiguous cases, and do not consistently prefer object antecedents.
- In OVS sentences, linear order (mention order) is more influential than subjecthood for pronoun resolution, especially for overt pronouns.
- Findings challenge the Position of Antecedent Hypothesis regarding overt and null pronoun behavior.
Conclusions:
- Pronoun resolution in Catalan is influenced by a complex interplay of factors.
- Positional prominence (mention order) plays a critical role, particularly in non-canonical sentence structures.
- Overt and null pronouns do not strictly adhere to the proposed division of labor; overt pronouns exhibit more flexible resolution strategies.
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