LANGUAGE - quiz

Question 1

when comparing garden path and constraint based approach to parsing, the crucial question is ________ is involved

A) whether semantics

B) whether syntax

C) when semantics

D) when syntax

Answer 1

C

Question 2

when we hear the sentence “the woman with the sparkly black backpack is my sister”, we recognise that the sentence has two main constituents: the subject (the woman with the sparkly black backpack) and its predicate (is my sister), what does this correspond to?

Answer 2

Parsing

Question 3

in parsing, semantics contribute to the constraint based approach by providing constraints related to word meanings and influenced the interpretation of _______ structures

Answer 3

syntactic

Question 4

what are two types of contexts that influence parsing of a sentence, according to the constraint based approach to parsing, what are they?

Answer 4

• story
• scene

Question 5

after participants heard the sentence “place the apple” they moved their eyes to the apple, then hearing the rest of the sentence “on the towel” they assumed that they were being told to put the apple on the towel, and then when they heard “in the box”, they realised they were looking at the wrong place and quickly shifted their eyes to the box. what technique is used in determining how information in a scene can influence how a scene is processed?

Answer 5

visual world paradigm

Question 6

a syntax based principle where too many words are added to a phrase, everytime a new word is encountered

Answer 6

late closure

Question 7

“the senator who spotted the reporter shouted” is an example of _______ relative construction

Answer 7

subject

Question 8

reading the sentence “the runner jumped over the hurdle” brings up a mental image of a runner on a track, jumping over a hurdle is explain by the _____ model

Answer 8

situation model

Question 9

“the senator who the reporter spotted shouted” is an example of ________ relative construction

Answer 9

object

Question 10

a task used to illustrate processing differences between high and low frequency words

Answer 10

lexical decision task

Question 11

the word “bug” can refer to an insect, a hidden listening device or to annoying someone

Answer 11

lexical ambiguity

Question 12

the runner jumped over the hurdle brings up an image of a run-ner on a track, jumping a hurdle. this is explained why the ______ model

Answer 12

situation

Question 13

in an eye movement study, Rayner and coworkers had participants read sentences that contained either a high- or low- frequency target word. For example, the sentence “Sam wore the horrid coat though his ____ girlfriend complained,” contained either the target word “pretty” or “demure.” Results showed the participants’ _____ was shorter for the target word _____.

a.
lexical distinction; demure

b.
fixation; demure

c.
fixation; pretty

d.
lexical distinction; pretty

Answer 13

c.
fixation; pretty

Question 14

Chaz is listening to his grandma reminisce about the first time she danced with his grandpa 60 years ago. When his grandma says, “It seemed like the song would play forever,” Chaz understands that it is more likely his grandma was listening to a radio playing and not a CD. This understanding requires Chaz use a(n)

a.
given-new contract.

b.
age-appropriate principle.

c.
garden path model.

d.
instrument inference.

Answer 14

d.
instrument inference.

Question 15

In New Guinea, tribes that had been isolated for centuries were found that

a.
had just a few language systems that were all governed by similar rules.

b.
communicated by hand signals but not verbal language as we know it.

c.
had a large number of sophisticated language systems.

d.
had languages that were more primitive than languages of most non-isolated societies.

Answer 15

c.
had a large number of sophisticated language systems.

Question 16

The word frequency effect refers to the fact that we respond more

a.
slowly to letters appearing in non-words than letters appearing in words.

b.
quickly to letters that appear multiple times in a word than just once in a word.

c.
quickly to phonemes that appear multiple times in a word than just once in a word.

d.
slowly to low-frequency words than high-frequency words.

Answer 16

d.
slowly to low-frequency words than high-frequency words.

Question 17

Consider the following sentences: “Captain Ahab wanted to kill the whale. He cursed at it.” These two sentences taken together provide an example of a(n)

a.
global connection.

b.
garden path sequence.

c.
instrument inference.

d.
anaphoric inference.

Answer 17

d.
anaphoric inference.

Question 18

The given-new contract is a method for creating

a.
anaphoric inferences between consecutive sentences.

b.
resolution of a lexically ambiguous sentence.

c.
children’s mastery of syntax.

d.
comprehension between a speaker and a listener in a conversation.

Answer 18

d.
comprehension between a speaker and a listener in a conversation.

Question 19

Lexical ambiguity studies show that people access ambiguous words based on

a.
the meaning dominance of each definition of the word.

b.
the identification of a single meaning for that word.

c.
the word that comes immediately before and the word that comes immediately after the ambiguous word in the sentence.

d.
a bottom-up progression of meaning comprehension.

Answer 19

a.
the meaning dominance of each definition of the word.

Question 20

Yoda, a central character of the Star Wars movies created by George Lucas, has a distinctive way of speaking. His statement, “Afraid you will be,” violates which property of the English language?

a.
Language has a structure that is governed by rules

b.
Coding is required for langauge

c.
Language involves the use of a lexicon

d.
Language symbols must have high discriminability

Answer 20

a.
Language has a structure that is governed by rules

Question 21

Tanenhaus and coworkers’ eye movement study presented participants with different pictures for interpreting the sentence, “Put the apple on the towel in the box.” Their results support

a.
the syntax-first approach to parsing.

b.
the interactionist approach to parsing.

c.
the garden-path model to parsing.

d.
both syntax-first and interactionist approaches to parsing.

Answer 21

b.
the interactionist approach to parsing.

Question 22

Which of the following is the best example of a garden path sentence?

a.
Before the police stopped the Toyota disappeared into the night.

b.
The Eskimos were frightened by the walrus.

c.
The man was not surprised when he found several spiders, roaches, and other bugs in the corner of the room.

d.
The cats won’t bake.

Answer 22

a.
Before the police stopped the Toyota disappeared into the night.

Question 23

Pollack and Pickett’s experiment on understanding speech found that when participants were presented with individual words taken out of conversations (single words presented alone with no context), they could identify

a.
none of the words spoken by others.

b.
50% of the words spoken by their own voices.

c.
50% of the words spoken by others with an accent similar to theirs.

d.
100% of the words spoken by their own voices.

Answer 23

b.
50% of the words spoken by their own voices.

Question 24

In the lexical decision task, participants are asked to

a.
decide whether a string of letters is a word or a non-word.

b.
identify words that are contained in sentences.

c.
separate a sentence into individual words.

d.
decide which meaning of an ambiguous sentence is correct in a specific situation.
a.
decide whether a string of letters is a word or a non-word.

Answer 24

a.
decide whether a string of letters is a word or a non-word.

Question 25

Language consists of smaller components, like words, that can be combined to form larger ones, like phrases, to create sentences, which themselves can be components of a larger story. This demonstrates the _______ property of language.

a.
hierarchical

b.
propositional

c.
relational

d.
parallel

Answer 25

a.
hierarchical

Question 26

Coherence refers to the

a.
mental process whereby ambiguity is resolved online during sentence reading.

b.
mental process by which readers create information during reading that is not explicitly stated in the text.

c.
representation of the text in a reader’s mind, so that information in one part of the text is related to information in another part of the text.

d.
principle that we process information in isolation before we link it to its context.

Answer 26

c.
representation of the text in a reader’s mind, so that information in one part of the text is related to information in another part of the text.

Question 27

The interactionist approach to parsing states that

a.
semantics is activated as a sentence is being read.

b.
semantics is only activated to clear up ambiguity.

c.
the grammatical structure of a sentence determines the initial parsing.

d.
semantics is activated only at the end of a sentence.

Answer 27

a.
semantics is activated as a sentence is being read.

Question 28

Noam Chomsky proposed that

a.
as children learn language, they produce only sentences they have heard before.

b.
the underlying basis of language is different across cultures.

c.
language is learned through the mechanism of reinforcement.

d.
humans are genetically programmed to acquire and use language.

Answer 28

d.
humans are genetically programmed to acquire and use language.

Question 29

According to the situation model of text processing,

a.
people create a mental representation of what the text is about in terms of people, objects, locations, and events.

b.
people create a mental representation of what the text is about in terms of information about phrases, sentences, and paragraphs.

c.
people draw inferences about what is happening in a story by considering both local and global connections.

d.
it will take longer to understand a story that involves a complex series of situations.

Answer 29

a.
people create a mental representation of what the text is about in terms of people, objects, locations, and events.

Question 30

Ron is an avid reader. He has a large vocabulary because every time he comes across a word he doesn’t know, he looks it up in the dictionary. Ron encounters “wanderlust” in a novel, reaches for the dictionary, and finds out this word means “desire to travel.” The process of looking up unfamiliar words increases Ron’s

a.
parser.

b.
lexicon.

c.
syntactical capacity.

d.
mental set.

Answer 30

b.
lexicon

Question 31

Brain imaging studies reveal that semantics and syntax are associated with which two lobes of the cerebral cortex?

a.
the temporal and parietal lobes

b.
the frontal and temporal lobes

c.
the parietal and occipital lobes

d.
the frontal and parietal lobes

Answer 31

b.
the frontal and temporal lobes

Question 32

Ty has finished work on his doctoral dissertation. He studied how most adults understand words, specifically the priming effects of categorically related words and submitted a proposal to be included in a psychological conference to present his work to his peers. Presentations at the conference are grouped based on the particular topic in psychology under consideration. It is most likely that Ty’s work will be presented in a conference session on

a.
psychophysics.

b.
psycholinguistics.

c.
neuropsychology.

d.
psychoacoustics.

Answer 32

b.
psycholinguistics.

Question 33

Which of the following is NOT influenced by meaning?

a.
Phonemic restoration effect

b.
Word frequency effect

c.
Word superiority effect

d.
The lexical decision task

Answer 33

b.
Word frequency effect

Question 34

When we look at a record of the physical energy produced by conversational speech in a person’s native language, we see that the speech signal

has breaks between morphemes.
has breaks between phonemes.
is continuous.
has breaks between words.

Answer 34

is continuous.

Question 34

Consider the sentence, “Because he always jogs a mile seems like a short distance to him.”
The principle of late closure states that this sentence would first be parsed into which of the following phrases?

“Because he always jogs a mile”
“Because he always jogs”
“a mile seems”
“he always jogs”

Answer 34

“Because he always jogs a mile”

Question 34

A researcher had participants read each of the sentences below and measured the time it took to read each sentence.
Trial 1: The lamb ran past the cottage into the pasture.
Trial 2: The dog ran past the house into the yard.

The participants’ response times were longer for _____ because of the _____ effect.

trial 2; word frequency
trial 2; word superiority
trial 1; word frequency
trial 1; word superiority

Answer 34

trial 1; word frequency

Question 35

The crucial question in comparing syntax-first and interactionist approaches to parsing is ____ is involved.

when semantics
when syntax
whether syntax
whether semantics

Answer 35

when semantics

Question 36

According to the situation model of text processing,

people create a mental representation of what the text is about in terms of information about phrases, sentences, and paragraphs.
people draw inferences about what is happening in a story by considering both local and global connections.
it will take longer to understand a story that involves a complex series of situations.
people create a mental representation of what the text is about in terms of people, objects, locations, and events.

Answer 36

people create a mental representation of what the text is about in terms of people, objects, locations, and events.

Question 36

Which of the following is NOT influenced by meaning?

Phonemic restoration effect
The lexical decision task
Word superiority effect
Word frequency effect

Answer 36

Word frequency effect

Question 36

When the front part of a sentence can be interpreted more than one way, but the end of the sentence clarifies which meaning is correct, we say that the sentence is an example of

speech segmentation.
temporary ambiguity.
parsing.
lexical priming.

Answer 36

temporary ambiguity.

Question 36

Which set of stimuli would be the best selection for having people perform a lexical decision task?

Correctly spelled words “speech, potato” and misspelled words “speach, potatoe”
Concrete words “window, monkey” and abstract words “doubt, energy”
Common words “cat, boat” and uncommon words “peon, furtive”
Words “pizza, history” and non-words “pibble, girk”

Answer 36

Words “pizza, history” and non-words “pibble, girk”

Question 37

Brain imaging studies reveal that semantics and syntax are associated with which two lobes of the cerebral cortex?

the temporal and parietal lobes
the frontal and parietal lobes
the parietal and occipital lobes
the frontal and temporal lobes

Answer 37

the frontal and temporal lobes

Question 38

According to the idea of _____, when we read a sentence like, “Carmelo grabbed his coat from his bedroom and his backpack from the living room, walked downstairs, and called his friend Gerry,” we create a simulation of Carmelo’s apartment and keep track of his location as he moves throughout the apartment.

speech continuity
situation models
global connections
causal inference

Answer 38

situation models

Question 39

Imagine you are interpreting a pair of sentences such as “The sidewalk was covered with ice” and “Ramona fell down.” The kind of inference we use to link these sentences together would most likely be a(n) _____ inference.

causal
instrument
anaphoric
coherent

Answer 39

causal

Question 39

Lexical ambiguity studies show that people access ambiguous words based on

a bottom-up progression of meaning comprehension.
the identification of a single meaning for that word.
the meaning dominance of each definition of the word.
the word that comes immediately before and the word that comes immediately after the ambiguous word in the sentence.

Answer 39

the meaning dominance of each definition of the word.

Question 39

Which property below is NOT one of the characteristics that makes human language unique?

Governed by rules
It involves arrangement of a sequence of symbols
Communication
Hierarchical structure

Answer 39

Communication

Question 40

According to the situation model of text processing,

people create a mental representation of what the text is about in terms of people, objects, locations, and events.
people draw inferences about what is happening in a story by considering both local and global connections.
it will take longer to understand a story that involves a complex series of situations.
people create a mental representation of what the text is about in terms of information about phrases, sentences, and paragraphs.

Answer 40

people create a mental representation of what the text is about in terms of information about phrases, sentences, and paragraphs.