Psycholinguistics lesson 6 Flashcards
Understanding sentences isn’t just a matter of recognising ______ words.
individual
To reconstruct the message we must also reconstruct the _____ of the sentence or in other words the _____.
structure
syntax
We have to put the meanings of the words ____ and the meaning _____ between the words in the sentence.
together
relations
We do not wait until the end of a sentence to _____ _____ of what we ____, this process is highly _______.
make sense
hear
incremental
At any given point in a sentence what do we do?
We construct a partial interpretation of the sentence so far.
When would we often have to revise a sentence?
If it was an ambiguous sentence
A sentence that is ambiguous until half way through and at the end becomes unambiguous is known as a ____ ambiguous.
Temporarily
What is a globally ambiguous sentence?
A sentence that is ambiguous from start to finish.
Hospitals are sued by 7 foot doctors- what type of sentence is this?
A globally ambiguous sentence
Word ____ can affect meaning.
organisation
The syntactic properties of sentences can be described at the level of- W\_\_\_\_\_ P\_\_\_\_\_\_\_ C\_\_\_\_\_\_ (not important) S\_\_\_\_\_\_\_
words
phrases
clauses
sentences
What is a phrase?
A phrase is the building block of a sentence, it is a group of words that “go together”
What is a Noun Phrase made up of (NP)?
(sometimes a determiner)and a noun
What is A Verb Phrase made up of (VP)?
A verb and sometimes a NP
What is a preposition phrase made up of (PP)?
A preposition (eg. in) and a NP (the red dress)
What is a sentence?
A group of phrases that MUST have a verb phrase
The woman ate the apple
-split this sentence into its NP and VP
NP- the woman
VP- ate the apple
The woman in the red dress ate the apple
-split this sentence into its NP, PP and VP.
NP-The woman
PP-in the red dress
VP- ate the apple
“in the red dress” is the PP telling us information about the woman so should be attached to the same ____ that “the woman” is.
NP
Name 2 things every sentence should have.
A NP aka. the subject
A VP aka. the predicate
The predicate is also known as the ____.
Verb Phrase (VP)
What can a noun phrase (NP) also be called?
The subject
If there are 2 possible meanings/interpretations of a sentence what is this known as?
eg.
1. John saw the man with the telescope (he used the telescope to see the man)
2. John saw the man with the telescope (John saw the man who had the telescope)
Syntactic Ambiguity
In syntactic ambiguity- what does the meaning depend on?
Whether the phrase “with the telescope” is attached to the NP (the man) or the VP (saw the man).
If the VP is attached to the PP- explain the ambiguous sentence John saw the man with the telescope.
this means that John was using the telescope to see the man, he was doing the act of seeing.
If the NP is attached to the PP- explain the ambiguous sentence, John saw the man with the telescope.
This means that john saw a man who had a telescope.
How many nodes does the VP attachment of the PP have?
7
How many nodes does the NP attachment of the PP have?
8
Name the 2 most influential theories of sentence processing.
Garden Path Model
Constraint-Based Model
What is the major concern of the 2 sentence processing theories?
How we process syntactically ambiguous sentences.
What happens in the initial analysis stage of the garden path model?
It first computes the phrase structure that is syntactically simpler eg. 7 nodes instead of 8 nodes.
In the garden path model the processor builds ____ syntactic structure/s at a time.
1
At the initial stage what is the only thing the garden path model considers?
syntax
The Garden Path model doesn’t consider _____.
semantics
Does the Garden Path model initially consider context?
No
The structure with the fewer ____ _____ is the one that is syntactically simpler.
branching nodes
According to the garden path model- what sentence should we favour?
The VP attachment to the PP eg. John used the telescope to see the man
In the Garden-Path Model, if the initial analysis is _____ with the ______ information, the processor re-analyses and goes for the alternative _____.
inconsistent
semantics
analysis
In the garden-path model if we have to re-analyse, what could we say?
That we have been misled so must back track.
Why is re-analysis costly?
As when reading we will slow down and often we have to read part of the sentence again.
Is re-analysis conscious?
We mostly re-analyse unconsciously .
What sentence would we slow down when reading according to the Garden-Path Model?
A- John saw the man with the telescope but then realised he had seen wrong. It was only a pair of binoculars the man had in his hands.
B- John saw the man with the telescope, John had just got interested in anatomy and was trying out his new telescope.
According to the Garden Path Model, continuation A will cause a slowdown and re-analysis.
What is the name for choosing the simplest structure with the least nodes?
Minimal Attachment
In Rayner, Carlson and Frazier 1983, the eye movements of participants were recorded when people read sentences, what was their experiment focused on?
Minimal Attachment
Participants read the 2 sentences below-
- The spy saw the cop with binoculars but the cop didn’t see him
- The spy saw the cop with the revolver but the cop didn’t see him
Describe the results.
At the noun (binoculars/revolver) there is no difference in word fixation duration
BUT
After the noun the sentence with the revolver is read slower than the sentence with binoculars
What did Rayner, Carlson and Frazier (1983) show about participants?
That they re-analysed the sentence with “revolver” in it.
Why did people re-analyse the sentence with “revolver” in it? mentioning minimal attachment
Due to minimal attachment we attach the “revolver” to the VP as it is the simplest syntactic structure however we realise that it is implausible as we can’t use revolvers to see things. So we re-analyse the sentence.
The processor only realises the implausibility…
After reading “revolver”
The garden path model says that the in the first structure the processer doesn’t take into account _________. It only considers ______.
Semantics
syntax
When we slow down when reading a sentence what does this indicate?
That only then, the meaning is taken into account.
If there is no slow down when reading, what does this mean?
That the initial sentence structure with the VP attachment is the correct one when meaning is taken into account.
What are the 2 principles of the Garden Path model?
- Minimal Attachment
2. Late Closure
If the number of nodes in two structures are the same, what wont help in choosing a preferred structure?
Minimal Attachment
In the case that minimal attachment can’t help in choosing preferred structure, what principle is used?
Late Closure
Late Closure is a _____ preference.
Recency
In late closure what do you attach the ambiguous phrase onto?
You attach an ambiguous phrase to the most recent phrase
What does this sentence mean if we use the late closure principle-
The man realised we left yesterday
The event of leaving happened yesterday.
If we say-
The man realised we left yesterday
and mean that the event of realising happened yesterday, what is this known as?
Early Closure
Is early or late closure preferred?
Late closure is preferred
There is a lot of experimental evidence supporting this model, Using eye ____ and self-paced ____, mainly from reading sentences in ____/ without a preceding _____.
tracking
reading
isolation
context
Several ______ ambiguous sentences are tested eg. The horse raced past the barn fell.
syntactically
The Garden- Path model is a ___ stage model of sentence processing.
2
In the 1st stage only ___ structure is constructed according to the principles of _____ and _______. Only ______ is considered at this stage. Other potentially relevant information is ________.
1 minimal attachment late closure syntax Ignored.
In the 2nd stage of the garden-path model, what is considered? If the initial analysis is inconsistent with these factors what happens?
Semantics/context etc.
There is a re-analysis
Name the other model apart from the Garden-Path Model.
The constraint based model.
In the constraint-based model, on encountering an ambiguous structure the processor activates…
all analyses in parallel.
_____ sources of information eg. syntactic, ____, ______ and _______ are used _____ and ____ with each other.
Multiple semantic context frequency immediately interact
What information is used at the same time, in the constraint-based model?
non-syntactic and syntactic
Different analyses are _____ on the basis of many different _____.
Weighted
constraints
The stronger the support for an analysis, the _______ the ________.
Higher
Activation
Structures that are more ____, more _____ or ____ compatible with the context will receive higher activation than the other structures.
frequent
plausible
more
Highly activated structures may be _____ more _____ than the ones less activated.
syntactically
complex
Highly activated structures are ______ to process than less activated structures.
easier.
What is the major difference between the Garden-Path Model and the Constraint-Based Model?
Garden Path model- semantics are considered later, after syntax.
Constraint-Based model- semantics are considered at the same time as syntax
If the context introduces a semantic bias for the more complex structure, will there be a slow down?
No
what happens if the semantic bias is very strong?
The more complex structure may be easier to process than the simpler structure.
Taraban and McClelland (1998) used 2 sentences below in their experiment-
- The couple admired the house with a friend but knew it was overpriced
- The couple admired the house with a garden but knew it was overpriced.
What structure (attachment) are 1 and 2?
- The PP is attached to the VP
2. The PP is attached to the NP
- The couple admired the house with a friend but knew it was overpriced
- The couple admired the house with a garden but knew it was overpriced.
According to the Garden-Path Model, what sentence should be more difficult and the disprefered initial interpretation?
Number 2- because it requires NP attachment
Why is sentence number 1- The couple admired the house with a friend but knew it was overpriced, the preferred initial interpretation?
As it required VP attachment
However what did the Taraban and McClelland experiment find?
- The couple admired the house with a friend but knew it was overpriced
- The couple admired the house with a garden but knew it was overpriced.
That sentence 1 was read slower than sentence 2
Why was sentence 2- The couple admired the house with a garden but knew it was overpriced- read faster?
As a semantic bias was created for the NP attached structure, so the semantic constraint here is stringer than the syntactic constraint.
Name the 3 main constraints used to build the correct structure.
Semantic
syntactic
Frequency (of a construction)
Constraints are in ______.
competition
If there is a strong semantic bias for the more complex structure, ____ will win and _____ will lose.
semantics
syntax
If a construction with a complex structure is very ______ with certain words, _____ will win and syntax will lose.
frequent
frequency
A lot of evidence for constraint based models comes from manipulations of what? and what does this create?
context
Manipulation of context introduces a semantic bias for the more complex structure).
Also manipulating frequency of constructions with certain _____ can affect structure.
verbs
What sentence will be preferred using verb frequency?
- John realised his goals were unrealistic
- John realised his goals
1 :)
What does the visual context effect?
Visual context has an immediate effect on sentence processing and can override syntax.
Does visual context have the same effect in adulkts than under 5’s?
No, under 5’s show a garden path on both occasions.
The visual context with 2 apples caused the participants to…
attach “on the towel” to the NP, the more complex structure and because of this there’s no garden path.
When participants see 1 apple why do they experience a garden path?
As they construct the simplest meaning by attaching the PP to the VP but then revise this as this becomes inconsistent with the context as the sentence continues.
The constraint-based model is _____.
interactive
who investigated the effect of visual context?
Spivey et al. 2001
After words are recognised they are integrated into a partial ____ of the sentence.
representation
