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Abstract:
The referential context hypothesis of processing syntactically
ambiguous sentences proposes that initial syntactic decisions can
be influenced by the contextual plausibility of the alternative
syntactic analyses (e.g. Altmann, Garnham and Dennis, 1992). One
of the main contextual manipulations studied previously involved
introducing two like protagonists versus one protagonist.
Subject/object relative clause ambiguities in German provide
an interesting challenge for the referential context hypothesis.
A new kind of referential context manipulation is required here -
manipulating the number of potential referents is not informative
since both resolutions obviously involve a relative clause. Hence
both types of context have to mention two possible referents but
still provide some information which makes either the
subject-relative or the object-relative clause referentially
necessary.
German subject vs. object relative sentences are identical up
to the clause-final verb which is marked for number (e.g. 'hatte'
vs. 'hatten'), signalling either a subject relative (1) or an
object relative (2):
(1) das Mädchen, das die Jungen gehasst hatte, ...
the girl that the boys hated had-sg. -- i.e.: the girl that
had hated the boys
(2) das Mädchen, das die Jungen gehasst hatten, ...
the girl that the boys hated had-pl. -- i.e.: the girl that
the boys had hated
Subject relatives are easier to process than object relatives.
In order to investigate whether referential context can override
this preference, two contexts were created. Both contexts
introduced two girls and some boys (for example). The
subject-relative supporting context further stated that one of
the girls hated the boys, whereas the object-relative supporting
context stated that the boys hated one of the girls. Given the
need to establish a unique referent, a subject-relative clause is
felicitous following the first context (because a subject
relative allows identification of 'the girl' as the girl that had
hated the boys), and an object relative is felicitous following
the second context (allowing identification of 'the girl' as the
girl that the boys had hated). Judgement and production data show
that this novel kind of referential context manipulation did
override the usual preference for subject relatives over object
relatives. These results extend previous evidence for the
referential context hypothesis and indicate that readers try to
identify a referent not only by taking into account the number of
potential referents but by making use of factual information
presented in the context, even if this means adopting the object
relative which is usually unpreferred.
Altmann, G. T. M., Garnham, A. H., and Dennis, J. (1992).
Avoiding the garden path: Eye movements in context.
Journal of Memory and Language
, 31, 685--712.
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