Effects of Local and Global Context on Processing Sentences with Subject and Object Relative Clauses

An eye tracking study investigated the effects of local and global discourse context on the processing of subject and object relative clauses, whereby the contexts favored either a subject relative clause interpretation or an object relative clause interpretation. The fixation data replicated previous studies showing that object relative clause sentences were more difficult to process than subject relative sentences. Crucially, however, the reading difficulty asymmetry between subject and object relative clause sentences disappeared when the sentences were presented with a local or a global discourse context that favored the objects in the object relative clauses. These findings demonstrate that the evidence for a syntax-based account of sentence processing is found when sentences are presented in isolation. However, if sentences are placed more naturally, in context, discourse factors outweigh the initial structural assignment.

[1]  Lyn Frazier,et al.  The interaction of syntax and semantics during sentence processing: eye movements in the analysis of semantically biased sentences , 1983 .

[2]  Donald Mitchell,et al.  Lexical guidance in human parsing: Locus and processing characteristics. , 1987 .

[3]  Alan Garnham,et al.  Effects of context in human sentence parsing: Evidence against a discourse-based proposal mechanism. , 1992 .

[4]  James L. McClelland,et al.  Constituent Attachment and Thematic Role Assignment in Sentence Processing: Influences of Content-Based Expectations , 1988 .

[5]  Mark Steedman,et al.  Interaction with context during human sentence processing , 1988, Cognition.

[6]  Walter Kintsch,et al.  Comprehension: A Paradigm for Cognition , 1998 .

[7]  Simon P. Liversedge,et al.  Chapter 3 – Eye Movements and Measures of Reading Time , 1998 .

[8]  Max M. Louwerse.  Un modelo conciso de cohesión en el texto y coherencia en la comprensión , 2004 .

[9]  David R. Dowty,et al.  Natural Language Parsing: Psychological, Computational, and Theoretical Perspectives , 1985 .

[10]  Brian MacWhinney,et al.  The processing of restrictive relative clauses in Hungarian , 1988, Cognition.

[11]  Lyn Frazier,et al.  ON COMPREHENDING SENTENCES: SYNTACTIC PARSING STRATEGIES. , 1979 .

[12]  W. Kintsch,et al.  Strategies of discourse comprehension , 1983 .

[13]  Mark Steedman,et al.  On not being led up the garden path : The use of context by the psychological syntax processor , 1985 .

[14]  Lyn Frazier,et al.  Sentence processing: A tutorial review. , 1987 .

[15]  Gerry T. M. Altmann,et al.  Ambiguity, parsing strategies, and computational models , 1988 .

[16]  Walter Kintsch,et al.  Toward a model of text comprehension and production. , 1978 .

[17]  V. M. Holmes,et al.  Eye fixation patterns during the reading of relative-clause sentences. , 1981 .

[18]  Robin K. Morris,et al.  Processing Subject and Object Relative Clauses: Evidence from Eye Movements , 2002 .

[19]  Edward Gibson,et al.  Processing relative clauses in Chinese , 2003, Cognition.

[20]  K. Rayner,et al.  Making and correcting errors during sentence comprehension: Eye movements in the analysis of structurally ambiguous sentences , 1982, Cognitive Psychology.

[21]  J. Henderson,et al.  Use of verb information in syntactic parsing: evidence from eye movements and word-by-word self-paced reading. , 1990, Journal of experimental psychology. Learning, memory, and cognition.

[22]  James L. McClelland.  The Case for Interactionism in Language Processing. , 1987 .

[23]  J. S. Evans,et al.  Understanding sentences with relative clauses , 1976, Memory & cognition.

[24]  A. Graesser,et al.  Handbook of discourse processes , 2003 .

[25]  G. Underwood.  Eye guidance in reading and scene perception , 1998 .

[26]  M. Louwerse,et al.  Thematics : interdisciplinary studies , 2002 .