An expectation-based account for the processing difficulty of it object-extracted relative clauses
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Previous experimental studies showed that object-extracted relative clauses were easier to process than subject-extracted relative clauses when their embedded NPs were pronouns that typically refer to discourse-old topics. However, Reali & Christiansen (2007) found that this was not the case when an embedded pronoun is the inanimate singular pronoun it. This paper argues that the result of Reali & Christiansen’s experiment is partly due to embedded noun animacy, which strongly correlates with topicality. A fine-grained corpus study is conducted to show that embedded NPs are highly likely to be inanimate descriptive NPs headed by common nouns in subject-extracted relative clauses, whereas in object-extracted relative clauses the embedded NPs tend to be animate pronouns or proper nouns. Following the claim that the statistical biases observed in corpora have explanatory power for the processing difficulties of relative clauses, these contrasting distributional patterns suggest that the processing difficulty or easiness of object-extracted relative clauses depends on whether embedded NPs are unmarked for subjects in terms of animacy and topicality. It is thus argued that the processing difficulty of object-extracted relative clauses with inanimate pronouns, compared to those with animate pronouns, should be explained in terms of the degree of subjecthood of embedded NPs.
Abstract
Previous experimental studies showed that object-extracted relative clauses were easier to process than subject-extracted relative clauses when their embedded NPs were pronouns that typically refer to discourse-old topics. However, Reali & Christiansen (2007) found that this was not the case when an embedded pronoun is the inanimate singular pronoun it. This paper argues that the result of Reali & Christiansen’s experiment is partly due to embedded noun animacy, which strongly correlates with topicality. A fine-grained corpus study is conducted to show that embedded NPs are highly likely to be inanimate descriptive NPs headed by common nouns in subject-extracted relative clauses, whereas in object-extracted relative clauses the embedded NPs tend to be animate pronouns or proper nouns. Following the claim that the statistical biases observed in corpora have explanatory power for the processing difficulties of relative clauses, these contrasting distributional patterns suggest that the processing difficulty or easiness of object-extracted relative clauses depends on whether embedded NPs are unmarked for subjects in terms of animacy and topicality. It is thus argued that the processing difficulty of object-extracted relative clauses with inanimate pronouns, compared to those with animate pronouns, should be explained in terms of the degree of subjecthood of embedded NPs.
참고문헌 (36)
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