The Interplay between Prosody and Syntax in Sentence Processing: The case of subject-control versus object-control verbs
Publication year
2010Source
Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 22, 5, (2010), pp. 1036-1053ISSN
Publication type
Article / Letter to editor

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Organization
SW OZ DCC PL
SW OZ DCC CO
SW OZ DCC BO
Journal title
Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience
Volume
vol. 22
Issue
iss. 5
Languages used
English (eng)
Page start
p. 1036
Page end
p. 1053
Subject
DI-BCB_DCC_Theme 1: Language and Communication; PsycholinguisticsAbstract
This study addresses the question whether prosodic information can affect the choice for a syntactic analysis in auditory sentence processing. We manipulated the prosody (in the form of a prosodic break; PB) of locally ambiguous Dutch sentences to favor one of two interpretations. The experimental items contained two different types of so-called control verbs (subject and object control) in the matrix clause and were syntactically disambiguated by a transitive or by an intransitive verb. In Experiment 1, we established the default off-line preference of the items for a transitive or an intransitive disambiguating verb with a visual and an auditory fragment completion test. The results suggested that subject- and object-control verbs differently affect the syntactic structure that listeners expect. In Experiment 2, we investigated these two types of verbs separately in an on-line ERP study. Consistent with the literature, the PB elicited a closure positive shift. Furthermore, in subject-control items, an N400 effect for intransitive relative to transitive disambiguating verbs was found, both for sentences with and for sentences without a PB. This result suggests that the default preference for subject-control verbs goes in the same direction as the effect of the PB. In object-control items, an N400 effect for intransitive relative to transitive disambiguating verbs was found for sentences with a PB but no effect in the absence of a PB. This indicates that a PB can affect the syntactic analysis that listeners pursue.
This item appears in the following Collection(s)
- Academic publications [227900]
- Electronic publications [107393]
- Faculty of Social Sciences [28471]
- Open Access publications [76515]
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