cals conference language and mind - bib.irb.hr · ewa dąbrowska, different speakers, different...

CALS CONFERENCE LANGUAGE AND MINDLANGUAGES IN THE MIND: SYSTEMATIC VARIABILITY OF AGREEMENT AND WORD ORDER INTERFACE OPTIONS Anita Peti-StantićFaculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, Univeristy of Zagreb May 5, 2018

CALS CONFERENCE Language and Mind, Rijeka, May 5, 2018

AN OUTLINE OF THE TALK

! 1. MENTAL GRAMMAR

! 2. VARIABILITY OF INTERFACE OPTIONS

! 4. EXPERIMENTS

! 5. SEMANTIC MODULATION OF AGREEMENT AND WO

! 6. PROJECT MEGAHR/MEGACRO ! http://megahr.ffzg.unizg.hr/

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1. MENTAL GRAMMAR

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1. MENTAL GRAMMAR

! Question on the Universal Grammar (and the relation of UG to our mind) ! RECEIVED KNOWLEDGE - all learners converge on the

same grammar (possible difference between L1 and L2 learners, but the mental grammar in L1 is assumed to be the same)

! BUT: new evidence shows that this is a myth ! Ewa Dąbrowska, Different speakers, different grammars:

Individual differences in native language attainment

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1. MENTAL GRAMMAR

! RELEVANT (PROCESSING) QUESTIONS ! Which part of the language knowledge is stored in our memory

and which part of it we construct on the spot? ! Which part of the language knowledge is common to all speakers

of the language and which part is subject to variability? ! Which part of the language knowledge arises from the UG

hierarchy and which part from the conceptual potential of systematic combinatoriality?

! Which building blocks of our mental grammars are universal, and which are local (language-specific and bound to certain constructions)?

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2. VARIABILITY OF INTERFACE OPTIONS

! COORDINATED RESEARCH IN THE EXPERIMENTAL MORPHOSYNTAX OF SOUTH SLAVIC LANGUAGES(EMSS) ! Leverhulme project: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/pals/research/linguistics/research/leverhulme ! Andrew Nevins, UCL, Research Head, Jana Willer Gold, Network

Coordinator ! Partners: Nova Gorica, Zadar, Zagreb, Sarajevo, Novi Sad, Niš

! THE BUILDING BLOCKS OF CROATIAN MENTAL GRAMMAR: CONSTRAINTS OF INFORMATION STRUCTURE (MEGAHR/MEGACRO) ! Croatian National Science Foundation project ! http://megahr.ffzg.unizg.hr/

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http://www.ucl.ac.uk/pals/research/linguistics/research/leverhulme

http://www.ucl.ac.uk/pals/research/linguistics/research/leverhulme



! MOTIVATION AND BACKGROUND

! Some languages have rules which are basically syntactic, others rely on a semantic principle and yet others show interesting combinations of the two principles. …Gender resolution rules are language specific. ! [Corbett, Resolution rules, CH8, Agreement pp 175]

! Greville Corbett: Hierarchies, Targets, and Controllers: Agreement Patterns in Slavic Languages; Gender; Number; Features; Agreement ; The Syntax-morphology interface; Cannonical Morhpology and Syntax

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! In a variety of languages (in Slavic language family Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian, Slovenian, in other languages - Hindi, Ndebele), coordinated subjects (and in some cases, objects) consisting of two (and more) NPs can trigger verbal agreement with only one of these noun phrases, rather than with the coordination as a whole.

! TERMINOLOGY: ! non-coordinated/simple/non-conjoined subjects ! coordinated/complex/conjoined subjects ! full/resolved agreement vs. partial agreement (agreement with a

single conjunct)

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3. EXPERIMENTS: BASIC FACTS IN SSL LANGUAGES

! Verbs obligatorily agree with subjects (both pre- and post-verbally)

! Agreement with finite verbs (aux and main verbs) in person & number – without exception

! Stol stoji nasred sobe. Stolovi stoje ... ! table.MASC.SG stand.3.SG table.MASC.PL stand.3.SG

! Nasred sobe stoji stol. Nasred sobe stoje stolovi.

! Ja stojim nasred sobe. Mi stojimo ... ! PERS.PRO.1.SG stand.1.SG PERS.PRO.1.PL stand.1.PL

! Agreement with participles in number & gender – without exception with number, variable with gender

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3. EXPERIMENTS: BASIC DATA – FULL AGREEMENT

! NON-COORDINATED SUBJECTS sg.

! Dječak je zaustavljen.

! boy.MASC.SG AUX.SG stop.Part.MASC.SG

! Pjesma je otpjevana.

! song.FEM.SG AUX.SG sing.Part.FEM.SG

! Pismo je poslano.

! letter.N.SG AUX.SG send.Part.N.SG

! NON-COORDINATED SUBJECTS pl.

! Dječaci su zaustavljeni.

! boy.MASC.PL AUX.PL stop.Part.MASC.PL

! Pjesme su otpjevane.

! song.FEM.PL AUX.PL sing.Part.FEM.PL

! Pisma su poslana.

! letter.N.PL AUX.PL send.Part.N.PL

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3. EXPERIMENTS: COORDINATED PARTIAL AGREEMENT

! MASC Dječak i pas su zaustavljeni.

! boy.MASC.SG dog.MASC.SG AUX:PL stop.Part.MASC.PL

! Dječaci i psi su zaustavljeni.

! boy.MASC.PL dog.MASC.PL AUX:PL stop.Part.MASC.PL ! FEM Pjesma i melodija su otpjevane.

! Song.FEM.SG melody.FEM.SG AUX.PL sing.Part.FEM.PL

! Pjesme i melodije su otpjevane.

! song.FEM.PL melody.FEM.PL AUX.PL sing.Part.FEM.PL

! NEUT Pismo i pero su poslani. ! letter.N.SG feather.N.sg AUX.PL send.Part.MASC.PL

! * Pismo i pero su poslana.

! letter.N.SG feather.N.sg AUX.PL send.Part.N.PL

! Pisma i pera su poslana. ! letter.N.SG feather.N.sg AUX.PL send.Part.N.PL

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3. EXP: BASIC FACTS MASCULINE! Sg Dječak je zaustavljen. Zaustavljen je dječak.

! Pl Dječaci su zaustavljeni. Zaustavljeni su dječaci.

! Sg&Sg Dječak i pas su zaustavljeni. Zaustavljeni su dječak i pas.

! Pl&Sg Dječaci i pas su zaustavljeni. Zaustavljeni su dječaci i pas.

! Sg&Pl Dječak i psi su zaustavljeni. Zaustavljeni su dječak i psi.

! Pl&Pl Dječaci i psi su zaustavljeni. Zaustavljeni su dječaci i psi.

! ... Agreement pattern with Masculine NP’s is repeated (to high extent) in Feminine agreement patterns, but not in Neuters.

! M+M= always M 12


3. EXP: BASIC FACTS FEMININE! Sg Djevojčica je zaustavljena. ! Pl Djevojčice su zaustavljene. ! Sg&Sg Djevojčica i mačka su zaustavljene. ! Pl&Sg Djevojčice i mačka su zaustavljene.

! ? Djevojčice i mačka su zaustavljeni. DEF

! Sg&Pl Djevojčica i mačke su zaustavljene. ! ? Djevojčica i mačke su zaustavljeni. DEF

! Pl&Pl Djevojčice i mačke su zaustavljene. ! ? Djevojčice i mačke su zaustavljeni. DEF

!F+F= always F 13


3. EXP: BASIC FACTS NEUTRUM! Sg Pismo je poslano. ! Pl Pisma su poslana. ! Sg&Sg Pismo i pero su poslani. DEF

! *Pismo i pero su poslana. ! Pl&Sg Pisma i pero su poslani. DEF

! *Pisma i pero su poslana. ! Sg&Pl Pismo i pera su poslani. DEF

! ?Pismo i pera su poslana. ! Pl&Pl Pisma i pera su poslana.

!N+N= N and M (coordinated sg’s, some coordinated structures with pl involving sg)

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3. EXP: BASIC FACTS PUZZLE! What happens when the coordinated subjects consists

of two nouns that differ in gender?

! Alltogether 9 combinations ! 3 same-gender combinations: MM, FF, NN ! 6 different ! gender combinations: MF, MN, FM, FN, NM, NF

! directionality matters: MF and FM is not the same

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3. EXP: QUESTIONING THEORETICAL ASSUMPTIONS

! 1. Coordination between same-gender nouns > full agreement in plural (M > M, F > F, N > N) ! PUZZLE: sg+sg; pl+pl; sg+pl; pl+sg >pl, but no full gender agreement in

all conditions

! 2. Coordination between different-gender nouns > ‘partial agreement’ (sg+sg/pl+pl/sg+pl/pl+sg >pl, but... ! MF > M and/or F ! MN > M and/or N ! FM > F and/or M ! FN > F and/or N and/or M ! NM > N and/or M ! NF > N and/or F and/or M

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3. EXP: THEORETICAL ASSUMPTIONS! Grammars treat Masc as a default/last

resort

! If coordination contains Masc, significantly HIGHER PROPORTION of Masc agreement

! If coordination contains Masc, significantly FASTER ! most probably because of Masc

default, ‘consolation’ option

! (OR SLOWER as ‘last resort”)

! The most interesting conditions are FN and NF (without Masc)

! MF > M and/or F

! MN > M and/or N

! FM > F and/or M

! FN > F and/or N and/or M

! NM > N and/or M

! NF > N and/or F and/or M

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3. EXP: THEORETICAL ASSUMPTIONS

!SV HCA/FCA CCA

! VS

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EXP 1, 2015: MATERIALS AND PARTICIPANTS (with A. Nevins, J. Willer-Gold and J. Tušek)

! Controlled experimental study

! 6 partner sites in 4 countries (Slovenia, Croatia 2x, Bosnia, Serbia 2x) ! uniform experimental testing battery at six universities

in parallel ! keep experimental settings as identical as possible

! uniform stimulus design, presentation methods, number of participants

! quantitative analysis

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EXP 1, 2015: GOALS AND TASKS

! ELICIT SPOKEN AGREEMENT WITH THE PREVERBAL AND POSTVERBAL COORDINATED SUBJECTS. ! preverbal (1a) and postverbal (1b) coordinated

subjects matched and non-matched in gender ! TYPE OF EXPERIMENT:

! self-paced reading and sentence completion task ! on-line elicited production task with digital recording

of responses (recording and coding: Audacity, Praat, IBEX)

! PARTICIPANTS: n=30 [1st year student, attended the local secondary school, non linguist, not students of B/C/S/S languages, F/M 50/50]

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EXP 1, 2015: EXPERIMENTAL ITEMS

! 9 conditions (matched: MM, FF, NN, non-matched: MF, MN, FM, FN, NM, NF)

! 6 items per condition ! 54 test examples ! 54 fillers ! total of 108 sentences

! Model sentences used as primes for the test examples contained a simple non-conjoined singular subjects in Masculine.

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EXP 1, 2015: GENERAL CONDITIONS

! 1: INTERNAL STRUCTURE of model sentence ! WO and internal structures:

! COND SV: [S Aux V Adv], [S Aux V PP] ! COND VS: [Adv Aux V S], [PP Aux V S]

! all nouns in subject and non-subject positions are inanimate plurals

! 2. AVERAGE LENGTH WAS BALANCED

! 3. SV-VS COMPARABILITY

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EXP 1, 2015: PRESENTATION OF STIMULI

! Model sentence: ! Prijevod je ovjeren pečatom. ! translation.MASC.SG AUX.SG authenticated.MASC.SG seal

! Replacement phrase: ! Molbe i rješenja ! requests.FEM.PL and solutions.NEUT.PL

! Produced response: ! Molbe i rješenja su ovjeren-i/-a/-e pečatom ! requests.FEM.PL and solutions.NEUT.PL AUX.PL authenticated.MASC/FEM/

NEUT.PL by.seal

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EXP 1, 2015 RESULTS: Zagreb

SV: greater variability of answers

0%

25%

50%

75%

100%

CondMF CondMN CondFN CondNF CondFM CondNM

Masc.pl.Fem.pl.Neut.pl.Masc.sg.Fem.sg.Neut.sg.Masc.du.Fem.du.Neut.du.

VS: almost no variability of answers

0%

25%

50%

75%

100%

CondMF CondMN CondFN CondNF CondFM CondNM

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EXP 2: ZAGREB 2016 (with J. Willer-Gold and J. Tušek)

! EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN: SAME as 2015 ! mostly the same sentences

! DIFFERENT from 2015 ! only SV position (54 exp stimuli and 54 fillers – 108

sentences) ! adverbs and adverbial constructions preceeded

coordianated structure (informations structure concern)

! presentation of stimuly somewhat different (memory concern)

! different fillers

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! Večeras je pjenušac natočen u čaše.

! tonight.ADV AUX.sg champagne.MASC.SG pour.PART.MASC.SG into glasses.ADV

! Večeras su vina i rakije ___________ u čaše.

! tonight.ADV AUX.pl wines.N.SG and spirit.F.SG pour.PART.MASC.SG into glasses.ADV

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EXP 2, 2016: FILLERS (animate M and F)

! Iznenada je mladić protrčao terenom. ! A boy suddenly run across the court.

! Iznenada su sportašice i novinari ___________ terenom. ! Sportswomen and reporters _________ the court.

! Iznenada je djevojka protrčala terenom. ! A girl suddenly run across the court.

! Iznenada su sportašice i novinari ___________ terenom. ! Sportswomen and reporters ____________ the court.

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EXP 2, 2016: SORTING OUT STIMULI

!1: stimuli with the coordination between the same gender conjuncts (MM, FF, NN)

!2: stimuli that include M (MF, MN, FM, NM)

!3: stimuli that do not include M (NF and FN)

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EXP 1 and 2, 2016: SV observe MF and MN and than FN and NF

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EXP 2, 2016: RESULTS

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EXP 2, 2016: DIFFERENT GENDER COORDINATION (with M: MF/FM/MN/NM)! expected difference between M in HCA/FCA and M in CCA

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EXP 2, 2016: DIFFERENT GENDER COORDINATION (with M)

! FM – 96.9% M MF – 71.0% M

! NM – 93.8% M MN – 62.4% M ! Significant difference between M as HCA/FCA and M as CCA

(combined difference approximately 95 : 66)

! Why this matters? ! because compared to NN and FF conditions: FF – 90.0 % and NN –

83.3% N ! M in FM and NM is almost at the ceiling, such as in MM (98.8%) !!!

! M in MF – 71% compared to 96.9% of M in FM

! M in MN – 62.4% compared to 93.8% of M in NM

! RESULTS obviously and strongly point in the direction of CCA agreement!

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EXP 1 and 2, 2016: INTERIM CONCLUSIONS

! Same gender conjunct agreement and different gender conjunct agreement with M point to two conclusions: ! 2. BEING MASC MATTERS

! not insignificant number of Masc in Non-Masc conditions (FF and NN)

! exceptionally high number of Masc in both +Masc condition (especially MF, MN)

! 1. LINEAR PROXIMITY MATTERS ! percentage of M in CCA is significantly higer than in

HCA/FCA ! F and N gain some ground only in CCA condition

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EXP 2, 2016: DIFFERENT GENDER COORDINATION (without M: FN/NF)! all three agreeement grammars, &P, HCA/FCA, PPA, expected

! F in FN and N in NF expected to reach the lowest realization (because being CCA matters)

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EXPERIMENT 3, 2018: GRAMMATICALITY PRODUCTION STUDY (with M. Tonković)

! EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN: only SV position ! 3 sets of experiments for 3 conditions: F and M, M and

F, (NEW:) M and almost all F ! NEW: animate and inanimate stimuli ! concrete and non-concrete stimuli (controlled in our

Croatian psycholinguistic database) ! 3 conditions, 2 variables, 4 combinations – 64 sentences (16

each: animate concrete, animate non-concrete, inanimate concrete, inanimate non-concrete)

! 90 participants

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! AC Redatelji i glumice su pametni pametne ! director.MASC.PL and actor.FEM.PL are smart.M.PL/FEM.PL

! AN-C Fizičari i biologinje su sposobni sposobne

! N-AC Kaputi i haljine su složeni složene

! N-AN-C Stavovi i teze su promjenjivi promjenjive

! controlled for pametne pametni/ pametni pametne

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EXP 3, 2018: PRELIMINARY RESULTS FM (out of 16)

,16

2,12

4,08

6,04

8,00

concrete abstract

animateinanimate

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EXP 3, 2018: PRELIMINARY RESULTS MF (out of 16)

0,00

2,00

4,00

6,00

8,00

concrete abstract

animateinanimate

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EXP 3, 2018: PRELIMINARY RESULTS M+almost all F (out of 16)

0,00

1,75

3,50

5,25

7,00

concrete abstract

animateinanimate

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EXP 3, 2018: RESULTS M+almost all F (out of 16)

! 7 out of 16: 44%

! statistically significant difference between animate and inanimate

! both concrete and abstract animate with ‘almost all’ reached the level of inanimate F (almost 30%) ! !!! Theory and typollogy reject this possibility

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EXP 1, 2 and 3: CONCLUSION

! there are at least three/four STRATEGIES OF AGREEMENT among speakers (&P, HCA/FCA, CCA)

! CCA most widely spread agreement grammar, most efficient in terms of data integration

! reinforcement of CC (in terms of IS) raises the chances of being chosen for agreement

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5. PROJECT MEGAHR/MEGACRO

! THE BUILDING BLOCKS OF CROATIAN MENTAL GRAMMAR: CONSTRAINTS OF INFORMATION STRUCTURE (MEGAHR/MEGACRO)

! THEORETICAL GROUNDING OF OUR WORK: Croatian is morphosyntactically rich and interesting language that can serve as a testing ground for intertwining of numerous grammatical relations, especially the ones at the interface of three relevant representational levels (phonoogical, morphosyntacic and semantic/conceptual).

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4. SEMANTIC MODULATION OF AGREEMENT AND WO

! THEORETICALLY: “same-except” principle (Peter Culicover & Ray Jackendoff (2012) Same-except: a domain-general cognitive relation and how language expresses it. Language, Volume 88, Number 2, June 2012, pp. 305-340)

! EXPERIMENTALLY: step by step experimentation

! AGREEMENT RESULTS: we managed to raise the proportion of AGR with second (weaker) conjunt by semantically modulating it

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5. MEGAHR

! METHODOLOGY: connecting theoretically informed quantitative and qualitative corpus and psycholinguistic research

! IMPORTANT: methodologically heterogeneous testing of processing ! grammaticality judgements ! sentence comprehension ! typology of errors

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COLLABORATORS AND EXPERTSlinguistiscs, psycholinguistics, developmental psychology, natural langauge processing, computational modeling, neurolinguistic modeling

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INFORMAL COLLABORATORS! MA STUDENTS:

! Doris Sulcer ! Matko Galić

! PROJECT COLLABORATION: ! individual work ! work in pairs and groups ! together we manage to investigate the range of questions

none of us would be able to do alone ! open access

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5. MEGACRO: WHAT IS COMPLETED?

!corpus HrWac – words more frequent than 3000 times: 7695 Nouns, 3124 Adjectives, 2849 Verbs (random choice of 1000 of each)

!Objective measures for 3000 words: ! Frequency in HrWac corpus! Number of graphemes

!Subjective measures for 3000 words (experimenting with 900 (+900) participants:

! Concreteness/Abstractness! Imageability! Relative frequency! Age of acquisition (AoA)

!MIN/MAX, MEAN VALUE, CENTRAL VALUE, STANDARD DEVIATION

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5. MEGAHR/MEGACRO: WHAT WE DO NOW?

! Preparing Croatian Psycholinguistic Database – 3000 Nouns, Verbs and Adjectives

! New 3000 words prepared - Croatian frequency dictionary and elementary school textbooks for 4, 5 and 6 grades ! testing for the same measures

! Plan to re-publish the database with 6000 words

! At the same time theoretical and experiemntal research on ! Agreement ! Ellipsis ! Word order

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THANK YOU!

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