Word category and verb-argument structure information in the dynamics of parsing

Frisch, Hahne, and Friedericie (2004) Cognition

Word class information

Major word categories: nouns, verbs, prepositions, adverbs, etc.

Necessary for telling whether a concatenation of words is legal or not in that language e.g. ‘the doctor’ (Determiner + noun) is okay ‘the of’ (Determiner + determiner) is not

Phrase structures

Different members of the same category can have different, lexeme-specific relationships to other elementse.g (1a) Anne visited the doctor last summer. (2) * Anne sneezed the doctor last summer.

Different views

Both phrase structure and argument structure information are used to restrict the number of structural alternatives

Phrase structure preferences alone are used for initial sentence processing

Visit Usually appears after a grammatical subject (can be a noun, can be a gerund) Usually doesn't appear after a preposition or a determiner Needs to be conjugated for distinctions like number, person, voice, mood, and

tense, etc. Usually takes two arguments (the one who is visited and the one who visits) The visitor is usually animate

Work Usually appears after a grammatical subject (can be a noun, can be a gerund) Usually doesn’t appear after a preposition or a determiner Needs to be conjugated for distinctions like number, person, voice, mood, and

tense, etc. Usually takes one argument (the one who works) The argument is usually animate

Doctor Usually appears after a determiner or an article Usually takes the thematic role of ‘agent’ …….. …… …….

Different views

Both phrase structure and argument structure information are used to restrict the number of structural alternatives

Phrase structure preferences alone are used for initial sentence processing

Does word class information processed prior to argument information?

What happens if there are double violations? Additive or not?

ERP components

Qualitative difference—different latencies, spatial distributions or polarities in different conditions

Quantitative difference—amplitude modulations without changes in latency or topography

(E)LAN N400 P600

N400

left anterior negativity (LAN)

Expect the Unexpected: Event-related Brain--Response to Morphosyntactic Violations Coulson, King and Kutas 1998 Language and cognitive processes, 13 (1), 21-58

P600

Expect the Unexpected: Event-related Brain--Response to Morphosyntactic Violations Coulson, King and Kutas 1998 LANGUAGE AND COGNITIVE PROCESSES, 13 (1), 21-58

Conditions 2 (phrase structure) *2(argument structure)

Correct in the garden was often worked and……(“Work was often going on in the garden.”)

Phrase structure violation only in the garden was on-the worked and……

Argument structure violation only the garden was often worked and……

Phrase structure+ argument structure violation the garden was on-the worked and……

160 critical items+160 filler items

Procedure

Word by word visual presentation Duration 400ms Inter-stimulus interval 100ms

Subjects were asked to perform an acceptability judgment 800ms after the final word of each sentence.

ERP recordings

Data analysis Trials with incorrect responses and/or ocular artifacts are

excluded from the averages. Time window: 300-600 (for N400 effect)

600-1200 (for P600 effect)

Experiment 1

Procedure

Word by word visual presentation Duration 400ms Inter-stimulus interval 100ms

Subjects were asked to perform an acceptability judgment 800ms after the final word of each sentence.

ERP recordings

Data analysis Trials with incorrect responses and/or ocular artifacts are

excluded from the averages. Time window: 300-600ms (for N400 effect)

600-1200ms (for P600 effect)

Experiment 1

Prediction

LAN N400 P600

Phrase structure violation

()

Argument structure violation

Double violation

() ?

Results =Exp 1= Exper 1(visual) Fig. 1.

Results =Exp 1=

Results =Exp 1=

Summary

LAN N400 P600

Phrase structure violation

Argument structure violation

Double violation

Procedure

Auditory presentation Normal speech rate

Subjects were asked to perform an acceptability judgment 800ms after the final word of each sentence.

ERP recordings

Data analysis Trials with incorrect responses and/or ocular artifacts are

excluded from the averages. Time window: 200-400 (for ELAN effect)

300-500 (for N400 effect) 700-1200 (for P600 effect)

Experiment 2

Prediction

LAN N400 P600

Phrase structure violation

Argument structure violation

Double violation

?

Results =Exp 2=

Exper 2(auditory) Fig. 4.

Results =Exp 2=

Results =Exp 2=

Summary

LAN N400 P600

Phrase structure violation

Argument structure violation

Double violation

=comparison=

Exper 1(visual) Exper 2 (auditory) Fig. 4.Fig. 1.

Exper 1(visual) Exper 2 (auditory)

Fig. 5.Fig. 2.

=comparison= =comparison=

Exper 1(visual) Exper 2 (auditory)

Fig. 5.Fig. 3.

=comparison= =comparison=

Summary

The integration of major category information and of lexeme-specific argument taking properties of verbs elicit qualitatively different brain responses.

Phrase structure violation elicit (a LAN followed by) a P600 in the ERP

The LAN effect is more robust in the auditory modality, and is only marginally significant in the visual modality.

Argument structure mismatches is associated with larger N400-P600 responses.

Sentences containing double violations (phrase & argument violation) elicited similar responses as sentences containing phrase violation along

(a LAN followed by) a P600 in the ERP BUT no N400 effect!! The P600 doesn't seem to be additive when compared with two other

conditions

General discussion The early phrase structure violation correlate –LAN

The presence of a LAN is independent of an additional argument structure violation

supports the view that there exits a correlate for initial phrase structure processing.

General discussion The lexical integration effect –N400 The larger N400 in this biphasic response indicates the

semantic/thematic problems which arise when a NP argument cannot be assigned a thematic role by the verb

The absence of N400 effect in the double violation condition supports the structure-first approaches to parsing There is a functional priority of word category integration (phrase

structure processing) over the integration of all other information types (e.g. argument structure)

Failure to integrate phrase structures would block the following argument structure integration.

General discussion The post-initial evaluation effect –P600 The P600 elicited in the two different kind of violation may reflect

different kind of syntactic repair due to differences in the nature of the violations

Phrase structure—concatenating items to derive a phrase structure representation

Argument structure—matching process between a (legal)structure output and more detailed information from the specific lexical entry

The non-additive P600 in the double violation condition Ceiling effect, or The revision processes are primarily determined by phrase structure

violations, and are independently of other types of information.

Conclusion Mismatch of major category information leads to an

enhanced LAN as well as P600.

Lexeme specific argument taking properties of verbs is associated with a less reduced N400 and an enlarged P600.

The successful integration of word category information typically precedes the application of verb-argument structure information.

Questions?

All critical words in the experimental item as well as filler items are repeated for 4 times.

Some researchers had found larger N400 for Phrase structure violations

A word may have more than one argument structure, like Frank sneezed the napkin off the table.

Is the distinction between major category information and argument information theory (e.g. GB) specific? Could it be…

If failure of integrating word category information blocks integration of other information, we will never be able to pick up new grammatical use of words and won’t be able to understand sentences like this one “Don’t you try to blue pin me.”

Questions?

All critical words in the experimental item as well as filler items are repeated for 4 times.

Some researchers had found larger N400 for Phrase structure violations

A word may have more than one argument structure, like Frank sneezed the napkin off the table.

Is the distinction between major category information and argument information theory (e.g. GB) specific? Could it be…

If failure of integrating word category information blocks integration of other information, we will never be able to pick up new grammatical use of words and won’t be able to understand sentences like this one “Don’t you try to blue pin me.”

Federmeier, Kara D; Segal, Jessica B; Lombrozo, Tania; Kutas, Marta. Brain responses to nouns, verbs and class-ambiguous words in context. Brain. Vol 123(12) Dec 2000, 2552-2566.

Questions?

All critical words in the experimental item as well as filler items are repeated for 4 times.

Some researchers had found larger N400 for Phrase structure violations

A word may have more than one argument structure, like Frank sneezed the napkin off the table.

Is the distinction between major category information and argument information theory (e.g. GB) specific? Could it be…

If failure of integrating word category information blocks integration of other information, we will never be able to pick up new grammatical use of words and won’t be able to understand sentences like this one “Don’t you try to blue pin me.”

Questions?

All critical words in the experimental item as well as filler items are repeated for 4 times.

Some researchers had found larger N400 for Phrase structure violations

A word may have more than one argument structure, like Frank sneezed the napkin off the table.

Is the distinction between major category information and argument information theory (e.g. GB) specific? Could it be…

If failure of integrating word category information blocks integration of other information, we will never be able to pick up new grammatical use of words and won’t be able to understand sentences like this one “Don’t you try to blue pin me.”

Questions?

All critical words in the experimental item as well as filler items are repeated for 4 times.

Some researchers had found larger N400 for Phrase structure violations

A word may have more than one argument structure, like Frank sneezed the napkin off the table.

Is the distinction between major category information and argument information theory (e.g. GB) specific? Could it be…

If failure of integrating word category information blocks integration of other information, we will never be able to pick up new grammatical use of words and won’t be able to understand sentences like this one “Don’t you try to blue pin me.”

Early left anterior negativity

Adapted from