Models used to explain phenomena are necessarily finer grained than the models used to measure them. In language study, the measures used to assess development (e.g., readability indices) rely on models of language that are too coarse grained to be interpreted in a linguistic framework and so do not participate in linguistic accounts of development. This study argues that the constructionist approaches provide a framework for the development of a practical and interpretable measure of developmental complexity because these approaches feature affordances from which a measurement model may be derived: they describe language knowledge as a comprehensive network of enumerable entities that do not require the imputation of external processes, are extensible to early child language, and hold that the drivers of language development are the learning and generalization of constructions. It is argued here that treating schematic constructions as the unit of language knowledge supports a complexity measure that can reflect developmental changes arising from the learning and productive generalization of these units.
{"title":"Using constructions to measure developmental language complexity","authors":"Robert Nelson","doi":"10.1515/cog-2023-0062","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/cog-2023-0062","url":null,"abstract":"Models used to explain phenomena are necessarily finer grained than the models used to measure them. In language study, the measures used to assess development (e.g., readability indices) rely on models of language that are too coarse grained to be interpreted in a linguistic framework and so do not participate in linguistic accounts of development. This study argues that the constructionist approaches provide a framework for the development of a practical and interpretable measure of developmental complexity because these approaches feature affordances from which a measurement model may be derived: they describe language knowledge as a comprehensive network of enumerable entities that do not require the imputation of external processes, are extensible to early child language, and hold that the drivers of language development are the learning and generalization of constructions. It is argued here that treating schematic constructions as the unit of language knowledge supports a complexity measure that can reflect developmental changes arising from the learning and productive generalization of these units.","PeriodicalId":51530,"journal":{"name":"Cognitive Linguistics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.7,"publicationDate":"2024-08-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142218350","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Studies of word predictability in context show that words in English tend to be shorter if they are predictable from the next word, and to a lesser extent, if they are predictable from the previous word. Some studies distinguish function and content words, but otherwise have not considered grammatical factors, treating all two-word sequences as comparable. Because function words are highly frequent, words occurring with them have low predictability. Highest predictability occurs within bigrams with two content words. Using the Buckeye corpus, we show that content word bigrams from different constructions vary widely in predictability, with adjective–noun and noun–noun sequences (content words within a noun phrase) having the highest scores. It is known that in adjective–noun sequences, the vowel of the adjective is shorter than in other positions. We study noun–noun sequences within the noun phrase and show that the first noun is shorter than in other contexts. It follows that the shorter duration of the first word when it is predictable from the second in many cases is due to the noun phrase construction and not necessarily the regulation of duration corresponding to predictable versus unpredictable information. We conclude that predictability studies must consider the constructions words occur in.
{"title":"The role of constructions in understanding predictability measures and their correspondence to word duration","authors":"Joan Bybee, Earl Kjar Brown","doi":"10.1515/cog-2023-0077","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/cog-2023-0077","url":null,"abstract":"Studies of word predictability in context show that words in English tend to be shorter if they are predictable from the next word, and to a lesser extent, if they are predictable from the previous word. Some studies distinguish function and content words, but otherwise have not considered grammatical factors, treating all two-word sequences as comparable. Because function words are highly frequent, words occurring with them have low predictability. Highest predictability occurs within bigrams with two content words. Using the Buckeye corpus, we show that content word bigrams from different constructions vary widely in predictability, with adjective–noun and noun–noun sequences (content words within a noun phrase) having the highest scores. It is known that in adjective–noun sequences, the vowel of the adjective is shorter than in other positions. We study noun–noun sequences within the noun phrase and show that the first noun is shorter than in other contexts. It follows that the shorter duration of the first word when it is predictable from the second in many cases is due to the noun phrase construction and not necessarily the regulation of duration corresponding to predictable versus unpredictable information. We conclude that predictability studies must consider the constructions words occur in.","PeriodicalId":51530,"journal":{"name":"Cognitive Linguistics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.7,"publicationDate":"2024-07-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141865150","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Event integration – the conflation of multiple events into a unitary event – plays a vital role in language and cognition. However, the conditions under which event integration occurs in linguistic representation and the differences in how linguistic forms encode complex events remain unclear. This corpus study examines two types of Japanese complex predicates – compound verbs [V1-V2]V and complex predicates consisting of a deverbal compound noun and the light verb suru ‘do’ [[V1-V2]Nsuru]V – using an original “related-event approach”. Findings indicate that [[V1-V2]Nsuru]V can be established based on coextensiveness alone, whereas [V1-V2]V typically requires direct or shared causality (“the inevitable co-occurrence constraint”). The related-event approach examines related events of linguistic concepts, such as causes and purposes of an event, identified through “complex sentences” from ultra-large-scale web corpora. This study demonstrates that such an approach is effective in clarifying causal relationships between verbs. Furthermore, this paper contributes to the “iconicity versus frequency” debate by showing that conceptually more accessible events (causality plus coextensiveness) tend to be represented in a simpler form than less accessible events (coextensiveness only), due to “efficiency”. The frequency of usage is a result of the nature of concepts rather than the driving force of coding asymmetries.
{"title":"A related-event approach to event integration in Japanese complex predicates: iconicity, frequency, or efficiency?","authors":"Yiting Chen","doi":"10.1515/cog-2023-0041","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/cog-2023-0041","url":null,"abstract":"Event integration – the conflation of multiple events into a unitary event – plays a vital role in language and cognition. However, the conditions under which event integration occurs in linguistic representation and the differences in how linguistic forms encode complex events remain unclear. This corpus study examines two types of Japanese complex predicates – compound verbs [V1-V2]<jats:sub>V</jats:sub> and complex predicates consisting of a deverbal compound noun and the light verb <jats:italic>suru</jats:italic> ‘do’ [[V1-V2]<jats:sub>N</jats:sub> <jats:italic>suru</jats:italic>]<jats:sub>V</jats:sub> – using an original “related-event approach”. Findings indicate that [[V1-V2]<jats:sub>N</jats:sub> <jats:italic>suru</jats:italic>]<jats:sub>V</jats:sub> can be established based on coextensiveness alone, whereas [V1-V2]<jats:sub>V</jats:sub> typically requires direct or shared causality (“the inevitable co-occurrence constraint”). The related-event approach examines related events of linguistic concepts, such as causes and purposes of an event, identified through “complex sentences” from ultra-large-scale web corpora. This study demonstrates that such an approach is effective in clarifying causal relationships between verbs. Furthermore, this paper contributes to the “iconicity versus frequency” debate by showing that conceptually more accessible events (causality plus coextensiveness) tend to be represented in a simpler form than less accessible events (coextensiveness only), due to “efficiency”. The frequency of usage is a result of the nature of concepts rather than the driving force of coding asymmetries.","PeriodicalId":51530,"journal":{"name":"Cognitive Linguistics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.7,"publicationDate":"2024-07-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141772604","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The present paper addresses the notion of multimodal constructions. It argues that Tell me about it is a multimodal construction that consists of a fixed spoken and a variable, but largely obligatory multimodality slot on the formal side of the construction. To substantiate this claim, the paper reports on an experiment that shows that, first, hearers experience difficulties in interpreting Tell me about it when it is neither sequentially nor multimodally marked as either requesting or stance-related and, second, hearers considerably rely on multimodal features when a sequential context is missing. In addition, the experiment also shows that the more features are used, the better hearers get at guessing the meaning of Tell me about it. These results suggest that, independent of the question of whether the multimodal features associated with requesting or stance-related Tell me about it are non-spoken, unimodal constructions themselves (like a raised eyebrows construction), a schematic multimodality slot might be part of the constructions.
{"title":"Multimodal constructions revisited. Testing the strength of association between spoken and non-spoken features of Tell me about it","authors":"Claudia Lehmann","doi":"10.1515/cog-2023-0095","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/cog-2023-0095","url":null,"abstract":"The present paper addresses the notion of multimodal constructions. It argues that <jats:italic>Tell me about it</jats:italic> is a multimodal construction that consists of a fixed spoken and a variable, but largely obligatory multimodality slot on the formal side of the construction. To substantiate this claim, the paper reports on an experiment that shows that, first, hearers experience difficulties in interpreting <jats:italic>Tell me about it</jats:italic> when it is neither sequentially nor multimodally marked as either requesting or stance-related and, second, hearers considerably rely on multimodal features when a sequential context is missing. In addition, the experiment also shows that the more features are used, the better hearers get at guessing the meaning of <jats:italic>Tell me about it</jats:italic>. These results suggest that, independent of the question of whether the multimodal features associated with requesting or stance-related <jats:italic>Tell me about it</jats:italic> are non-spoken, unimodal constructions themselves (like a <jats:sc>raised eyebrows</jats:sc> construction), a schematic multimodality slot might be part of the constructions.","PeriodicalId":51530,"journal":{"name":"Cognitive Linguistics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.7,"publicationDate":"2024-07-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141609626","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract Given the colexification of perception and cognition, Georgakopoulos et al. (2022. Universal and macro-areal patterns in the lexicon: A case-study in the perception-cognition domain. Linguistic Typology 26(2). 439–487) claim that uncontrolled experience rather than controlled activity has a direct linkage to cognition. To test whether this is a universal tendency, this study conducts a contrastive behavioral profile analysis of two basic vision verbs in Mandarin: kàn, a controlled activity verb, and jiàn, an uncontrolled experience verb. The results show that (i) both kàn and jiàn colexify visual activity and cognitive senses; (ii) kàn is able to express a wider range of cognitive meanings, i.e., know, understand, and think, whereas jiàn only extends into know; and (iii) visual and cognitive meanings have more proximal relationships in the colexification pattern of kàn than that of jiàn. The study confirms the universality of the colexification between vision and cognition while providing counterexamples to the above-mentioned large data-based findings. Accordingly, a dichotomy of controlled activity versus uncontrolled experience is proposed for the colexification of vision and cognition in cognitive typology.
Abstract Given the colexification of perception and cognition, Georgakopoulos et al.词典中的普遍和宏观真实模式：感知-认知领域的案例研究。Linguistic Typology 26(2).439-487）声称，不受控制的经验而非受控制的活动与认知有着直接的联系。为了检验这是否是一种普遍倾向，本研究对普通话中的两个基本视觉动词进行了对比性行为特征分析：kàn（受控活动动词）和jiàn（非受控经验动词）。结果表明：(i) kàn 和 jiàn 都复用了视觉活动和认知感官；(ii) kàn 能够表达更广泛的认知意义，即知道、理解和思考，而 jiàn 只能扩展到知道；(iii) 视觉和认知意义在 kàn 的复用模式中比在 jiàn 的复用模式中具有更近的关系。该研究证实了视觉与认知之间复用的普遍性，同时也为上述基于大数据的研究结果提供了反例。据此，提出了认知类型学中视觉与认知共时化的可控活动与不可控经验的二分法。
{"title":"The colexification of vision and cognition in Mandarin: controlled activity surpasses uncontrolled experience","authors":"Ying Dai, Yicheng Wu","doi":"10.1515/cog-2023-0045","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/cog-2023-0045","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Given the colexification of perception and cognition, Georgakopoulos et al. (2022. Universal and macro-areal patterns in the lexicon: A case-study in the perception-cognition domain. Linguistic Typology 26(2). 439–487) claim that uncontrolled experience rather than controlled activity has a direct linkage to cognition. To test whether this is a universal tendency, this study conducts a contrastive behavioral profile analysis of two basic vision verbs in Mandarin: kàn, a controlled activity verb, and jiàn, an uncontrolled experience verb. The results show that (i) both kàn and jiàn colexify visual activity and cognitive senses; (ii) kàn is able to express a wider range of cognitive meanings, i.e., know, understand, and think, whereas jiàn only extends into know; and (iii) visual and cognitive meanings have more proximal relationships in the colexification pattern of kàn than that of jiàn. The study confirms the universality of the colexification between vision and cognition while providing counterexamples to the above-mentioned large data-based findings. Accordingly, a dichotomy of controlled activity versus uncontrolled experience is proposed for the colexification of vision and cognition in cognitive typology.","PeriodicalId":51530,"journal":{"name":"Cognitive Linguistics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.7,"publicationDate":"2024-06-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141356945","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Gordana Hržica, Sara Košutar, Tomislava Bošnjak Botica, Petar Milin
Entrenchment and schematisation are the two most important cognitive processes in language acquisition. In this article, the role of the two processes, operationalised by token and type frequency, in the production of overgeneralised verb forms in Croatian preschool children is investigated using a parental questionnaire and computational simulation of language acquisition. The participants of the questionnaire were parents of children aged 3;0–5;11 years (n = 174). The results showed that parents of most children (93 %) reported the parallel use of both adult-like and overgeneralised verb forms, suggesting that Croatian-speaking preschool children have not yet fully acquired the verbal system. The likelihood of overgeneralised forms being reported decreases with the age of the children and verb type frequency. The results of the computational simulation show that patterns with a higher type frequency also show a greater preference for the correct form, while lexical items show both learning and unlearning tendencies during the process.
{"title":"The role of entrenchment and schematisation in the acquisition of rich verbal morphology","authors":"Gordana Hržica, Sara Košutar, Tomislava Bošnjak Botica, Petar Milin","doi":"10.1515/cog-2023-0022","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/cog-2023-0022","url":null,"abstract":"Entrenchment and schematisation are the two most important cognitive processes in language acquisition. In this article, the role of the two processes, operationalised by token and type frequency, in the production of overgeneralised verb forms in Croatian preschool children is investigated using a parental questionnaire and computational simulation of language acquisition. The participants of the questionnaire were parents of children aged 3;0–5;11 years (<jats:italic>n</jats:italic> = 174). The results showed that parents of most children (93 %) reported the parallel use of both adult-like and overgeneralised verb forms, suggesting that Croatian-speaking preschool children have not yet fully acquired the verbal system. The likelihood of overgeneralised forms being reported decreases with the age of the children and verb type frequency. The results of the computational simulation show that patterns with a higher type frequency also show a greater preference for the correct form, while lexical items show both learning and unlearning tendencies during the process.","PeriodicalId":51530,"journal":{"name":"Cognitive Linguistics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.7,"publicationDate":"2024-04-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140809734","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Tamara Bouso, Marianne Hundt, Laetitia Van Driessche
A central aim of Construction Grammar is to model links within the construct-i-con. This paper investigates three constructions that share one property: an atypical element in the object slot. The constructions are therefore not prototypically transitive. Structural priming (implemented with an automatic maze variant of self-paced reading) is used to test hypotheses on the relation among the Reaction Objoid (She smiled her thanks), the Cognate Objoid (She smiled a sweet smile or He told a sly tale), and the Superlative Objoid (She smiled her sweetest) Construction, and between two variants of the latter (They worked (at) their hardest). Results support transitivity as gradient: intransitive COCs prime the ROC and the SOC, whereas COCs with transitives only prime the ROC. For variants of the SOC, we find evidence of asymmetric priming with the bare SOC priming the at-SOC. Within-construction priming effects in the SOC are of greater magnitude than those with the at-SOC and the latter are weaker than those of the COC and of a rather different nature than those from the ROC. This suggests that speakers, rather than creating a constructeme between the bare and the at-SOC, store distinct but closely related constructions on a cline of transitivity.
{"title":"A sisterhood of constructions? A structural priming approach to modelling links in the network of Objoid Constructions","authors":"Tamara Bouso, Marianne Hundt, Laetitia Van Driessche","doi":"10.1515/cog-2023-0103","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/cog-2023-0103","url":null,"abstract":"A central aim of Construction Grammar is to model links within the construct-i-con. This paper investigates three constructions that share one property: an atypical element in the object slot. The constructions are therefore not prototypically transitive. Structural priming (implemented with an automatic maze variant of self-paced reading) is used to test hypotheses on the relation among the Reaction Objoid (<jats:italic>She smiled her thanks</jats:italic>), the Cognate Objoid (<jats:italic>She smiled a sweet smile</jats:italic> or <jats:italic>He told a sly tale</jats:italic>), and the Superlative Objoid (<jats:italic>She smiled her sweetest</jats:italic>) Construction, and between two variants of the latter (<jats:italic>They worked (at) their hardest</jats:italic>). Results support transitivity as gradient: intransitive COCs prime the ROC and the SOC, whereas COCs with transitives only prime the ROC. For variants of the SOC, we find evidence of asymmetric priming with the bare SOC priming the <jats:italic>at-</jats:italic>SOC. Within-construction priming effects in the SOC are of greater magnitude than those with the <jats:italic>at-</jats:italic>SOC and the latter are weaker than those of the COC and of a rather different nature than those from the ROC. This suggests that speakers, rather than creating a constructeme between the bare and the <jats:italic>at-</jats:italic>SOC, store distinct but closely related constructions on a cline of transitivity.","PeriodicalId":51530,"journal":{"name":"Cognitive Linguistics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.7,"publicationDate":"2024-04-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140831735","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This special issue of Cognitive Linguistics reexamines the notions of uniformity and variability within morphological systems from a cognitive linguistic standpoint. It challenges traditional perspectives that regard morphological variability as mere deviations from the norm, suggesting instead that such variability is systematic and shaped by external influences including language acquisition and processing constraints. The contributions in this issue promote a shift from isolated analysis to a holistic view of paradigms, classes, and systems, advocating for a framework where morphological structures are seen as integral to communicative and functional aspects of language. By accounting for the broad adaptive dynamics of language systems, the complex interplay between uniformity and variability is revealed as an inherent aspect of language usage.
{"title":"Cognitive approaches to uniformity and variability in morphology","authors":"Petar Milin, Neil Bermel, James P. Blevins","doi":"10.1515/cog-2024-0027","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/cog-2024-0027","url":null,"abstract":"This special issue of Cognitive Linguistics reexamines the notions of uniformity and variability within morphological systems from a cognitive linguistic standpoint. It challenges traditional perspectives that regard morphological variability as mere deviations from the norm, suggesting instead that such variability is systematic and shaped by external influences including language acquisition and processing constraints. The contributions in this issue promote a shift from isolated analysis to a holistic view of paradigms, classes, and systems, advocating for a framework where morphological structures are seen as integral to communicative and functional aspects of language. By accounting for the broad adaptive dynamics of language systems, the complex interplay between uniformity and variability is revealed as an inherent aspect of language usage.","PeriodicalId":51530,"journal":{"name":"Cognitive Linguistics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.7,"publicationDate":"2024-04-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140602789","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Neil Bermel, Luděk Knittl, Martin Alldrick, Alexandre Nikolaev
This article approaches defective and overabundant paradigm cells as an opportunity and pitfall for usage-based linguistics. Through reference to two production tasks involving native speakers of Czech, we show how definitions of these two categories are problematized when multiple forms per context are entrenched, or when pre-emption seems to occur in the absence of entrenchment: in other words, pre-emption occurs via entrenchment of uncertainty. We explain the results by adopting a broader, usage-based perspective. We examine the relationship between frequency (as proxy for exposure) and reference-work information (as proxy for a priori structure) to assess their connection with our experimental results. We assign a role to frequency as helping to form perceptions of “suitable” and “unsuitable” forms, but also note places where non-frequency factors predominate. “Structure” as represented by reference-work recommendations appears to have no significant connection to our experimental results; we discuss reasons for this.
{"title":"Ideal and real paradigms: language users, reference works and corpora","authors":"Neil Bermel, Luděk Knittl, Martin Alldrick, Alexandre Nikolaev","doi":"10.1515/cog-2023-0032","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/cog-2023-0032","url":null,"abstract":"This article approaches defective and overabundant paradigm cells as an opportunity and pitfall for usage-based linguistics. Through reference to two production tasks involving native speakers of Czech, we show how definitions of these two categories are problematized when multiple forms per context are entrenched, or when pre-emption seems to occur in the absence of entrenchment: in other words, pre-emption occurs via entrenchment of uncertainty. We explain the results by adopting a broader, usage-based perspective. We examine the relationship between frequency (as proxy for exposure) and reference-work information (as proxy for <jats:italic>a priori</jats:italic> structure) to assess their connection with our experimental results. We assign a role to frequency as helping to form perceptions of “suitable” and “unsuitable” forms, but also note places where non-frequency factors predominate. “Structure” as represented by reference-work recommendations appears to have no significant connection to our experimental results; we discuss reasons for this.","PeriodicalId":51530,"journal":{"name":"Cognitive Linguistics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.7,"publicationDate":"2024-03-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140070244","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This study of morphological overabundance focuses on the (non-)synonymy of parallel forms in Estonian illative case (‘into’) and the type of entrenchment behind it. We focus on the lexical level, testing whether the form preferred for a lexeme depends on semantic or morphophonological factors, or both. Using multifactorial regression analyses, we compare three corpus datasets: lexemes biased toward long forms, those biased toward short forms and lexemes with balanced form distribution. This is the first study to investigate realised overabundance in this way, and to include inflection class membership in the model, enabling us to test whether declension class subsumes the morphophonological factors found to affect form preference in previous studies. The analysis shows that cell token frequency and inflection class are significant predictors of form preference, while the lexical-semantic features included in the study do not affect formative choice, highlighting the role of cell entrenchment instead of formative entrenchment in guiding form use. In conclusion, the study highlights the important role of inflection class (morphophonology) in the general shaping of form usage patterns in parallel forms and the weak role of semantic factors on the lexical level.
{"title":"Preferences in the use of overabundance: predictors of lexical bias in Estonian","authors":"Mari Aigro, Virve-Anneli Vihman","doi":"10.1515/cog-2023-0035","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/cog-2023-0035","url":null,"abstract":"This study of morphological overabundance focuses on the (non-)synonymy of parallel forms in Estonian illative case (‘into’) and the type of entrenchment behind it. We focus on the lexical level, testing whether the form preferred for a lexeme depends on semantic or morphophonological factors, or both. Using multifactorial regression analyses, we compare three corpus datasets: lexemes biased toward long forms, those biased toward short forms and lexemes with balanced form distribution. This is the first study to investigate realised overabundance in this way, and to include inflection class membership in the model, enabling us to test whether declension class subsumes the morphophonological factors found to affect form preference in previous studies. The analysis shows that cell token frequency and inflection class are significant predictors of form preference, while the lexical-semantic features included in the study do not affect formative choice, highlighting the role of cell entrenchment instead of formative entrenchment in guiding form use. In conclusion, the study highlights the important role of inflection class (morphophonology) in the general shaping of form usage patterns in parallel forms and the weak role of semantic factors on the lexical level.","PeriodicalId":51530,"journal":{"name":"Cognitive Linguistics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.7,"publicationDate":"2024-02-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140019467","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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