{"title":"动词参数结构预测隐式因果关系:细粒度语义的优势","authors":"Joshua K. Hartshorne, J. Snedeker","doi":"10.1080/01690965.2012.689305","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"While the referent of a nonreflexive pronoun clearly depends on context, the nature of these contextual restrictions is controversial. The present study seeks to characterise one representation that guides pronoun resolution. Our focus is an effect known as “implicit causality”. In causal dependant clauses, the preferred referent of a pronoun varies systematically with the verb in the main clause (contrast Sally frightened Mary because she … with Sally feared Mary because she…). A number of researchers have tried to explain and predict such biases with reference to semantic classes of verbs. However, such studies have focused on a small number of specially selected verbs. In Experiment 1, we find that existing taxonomies perform near chance at predicting pronoun-resolution bias on a large set of representative verbs. However, a more fine-grained taxonomy recently proposed in the linguistics literature does significantly better. In Experiment 2, we tested all 264 verbs in two of the narrowly defined verb classes from this new taxonomy, finding that pronoun-resolution biases were categorically different. These findings suggest that the semantic structure of verbs tightly constrains the interpretation of pronouns in causal sentences, raising challenges for theories which posit that implicit causality biases reflect world knowledge or arbitrary lexical features.","PeriodicalId":87410,"journal":{"name":"Language and cognitive processes","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0000,"publicationDate":"2013-11-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/01690965.2012.689305","citationCount":"73","resultStr":"{\"title\":\"Verb argument structure predicts implicit causality: The advantages of finer-grained semantics\",\"authors\":\"Joshua K. Hartshorne, J. Snedeker\",\"doi\":\"10.1080/01690965.2012.689305\",\"DOIUrl\":null,\"url\":null,\"abstract\":\"While the referent of a nonreflexive pronoun clearly depends on context, the nature of these contextual restrictions is controversial. The present study seeks to characterise one representation that guides pronoun resolution. Our focus is an effect known as “implicit causality”. In causal dependant clauses, the preferred referent of a pronoun varies systematically with the verb in the main clause (contrast Sally frightened Mary because she … with Sally feared Mary because she…). A number of researchers have tried to explain and predict such biases with reference to semantic classes of verbs. However, such studies have focused on a small number of specially selected verbs. In Experiment 1, we find that existing taxonomies perform near chance at predicting pronoun-resolution bias on a large set of representative verbs. However, a more fine-grained taxonomy recently proposed in the linguistics literature does significantly better. In Experiment 2, we tested all 264 verbs in two of the narrowly defined verb classes from this new taxonomy, finding that pronoun-resolution biases were categorically different. These findings suggest that the semantic structure of verbs tightly constrains the interpretation of pronouns in causal sentences, raising challenges for theories which posit that implicit causality biases reflect world knowledge or arbitrary lexical features.\",\"PeriodicalId\":87410,\"journal\":{\"name\":\"Language and cognitive processes\",\"volume\":null,\"pages\":null},\"PeriodicalIF\":0.0000,\"publicationDate\":\"2013-11-12\",\"publicationTypes\":\"Journal Article\",\"fieldsOfStudy\":null,\"isOpenAccess\":false,\"openAccessPdf\":\"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/01690965.2012.689305\",\"citationCount\":\"73\",\"resultStr\":null,\"platform\":\"Semanticscholar\",\"paperid\":null,\"PeriodicalName\":\"Language and cognitive processes\",\"FirstCategoryId\":\"1085\",\"ListUrlMain\":\"https://doi.org/10.1080/01690965.2012.689305\",\"RegionNum\":0,\"RegionCategory\":null,\"ArticlePicture\":[],\"TitleCN\":null,\"AbstractTextCN\":null,\"PMCID\":null,\"EPubDate\":\"\",\"PubModel\":\"\",\"JCR\":\"\",\"JCRName\":\"\",\"Score\":null,\"Total\":0}","platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Language and cognitive processes","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1080/01690965.2012.689305","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"","JCRName":"","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 73
摘要
虽然非反身代词的指称物显然取决于上下文,但这些上下文限制的性质是有争议的。本研究试图描述一种指导代词分辨的表征。我们关注的是一种被称为“隐性因果关系”的效应。在因果从属从句中,代词的首选指称物会随着主句中的动词而系统地变化(对比Sally frightened Mary because she…和Sally fears Mary because she…)。许多研究人员试图用动词的语义类别来解释和预测这种偏见。然而,这些研究主要集中在少数专门挑选的动词上。在实验1中,我们发现现有的分类法在预测大量代表性动词的代词解析偏差方面表现得很接近。然而,最近在语言学文献中提出的一种更细粒度的分类法做得更好。在实验2中,我们测试了这个新分类法中两个狭义定义的动词类中的所有264个动词,发现代词解析偏差在类别上是不同的。这些发现表明,动词的语义结构严格限制了因果句中代词的解释,这对那些认为内隐因果偏差反映了世界知识或任意词汇特征的理论提出了挑战。
Verb argument structure predicts implicit causality: The advantages of finer-grained semantics
While the referent of a nonreflexive pronoun clearly depends on context, the nature of these contextual restrictions is controversial. The present study seeks to characterise one representation that guides pronoun resolution. Our focus is an effect known as “implicit causality”. In causal dependant clauses, the preferred referent of a pronoun varies systematically with the verb in the main clause (contrast Sally frightened Mary because she … with Sally feared Mary because she…). A number of researchers have tried to explain and predict such biases with reference to semantic classes of verbs. However, such studies have focused on a small number of specially selected verbs. In Experiment 1, we find that existing taxonomies perform near chance at predicting pronoun-resolution bias on a large set of representative verbs. However, a more fine-grained taxonomy recently proposed in the linguistics literature does significantly better. In Experiment 2, we tested all 264 verbs in two of the narrowly defined verb classes from this new taxonomy, finding that pronoun-resolution biases were categorically different. These findings suggest that the semantic structure of verbs tightly constrains the interpretation of pronouns in causal sentences, raising challenges for theories which posit that implicit causality biases reflect world knowledge or arbitrary lexical features.