Abstract
Cataphoric dependencies where a pronoun precedes its antecedent appear to call on different mechanisms in language comprehension from forward dependencies where the antecedent precedes the pronoun. Previous research has shown that the resolution of cataphoric dependencies involves predictive processes such as the active search mechanism, which hypothesizes the automatic search for an antecedent immediately after encountering a cataphoric pronoun. The current study employs gender mismatch to investigate whether the active search for an antecedent of a cataphoric pronoun is restricted only to grammatically licit positions. We present results from an event-related potential experiment on the reading comprehension of cataphoric dependencies in Dutch. Results show that gender mismatch gives rise to an anterior negativity at grammatically licit antecedent positions only. We hypothesize that this negativity reflects the prediction failure for an antecedent after encountering a pronoun, rather than a gender mismatch. We discuss the timing, topography and functionality of this negativity with respect to previous studies and how this relates to the ERPs elicited in the processing of structural constraints on pronoun resolution.
Highlights
The on-line interpretation of pronominal dependencies has raised several questions within theories of sentence comprehension
We investigated event related potential (ERP) at the subject position of the embedded clause, Lodewijk, which is the first potential antecedent position in the sentence if there is no Principle C violation
This confirms our predictions that (i) an active search for an antecedent is initiated as soon as a cataphoric pronoun is processed and that, (ii) the active search mechanism (ASM) can be automatically initiated for every pronoun, which referential expression will be considered by the ASM is constrained by grammatical principles
Summary
The on-line interpretation of pronominal dependencies has raised several questions within theories of sentence comprehension. In the case of backward dependencies, the ASM hypothesizes that the human parser automatically starts a search for an antecedent in the upcoming sentence immediately after encountering a cataphoric pronoun This has been shown in behavioral studies through gender mismatch effect (GMME) observations in experimental paradigms where possible antecedents for cataphoric pronouns are restricted by grammatical principles (Sturt, 2003; Van Gompel and Liversedge, 2003; Kazanina et al, 2007; Yoshida et al, 2014). We postulate that the ERP component observed in cataphoric dependencies is related to a failure of a prediction by the parser, in line with the active search approach, while in the case of forward antecedent dependencies the effect can only be connected to a gender mismatch as no prediction is made (the pronoun is not required to interpret the antecedent)
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