Considering experimental and observational evidence of priming together, syntax doesn't look so autonomous.

Abstract

We agree with Branigan & Pickering (B&P) that structural priming experiments should supplant grammaticality judgments for testing linguistic representation. However, B&P overlook a vast (corpus-)linguistic literature that converges with-but extends-the experimental findings. B&P conclude that syntax is functionally independent of the lexicon. We argue that a broader approach to priming reveals cracks in the façade of syntactic autonomy.