The Lexico-Syntactic Interface: Psych Verbs and Psych Nouns

Abstract

The syntax of psychological (psych) nouns shows that there is actually a semantic difference between direct and reverse psych verbs that can be codified in aspectual terms. In the case of direct psych verbs we have a path function going from the experiencer to the target of emotion, while in the case of the reverse verbs we have a situation defined by a cause and a resultative state in which the experiencer is involved. Voorst's Involvement Theory determined that the first participant in the situation is the subject, the experiencer in the case of direct verbs and the cause in the case of reverse verbs, while the object of termination is the direct object. propose that the direct object is subject to an additional requirement of participation in the event in its whole extension. This requirement defines the difference between transitivity and intransitivity.