Sentence-final Position Research Articles

Processing instruction on the Spanish passive with transfer-of-training effects to anaphoric and cataphoric reference contexts

AbstractTransfer-of-training effects with processing instruction have recently been reported in the literature. That is, L2 learners receive processing instruction on one particular linguistic item and, as a consequence of instruction, learners' performance improves not only on the particular linguistic item but on other linguistic items as well. The present study examines processing instruction on the Spanish passive, the word order of which places the patient in the grammatical role of subject in sentence initial position and the agent as the object of a preposition in sentence final position. The purpose of the study is to determine whether learners transfer the training they receive on processing the word order of passive sentences to their processing of sentences with anaphoric reference, specifically, accusative case pronouns for which the word order is O

Functional head properties of the degree word Hen in Mandarin Chinese

Drawing on syntactic evidence, this paper shows that the functional projection DegP is attested in Mandarin Chinese, and the degree word hen ‘very’ heads DegP. The former finding is based on the fact that the string hen-XP exhibits a different distribution from XP. The latter finding is based on the facts that hen and adjective reduplication are in complementary distribution, and that hen can be stranded at the sentence-final position, like some other head elements in the language.

A Pragmatic-Functional Account for Indirect Object Alternation in English Literary Works

This study was intended to demonstrate that two types of indirect object alternation in English literary works have different functions in discourse in association with discoursal principles such as ‘end-weight’ or ‘end-focus’ principle and ‘the given-new information’ principle. This study hypothesized the structure of ‘S + V + + D.O’ is employed more frequently than the structure of ‘S + V + + Preposition + I.O’. This means that the more frequent structure can be an efficient language device along with the discoursal principles. Based on the analysis of data from three English novels, this study yielded some interesting findings as follows. First, the sentence structure of S + V + + D.O is much more frequently used than the structure of S + V + + Preposition + I.O in English literature. Second, in English literature, the indirect objects in the sentence-final position may be a focal point caused by ‘end-focus principle. Finally, direct objects in the sentence-final position have a strong tendency to be longer than the indirect objects in the same position due to ‘end-weight’ principle.

Morpho-Syntactic Load in Judging Adjective Plural Agreement

The study examined the impact of two grammatical factors on marking Hebrew adjectives in agreement with plural nouns in adults with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) compared with peers without ADHD. Participants were 36 adult speakers of Hebrew, who were administered a judgment test of 144 sentences, each containing an adjective in agreement with a plural noun in one of three different syntactic configurations—predicative adjectives, attributive adjectives in sentence–initial position, and attributive adjectives in sentence–final position. Noun suffixes were regular, semiregular (ambiguous), and irregular. Findings showed that participants with ADHD displayed lower accuracy and longer response time compared with controls. As morphological and morpho-syntactic difficulty simultaneously increased, participants with ADHD were significantly more likely to perform less well compared with controls on both accuracy and speed. These findings indicate that adults with ADHD might be suffering from a linguistic impairment exacerbated under more cognitively and linguistically demanding conditions.

Contextual learning of L2 word meanings: second language proficiency modulates behavioural and event-related brain potential (ERP) indicators of learning

New word learning occurs incidentally through exposure to language. Hypothesising that effectiveness of contextual word learning in a second language (L2) depends on the quality of existing lexical semantic knowledge, we tested more and less proficient adult bilinguals in an incidental word learning task. One day after being exposed to rare words in an L2 (English) reading task, the bilinguals read sentences with the newly learned words in the sentence-final position, followed by related or unrelated meaning probes. Both proficiency groups showed some learning through faster responses on related trials and a frontal N400 effect observed during probe word reading. However, word learning was more robust for the higher proficiency group, who showed a larger semantic relatedness effect in unfamiliar contexts and a canonical N400 (central–parietal). The results suggest that the ability to learn the meanings of new words from a context depends on the L2 lexical semantic knowledge of the reader.

Effect of visual support on the processing of multiclausal sentences

Processing morphemic elements is one of the most difficult parts of second language acquisition (DeKeyser, 2005; Larsen-Freeman, 2010). This difficulty gains prominence when second language (L2) learners must perform under time pressure, and difficulties arise in using grammatical knowledge. To solve the problem, the current study used the tenets of multimedia learning theory (Mayer, 2005) to help L2 learners’ reconstruct multiclausal sentences. This theory assumes that limitations in cognitive capacity are reduced when information is given to learners both visually and aurally. Given this assumption, the current study examined whether pictorial information helps L2 learners process morphemic elements in multiclausal sentences presented aurally. Thirty-two learners of Japanese engaged in elicited imitation both with and without pictorial support. The results revealed that the learners performed significantly better with pictorial support, lending support to multimedia learning theory for L2 learners’ processing of morphemic elements. However, a limited effect of pictorial support was found for the processing of an element that the L2 learners had learned recently, and that was in sentence-final position, suggesting that these types of items are difficult to automatize regardless of cognitive support.

The Evolution ofɦi23kã34(‘he says’) in Shanghainese

This paper presents a novel analysis of the grammaticalization path of the various uses of ɦi23ka34 (‘he says’) in modern Shanghainese. We propose that ɦi23ka34 originated from a quotative clause, then developed its reportative use by making the source of information obscure (in the sentence-final position), and finally integrated with the proposition to form a modal particle indicative of the speaker’s subjective evaluation. Recently, ɦi23ka34 has been raised to topic position to serve as a topic-marking function; specifically, one that expresses a counter-expectation meaning. The whole process can be chronologized as follows: quotative clause > reportative clause > modal particle > topic-marking particle. Such a path is considered to be elegant and practical since not only do the stages involved gracefully follow the principles of grammaticalization as delineated by Hopper (1991, 1996), but it is also helpful for the analysis of similar patterns across languages.

El foco informativo y la posición sintáctica de los depictivos orientados al sujeto en español

En este artículo analizamos la posición sintáctica de los depictivos orientados al sujeto (DOS) - como cansado en Juan llegó cansado al partido - con respecto a otros constituyentes posverbales como el objeto directo (Od) y los adjuntos locativos (LOC). La base empírica de nuestro estudio resulta de un experimento de producción en el que consideramos de manera sistemática el factor del foco informativo (36 participantes, realizado en Córdoba/España, febrero 2012). Los principales resultados acerca de la relación entre el foco informativo y la posición sintáctica del DOS frente a Od y LOC son: 1) La posición no marcada de los DOS depende de la función sintáctica del segundo constituyente: en el contexto de un Od, el orden no marcado es …-Od-DOS, mientras que en el contexto de un LOC es …-DOS-LOC. 2) Los tres constituyentes - DOS, LOC y Od - aparecen en la mayoría de las ocasiones en posición final cuando son el foco estrecho de la oración. 3) Muchos autores sostienen que en español el foco informativo debe estar en posición final de la oración. Según nuestros datos, la posición final es la posición preferida para el foco informativo, pero la focalización estrecha no implica la posición final del constituyente respectivo. 4) La posición del DOS depende decisivamente de la estructura informativa de la oración correspondiente; por eso, la estructura informativa debe incluirse en la determinación de la posición sintáctica y en la descripción de los órdenes.DOI http://dx.doi.org/10.15304/verba.41.1501

Fundamental frequency in Estonian emotional read-out speech

Fundamental frequency (F0, perceived as pitch) is an important prosodic cue of emotion. The aim of the present study was to find out if sentence emotion has any influence detectable in the F0 height and range of Estonian read-out speech. Thus the F0 of each vowel found in Estonian read-out sentences was measured, and its median for three emotions (anger, joy, sadness) and for neutral speech was calculated. In addition, the F0 range was measured for emotional and neutral speech, as well as the height of F0 for sentence-initial and sentence-final positions. The results revealed that in the investigated material, F0 was highest for joy and lowest for anger. The F0 range, however, was widest for anger and narrowest for sadness. The differences in F0 height at the beginning versus the end of sentences were not statistically significant, either for pairs of emotions or for emotions compared with neutral speech.

Truncation and backshift

This article deals with so-called sentence-final coordinating conjunctions in some dialectal varieties of English and Japanese. It emphasises that such final coordinating conjunctions derive from two syntactically different processes (“truncation” and “backshift”), and demonstrates that the final conjunctions stemming from each process differ accordingly in syntactic, prosodic, and discourse-pragmatic terms. In both English and Japanese, the backshift type of sentence-final coordinating conjunctions (i) can be fronted to sentence/clause-initial position with no semantic/logical contradiction, (ii) have a sentence-final contour, (iii) do not tolerate being followed by a filler or interjectory particle, and (iv) express emphatic or emotive meanings. On the other hand, the truncation type of sentence-final coordinating conjunctions show the opposite characteristics. The cross-linguistic commonality observed in each of the two types of sentence-final coordinating conjunctions strongly suggests that their discourse-pragmatic meanings are cross-linguistically associated with syntactic/grammatical repertoires, such as truncation, backshift, and sentence-final position.

Neural Mechanisms of Trace in Chinese Topicalized Constructions

Trace theory is a very important linguistic hypothesis within the framework of Generative Grammar. But whether the theory is correct, namely whether the assumed empty trace exists in syntactic representation, must be verified by experiments concerning the neural mechanisms of language. On the basis of Generative Grammar, the current study uses event- related potentials (ERP) to examine the neural mechanism of trace in Chinese topicalized constructions. The results show that three types of waves (a sustained negativity, a negativity elicited by the verb and a P600 elicited at the sentence-final position) are observed in the processing of Chinese topicalized constructions. These neural electrophysiological indexes indicate that the sentence-initial topic does leave a trace in the position out of which it moves, i.e. the sentence-final position, suggesting that there is a syntactic dependency between the topic and its trace. Consequently, we draw the conclusion that trace is neurologically supported in Chinese topicalized constructions and trace theory is neurophysiologically viable. Meanwhile, the study also adds neural evidence to the view that Chinese topicalized constructions are structures derived from syntactic movement.

Wh-duplication in Italian Sign Language (LIS)

This paper focuses on those wh-questions in Italian Sign Language (LIS) featuring two lexically identical wh-signs. We show that wh1 (the first wh in linear order) is shorter than wh2 (the second wh in liner order). However, there is evidence that this different duration is due to a phrase-final lengthening, as wh2 occupies a sentence-final position. We therefore conclude that the two wh-signs are identical full copies: one sitting in Spec,CP on the right in LIS and the other one sitting in Spec,FocP on the left. We show that this construction yields a (focused) cleft question interpretation and we speculate that both copies are phonologically realized because the wh-signs in Spec,CP and Spec,FocP are the heads of two distinct chains. Finally, we distinguish identical wh-duplication from improper wh-duplication, namely cases where one of the two wh-elements is what we call qartichoke, an underspecified interrogative sign only surfacing in wh-questions.

Prevalence of Vocal Fry in Young Adult Male American English Speakers

The purpose of this study was to assess possible gender differences in the prevalence of vocal fry in the voices of young male college students. Results were compared with previously published findings derived from a matched sample of female speakers. Thirty-four male college students, native American English speakers, produced speech samples in two speaking conditions: (1) sustained isolated vowel /a/ and (2) reading task. Data analyses included perceptual evaluations by two licensed speech-language pathologists. Results showed that vocal fry was perceived significantly more frequently in sentences than in isolated vowel productions. When vocal fry occurred in sentences, it was detected significantly more often in sentence-final position than in initial- and/or mid-sentence position. Furthermore, the prevalence of vocal fry in sentences was significantly lower for male speakers than has previously been reported for female speakers. Possible physiological and sociolinguistic explanations are discussed.

Information focus, syntactic weight and postverbal constituent order in Spanish

<span style="font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">In Spanish, postverbal constituents – such as direct object, locative adjunct or depicitive – can be ordered in different ways (e.g. <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Juan bailó desnudo en su casa</em> vs. <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Juan bailó en su casa desnudo</em>). The present paper examines two possible factors for postverbal constituent order: information focus and syntactic weight. Based on data from a perception experiment it will be shown that information focus and syntactic weight indeed influence in postverbal constituent order in Spanish: both the focalization of a constituent and the increase of the weight of a constituent increase the frequency with which the respective constituent takes up the sentence final position. As concerns the strength of the two factors, our results suggest that information focus and syntactic weight influence in postverbal constituent order to a similar extent. As concerns the syntatic position of narrow information focus in Spanish, our results show that the sentence final position is the preferred position for narrowly focused constituents, but such constituents are not limited to the sentence final position.</span> <!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:OfficeDocumentSettings> <o:RelyOnVML /> <o:AllowPNG /> </o:OfficeDocumentSettings> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:TrackMoves /> <w:TrackFormatting /> <w:HyphenationZone>21</w:HyphenationZone> <w:PunctuationKerning /> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas /> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:DoNotPromoteQF /> <w:LidThemeOther>DE</w:LidThemeOther> <w:LidThemeAsian>X-NONE</w:LidThemeAsian> <w:LidThemeComplexScript>X-NONE</w:LidThemeComplexScript> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables /> <w:SnapToGridInCell /> <w:WrapTextWithPunct /> <w:UseAsianBreakRules /> <w:DontGrowAutofit /> <w:SplitPgBreakAndParaMark /> <w:EnableOpenTypeKerning /> <w:DontFlipMirrorIndents /> <w:OverrideTableStyleHps /> </w:Compatibility> <m:mathPr> <m:mathFont m:val="Cambria Math" /> <m:brkBin m:val="before" /> <m:brkBinSub m:val="--" /> <m:smallFrac m:val="off" /> <m:dispDef /> <m:lMargin m:val="0" /> <m:rMargin m:val="0" /> <m:defJc m:val="centerGroup" /> <m:wrapIndent m:val="1440" /> <m:intLim m:val="subSup" /> <m:naryLim m:val="undOvr" /> </m:mathPr></w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[endif] --><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:OfficeDocumentSettings> <o:RelyOnVML /> <o:AllowPNG /> </o:OfficeDocumentSettings> </xml><![endif]--><!--[endif] -->

Verbal inflection errors in child L1

Song, Sundara & Demuth (2009) find an asymmetrical pattern for verbal inflection errors in child English: They observe more errors in sentence medial position than in sentence final position. To account for this asymmetry, they point towards the surface differences of both sentence positions. A similar asymmetry in Dutch, in which embedded clauses cause fewer problems for verbal inflection than main clauses, has been related to V2 (van Kampen 1997; Bastiaanse & van Zonneveld 1998; Weerman, Duinmeijer & Orgassa 2011). The present study disentangles both explanations (sentence position, i.e. ‘phonology’ vs. V2, i.e. ‘syntax’), and aims to provide a unified account for both the patterns found in English and Dutch. The inclusion of PP-over-V constructions in a sentence repetition task with monolingual Dutch children (aged 4;0 to 6;2) enables us to show that the phonological account proposed for English can account for the Dutch pattern as well.

Effect on Comprehension of Preposed versus Postposed Adverbial Phrases

A challenge for psycholinguistics is to describe how linguistic cues influence the construction of the mental representation resulting from the comprehension of a text. In this paper, we will focus on one of these linguistic devices: the sentence-initial positioning of spatial adverbials such as In the park.... Three self-paced reading experiments were conducted to test the 'Discourse Framing Hypothesis' according to which preposed adverbials can be seen as frame builders announcing that incoming contents satisfy the same informational criterion specified by the adverbial. Our results indicate that spatial adverbials do not play the same role when they are in sentence-initial and in sentence-final position. These results are discussed in the framework of Zwaan's Event Indexing Model.

Effects of semantic predictability and dialect variation on vowel production in clear and plain lab speech

Speech addressed to a non-native or hearing impaired listener features longer, more peripheral vowels. In addition, more extreme dialect-specific forms are produced in semantically predictable contexts, and less extreme forms (more standard forms) in unpredictable contexts. This study investigated the interactions between predictability and speaking style on Southern American English monophthongization of the vowel /aj/. The Midland dialect of American English served as the comparison. Participants read a set of sentences with monosyllabic target words in sentence-final position. Target words varied in semantic predictability based on the preceding sentential context. Each set of sentences was produced twice by each participant—first as if talking to a friend (“plain” speech) and again as if talking to a non-native or hearing impaired listener (“clear” speech). The duration, dispersion, and trajectory length of the vowel in each target word were measured. Preliminary results suggest that, as expected, Southern /aj/ has a shorter trajectory length than Midland /aj/, and in both dialects, /aj/ has a shorter trajectory length in clear speech than plain speech. However, these processes do not interact with each other or with semantic predictability, suggesting that style and predictability effects are independent of the realization of some dialect variants.

Tenetehára: A predicate-fronting language

AbstractThis article investigates whether Tenetehára is a predicate-raising language. The purpose is to determine whether VSO order results from verb movement to the heads T0or C0only, or whether Tenetehára exhibits VP remnant movement, similarly to languages like Niuean, Choi, Malagasy, and Seediq. The analysis concludes that Tenetehára does allow predicate movement, to Spec-CP or Spec-TP. Either option depends on particles related to tense and complementation, in sentence-final position. Additionally, assuming Kayne’s antisymmetry theory, in which all movement occurs to the left, and the predicate-raising hypothesis, it is proposed that final tense particle orders are derived from the basic word order [Tense [SVO]]. To derive the fact that T0can be head-final, the analysis holds that the predicate, represented by the v-VP complex, must move to the specifier position of TP. Finally, it is proposed that the syntactic trigger for predicate-raising is the presence of a [+PRED] feature both in the head C0and in the head T0, a fact that explains why Tenetehára grammar systematically strands tense and complementizer particles in clause-final position.

Prosodic characteristics of three sentence types in Thai

This study presents an acoustic analysis of three sentence types in Thai (declarative, interrogative, and emphatic) with the goal of providing a basic characterization of their prosody. To investigate prosodic realizations of sentence final syllables, we placed, in a sentence-final position, a target word which varied in one of the 5 lexical tones in Thai. We also varied the tonal context before the target word so that the pre-target word ends with low (21), mid (31), or high (45) tones. Preliminary results from one speaker show that F0 measures, especially f0 maximum, minimum, and range, differed across sentence types. In particular, emphatic sentences were distinguished from non-emphatic sentences by expanded F0 range, whereas target words in questions were distinguished from those in declarative sentences by both higher F0 maximum and minimum. Syllable duration also played a role in signaling emphasis and question: emphatic sentences were significantly longer than non-emphatic sentences, and questions were significantly shorter than declarative sentences. Interestingly, the tonal pattern of the target word changed for the case of emphasis when the target word had 31 and 45 tones. We will present findings from four additional Thai speakers and discuss their relevance to the intonational phonology of Thai.

Aging, parafoveal preview, and semantic integration in sentence processing: Testing the cognitive workload of wrap-up.

The current study investigated the degree to which semantic-integration processes ("wrap-up") during sentence understanding demand attentional resources by examining the effects of clause and sentence wrap-up on the parafoveal preview benefit (PPB) in younger and older adults. The PPB is defined as facilitation in processing word N + 1, based on information extracted while the eyes are fixated on word N, and is known to be reduced by processing difficulty at word N. Participants read passages in which word N occurred in a sentence-internal, clause-final, or sentence-final position, and a gaze-contingent boundary-change paradigm was used to manipulate the information available in parafoveal vision for word N + 1. Wrap-up effects were found on word N for both younger and older adults. Early-pass measures (first-fixation duration and single-fixation duration) of the PPB on word N + 1 were reduced by clause wrap-up and sentence wrap-up on word N, with similar effects for younger and older adults. However, for intermediate (gaze duration) and later-pass measures (regression-path duration, and selective regression-path duration), sentence wrap-up (but not clause wrap-up) on word N differentially reduced the PPB of word N + 1 for older adults. These findings suggest that wrap-up is demanding and may be less efficient with advancing age, resulting in a greater cognitive processing load for older readers.