A computational linguistic approach to natural language processing with applications to garden path sentences analysis

Abstract

Abstract-This paper discusses the computational parsing of GP sentences. By an approach of combining computational linguistic methods, e.g. CFG, ATN and BNF, we analyze the various syntactic structures of pre-grammatical, common, ambiguous and GP sentences. The evidence shows both ambiguous and GP sentences have lexical or syntactic crossings. Any choice of the crossing in ambiguous sentences can bring a full-parsed structure. In GP sentences, the probability-based choice is the cognitive prototype of parsing. Once the part-parsed priority structure is replaced by the full-parsed structure of low probability, the distinctive feature of backtracking appears. The computational analysis supports Pritchett's idea on processing breakdown of GP sentences.