Convergent probabilistic cues do not trigger syntactic adaptation: Evidence from self-paced reading.

Abstract

Previous work has ostensibly shown that readers rapidly adapt to less predictable ambiguity resolutions after repeated exposure to unbalanced statistical input (e.g., a high number of reduced relative-clause garden-path sentences), and that these readers grow to disfavor the a priori more frequent (e.g. main verb) resolution after exposure (Fine, Jaeger, Farmer, & Qian, 2013). However, recent work has failed to replicate effects indicating a penalty for the a priori preferred, more frequent continuation, despite finding a speedup in syntactic repair times after initial exposure to the dispreferred, infrequent structure (Harrington Stack, James, & Watson, 2018). The current study reports three self-paced reading experiments that test whether co-occurring cues (explicit comprehension questions, preceding semantic cues, and font color) help facilitate adaptation to reduced relative/main verb garden-path sentences. Results suggest that readers do not overcome preexisting expectation biases by rapidly adapting to statistically novel linguistic contexts even with convergent probabilistic cues. An emphasis is placed on the difference between syntactic satiation effects and expectation adaptation, the latter of which we argue can only be determined through a penalty for an a priori preferred resolution after repeated exposure to its a priori less-preferred counterpart.

Estimating the True Cost of Garden Pathing: A Computational Model of Latent Cognitive Processes

“…Another interesting question is whether readers strategically adapt their triage rates as the experiment progresses, and/or whether their ability to reanalyze the garden‐path structures improves as they are repeatedly exposed to stimuli of the same type. The empirical picture regarding syntactic adaptation is currently mixed (Dempsey, Liu, & Christianson, 2020; Fine & Jaeger, 2013; Harrington Stack, James, & Watson, 2018; Prasad & Linzen, 2021), but the BSPR paradigm could be especially prone to adaptation effects due to the unfamiliar way in which regressions are carried out. Overt reanalysis is presumably relatively costly in this paradigm so that readers could learn to avoid it as the experiment progresses.…”

Processing of Complement Coercion With Aspectual Verbs in Mandarin Chinese: Evidence From a Self-Paced Reading Study

“…Prior to the analysis, data were cleaned according to two separate measures (Dempsey et al, 2020). First, participants were excluded based on how accuracy scores to all comprehension questions (<75%) which were calculated in Excel.…”

Prediction and Error-Based Learning in L2 Processing and Acquisition

“…In particular, adaptation to garden-path sentences appears to be less robust than adaptation to simple structural alternations, in both L1 and L2 speakers. While some studies find an adaptation effect to garden-path sentences in L1 (Farmer et al, 2014; Fine et al, 2013; Kaan et al, 2019), others find no such evidence (Dempsey et al, 2020) or show that is very difficult to detect (Prasad & Linzen, 2021). In L2 speakers, the evidence is again mixed (Kaan et al, 2019; Hopp, 2020).…”