Do Marked Topics Enhance Memory?

Abstract

<jats:title>Do Marked Topics Enhance Memory?</jats:title> <jats:p>We examined the effects of markedness, the deviation from the canonical Subject-Verb-Object structure in English, on the memory of listeners for the topic of the sentence. We used three marked topic constructions: Left-Dislocation, Object-Fronting, and Subject-Marking. Sentences with these structures were inserted as the 6<jats:sup>th</jats:sup> item in lists of 12 canonical sentences. In all sentences the topic was the name of a man. We measured recall of the critical name. The results revealed that topics of Left-Dislocated sentences were recalled more than topics of the other constructions, with topics of Object-Fronting sentences recalled the least. We briefly discuss how sentence processing procedures might give rise to these effects.</jats:p>

Intonation influences processing and recall of left-dislocation sentences by indicating topic vs. focus status of dislocated referent

“…For English, Netz, Eviatar, and Kuzar (2011) report an auditory recall experiment where they found that an element that appears in a left-dislocated position as Thomas in Thomas, he found Susan is recalled better than an element that is 'topicalised' (= fronted) as in Thomas, Susan found, and also better than a clause-initial element that is not separated syntactically but only prosodically from the remainder of the clause, as in Thomas, found Susan. However, this study has several limitations.…”