Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-mp689 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-16T14:10:03.969Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Linguistic representations and memory architectures: The devil is in the details

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 June 2016

Dustin Alfonso Chacón
Affiliation:
Department of Linguistics, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742. dustin.alfonso@gmail.comshotam2@gmail.comcolin@umd.eduling.umd.edu/colin
Shota Momma
Affiliation:
Department of Linguistics, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742. dustin.alfonso@gmail.comshotam2@gmail.comcolin@umd.eduling.umd.edu/colin
Colin Phillips
Affiliation:
Department of Linguistics, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742. dustin.alfonso@gmail.comshotam2@gmail.comcolin@umd.eduling.umd.edu/colin

Abstract

Attempts to explain linguistic phenomena as consequences of memory constraints require detailed specification of linguistic representations and memory architectures alike. We discuss examples of supposed locality biases in language comprehension and production, and their link to memory constraints. Findings do not generally favor Christiansen & Chater's (C&C's) approach. We discuss connections to debates that stretch back to the nineteenth century.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2016 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Aoshima, S., Phillips, C. & Weinberg, A. (2004) Processing filler-gap dependencies in a head-final language. Journal of Memory and Language 51:2354.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bock, K. (1987) Exploring levels of processing in sentence production. In: Natural language generation, ed. Kempen, G., pp. 351–63. Springer.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bock, K. & Miller, C. A. (1991) Broken agreement. Cognitive Psychology 23:4593.Google Scholar
Chacón, D., Imtiaz, M., Dasgupta, S., Murshed, S., Dan, M. & Phillips, C. (submitted) Locality in the processing of filler-gap dependencies in Bangla.Google Scholar
Christianson, K. & Ferreira, F. (2005) Conceptual accessibility and sentence production in a free word order language (Odawa). Cognition 98:105–35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dillon, B., Mishler, A., Sloggett, S. & Phillips, C. (2013) Contrasting intrusion profiles for agreement and anaphora: Experimental and modeling evidence. Journal of Memory and Language 69:85103.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ferreira, F. & Swets, B. (2002) How incremental is language production? Evidence from the production of utterances requiring the computation of arithmetic sums. Journal of Memory and Language 46(1):5784.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Franck, J., Soare, G., Frauenfelder, U. H. & Rizzi, L. (2010) Object interference: The role of intermediate traces of movement. Journal of Memory and Language 62:166–82.Google Scholar
Frazier, L. & Fodor, J. D. (1978) The sausage machine: A new two-stage parsing model. Cognition 6:291–25.Google Scholar
Garrett, M. F. (1980) Levels of processing in sentence production. In: Language production: Vol. 1. Speech and talk, ed. Butterworth, B.. pp. 177221. Academic Press.Google Scholar
Kluender, R. & Kutas, M. (1993) Subjacency as a processing phenomenon. Language & Cognitive Processes 8:573633.Google Scholar
Lee, E. K., Brown-Schmidt, S. & Watson, D. G. (2013) Ways of looking ahead: Hierarchical planning in language production. Cognition 129:544–62.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Levelt, W. (2012) A history of psycholinguistics: The pre-Chomskyan era. Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lewis, R. L., Vasishth, S. & Van Dyke, J. A. (2006) Computational principles of working memory in sentence comprehension. Trends in Cognitive Sciences 10:447–54.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
McElree, B., Foraker, S. & Dyer, L. (2003) Memory structures that subserve sentence comprehension. Journal of Memory and Language 48:6791.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Meyer, A. S. (1996) Lexical access in phrase and sentence production: Results from picture-word interference experiments. Journal of Memory and Language 35:477–96.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Momma, S., Slevc, L. R. & Phillips, C. (2015) The timing of verb planning in active and passive sentence production. Poster presented at the 28th annual CUNY Conference on Human Sentence Processing, Los Angeles, CA, March 19–21, 2015. Google Scholar
Momma, S., Slevc, L. R. & Phillips, C. (in press) The timing of verb planning in Japanese sentence production. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition.Google Scholar
Omaki, A., Davidson-White, I., Goro, T., Lidz, J. & Phillips, C. (2014) No fear of commitment: Children's incremental interpretation in English and Japanese. Language Learning and Development 10:206–33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Phillips, C. (2013) Some arguments and nonarguments for reductionist accounts of syntactic phenomena. Language and Cognitive Processes 28:156–87.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Quirk, R., Greenbaum, S., Leech, G. N. & Svartvik, J. (1972) A grammar of contemporary English. Longman.Google Scholar
Smith, M. & Wheeldon, L. (1999) High level processing scope in spoken sentence production. Cognition 73:205–46.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Wagers, M., Lau, E. & Phillips, C. (2009) Agreement attraction in comprehension: Representations and processes. Journal of Memory and Language 61:206–37.Google Scholar
Wundt, W. (1904) The psychology of the sentence. In: Language and psychology: Historical aspects of psycholinguistics, ed. Blumenthal, A. L., pp. 932. Wiley.Google Scholar