scholarly journals The Blame Game: An investigation of Grammatical Aspect and Blame Judgments

2017 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Anita Eerland ◽  
Andrew M. Sherrill ◽  
Joseph P. Magliano ◽  
Rolf A. Zwaan
Keyword(s):  
Language Processing ◽  
Current Literature ◽  
Mental Representation ◽  
Temporal Dynamics ◽  
Processing System ◽  
Chronological Order ◽  
Imperfective Aspect ◽  
Grammatical Aspect ◽  
New Finding ◽  
Influence Perceptions

Imperfective aspect (i.e., Mark was punching John) is interpreted by the language processing system as a dynamic, unfolding sequence of actions, whereas perfective aspect (i.e., Mark punched John) is interpreted as a complete whole. A recent study showed that grammatical aspect can influence perceptions of intentionality for criminal actions (Hart & Albarracín, 2011). The current study builds on this finding. Five experiments examine whether grammatical aspect can also influence perceptions of blame, a concept related to intentionality. There were no effects of grammatical aspect on judgments of blame but the results showed an effect of narrated order (Experiments 1–3). First-mentioned actions made the agent more to blame for the outcomes than last-mentioned actions. This effect was not due to the order of the blame questions (Experiment 2) or influenced by the chronological order of the events (Experiment 3). Experiments 4 and 5 showed strong effects of grammatical aspect on temporal dynamics and revealed an interesting new finding. Grammatical aspect can influence the mental representation of a non-mentioned action. We discuss our results in light of the current literature on grammatical aspect effects.

In Search of a Human Language Processing System

1985 ◽  
Vol 30 (7) ◽  
pp. 529-531
Author(s):  
Patrick Carroll
Keyword(s):  
Language Processing ◽  
Processing System ◽  
Human Language

scholarly journals Limits on expectation-based processing: Use of grammatical aspect for co-reference in L2

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-25
Author(s):  
Theres Grüter ◽  
Hannah Rohde
Keyword(s):  
Real Time ◽  
Language Processing ◽  
Judgment Task ◽  
Linguistic Knowledge ◽  
Real Time Processing ◽  
Time Processing ◽  
Grammatical Aspect ◽  
Level Information ◽  
Native Speakers Of English ◽  
Reference Processing

Abstract This study examines the use of discourse-level information to create expectations about reference in real-time processing, testing whether patterns previously observed among native speakers of English generalize to nonnative speakers. Findings from a visual-world eye-tracking experiment show that native (L1; N = 53) but not nonnative (L2; N = 52) listeners’ proactive coreference expectations are modulated by grammatical aspect in transfer-of-possession events. Results from an offline judgment task show these L2 participants did not differ from L1 speakers in their interpretation of aspect marking on transfer-of-possession predicates in English, indicating it is not lack of linguistic knowledge but utilization of this knowledge in real-time processing that distinguishes the groups. English proficiency, although varying substantially within the L2 group, did not modulate L2 listeners’ use of grammatical aspect for reference processing. These findings contribute to the broader endeavor of delineating the role of prediction in human language processing in general, and in the processing of discourse-level information among L2 users in particular.

EXPRESS: Selective adaptation in sentence comprehension: Evidence from event-related brain potentials

2020 ◽  
pp. 174702182098462
Author(s):  
Masataka Yano ◽  
Shugo Suwazono ◽  
Hiroshi Arao ◽  
Daichi Yasunaga ◽  
Hiroaki Oishi
Keyword(s):  
Language Processing ◽  
Sentence Comprehension ◽  
Processing System ◽  
Selective Adaptation ◽  
Event Related Potential ◽  
Equal Probability ◽  
N400 Effect ◽  
Mixed Effect ◽  
Processing Cost ◽  
Low Probability

The present study conducted two event-related potential experiments to investigate whether readers adapt their expectations to morphosyntactically (Experiment 1) or semantically (Experiment 2) anomalous sentences when they are repeatedly exposed to them. To address this issue, we manipulated the probability of morphosyntactically/semantically grammatical and anomalous sentence occurrence through experiments. For the low probability block, anomalous sentences were presented less frequently than grammatical sentences (with a ratio of 1 to 4), while they were presented as frequently as grammatical sentences in the equal probability block. Experiment 1 revealed a smaller P600 effect for morphosyntactic violations in the equal probability block than in the low probability block. Linear mixed-effect models were used to examine how the size of the P600 effect changed as the experiment went along. The results showed that the smaller P600 effect of the equal probability block resulted from an amplitude’s decline in morphosyntactically violated sentences over the course of the experiment, suggesting an adaptation to morphosyntactic violations. In Experiment 2, semantically anomalous sentences elicited a larger N400 effect than their semantically natural counterparts regardless of probability manipulation. No evidence was found in favor of adaptation to semantic violations in that the processing cost of semantic violations did not decrease over the course of the experiment. Therefore, the present study demonstrated a dynamic aspect of language-processing system. We will discuss why the language-processing system shows a selective adaptation to morphosyntactic violations.

scholarly journals Actionality and the degree of temporal dynamics

2021 ◽  
Vol 74 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 435-466
Author(s):  
Walter Breu
Keyword(s):  
Temporal Dynamics ◽  
Comprehensive System ◽  
Grammatical Aspect

Abstract The interaction of lexical actionality with grammatical aspect is explained in a comprehensive system, based on the “degree of temporal dynamics” of simple and complex actional classes and of the various functions, expressed by aspect grammemes (extended ILA model, focus aspect). Then a new conceptualization of less frequent aspect phenomena is presented. A novelty is the differentiation of focus aspect from status aspect, characterized by habitualization and the transformation of telic events into atelic activities. Argument structures are claimed to be responsible for class changes, especially with respect to the incorporative (INCO) class, combining activity, telicity and a subsequent state.

scholarly journals A Natural Language Processing System for Extracting Evidence of Drug Repurposing from Scientific Publications

2020 ◽  
Vol 34 (08) ◽  
pp. 13369-13381
Author(s):  
Shivashankar Subramanian ◽  
Ioana Baldini ◽  
Sushma Ravichandran ◽  
Dmitriy A. Katz-Rogozhnikov ◽  
Karthikeyan Natesan Ramamurthy ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Natural Language Processing ◽  
Natural Language ◽  
Language Processing ◽  
Generic Drugs ◽  
Low Cost ◽  
Processing System ◽  
Drug Repurposing ◽  
Cancer Type ◽  
Entity Extraction ◽  
Scientific Publications

More than 200 generic drugs approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for non-cancer indications have shown promise for treating cancer. Due to their long history of safe patient use, low cost, and widespread availability, repurposing of these drugs represents a major opportunity to rapidly improve outcomes for cancer patients and reduce healthcare costs. In many cases, there is already evidence of efficacy for cancer, but trying to manually extract such evidence from the scientific literature is intractable. In this emerging applications paper, we introduce a system to automate non-cancer generic drug evidence extraction from PubMed abstracts. Our primary contribution is to define the natural language processing pipeline required to obtain such evidence, comprising the following modules: querying, filtering, cancer type entity extraction, therapeutic association classification, and study type classification. Using the subject matter expertise on our team, we create our own datasets for these specialized domain-specific tasks. We obtain promising performance in each of the modules by utilizing modern language processing techniques and plan to treat them as baseline approaches for future improvement of individual components.

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