Subjects are not all alike: Eye-tracking the agent preference in Spanish.
Experimental research on argument structure has reported mixed results regarding the processing of unaccusative and unergative predicates. Using eye tracking in the visual world paradigm, this study seeks to fill a gap in the literature by presenting new evidence of the processing distinction betwee...
| Main Authors: | , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Public Library of Science (PLoS)
2022-01-01
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| Series: | PLoS ONE |
| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0272211 |
| _version_ | 1811285987613999104 |
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| author | Beatriz Gómez-Vidal Miren Arantzeta Jon Paul Laka Itziar Laka |
| author_facet | Beatriz Gómez-Vidal Miren Arantzeta Jon Paul Laka Itziar Laka |
| author_sort | Beatriz Gómez-Vidal |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Experimental research on argument structure has reported mixed results regarding the processing of unaccusative and unergative predicates. Using eye tracking in the visual world paradigm, this study seeks to fill a gap in the literature by presenting new evidence of the processing distinction between agent and theme subjects. We considered two hypotheses. First, the Unaccusative Hypothesis states that unaccusative (theme) subjects involve a more complex syntactic representation than unergative (agent) subjects. It predicts a delayed reactivation of unaccusative subjects compared to unergatives after the presentation of the verb. Second, the Agent First Hypothesis states that the first ambiguous NP of a sentence will preferably be interpreted as an agent due to an attentional preference to agents over themes. It predicts a larger reactivation of agent subjects than themes. We monitored the time course of gaze fixations of 44 native speakers across a visual display while processing sentences with unaccusative, unergative and transitive verbs. One of the pictures in the visual display was semantically related to the sentential subject. We analyzed fixation patterns in three different time frames: the verb frame, the post-verb frame, and the global post-verbal frame. Results indicated that sentential subjects across the three conditions were significantly activated when participants heard the verb; this is compatible with observing a post-verbal reactivation effect. Time course and magnitude of the gaze-fixation patterns are fully compatible with the predictions made by the Agent First Hypothesis. Thus, we report new evidence for (a) a processing distinction between unaccusative and unergative predicates in sentence comprehension, and (b) an attentional preference towards agents over themes, reflected by a larger reactivation effect in agent subjects. |
| first_indexed | 2024-04-13T02:53:02Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-387a2ff6e5544c7fadc85057e42e0ca4 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1932-6203 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-04-13T02:53:02Z |
| publishDate | 2022-01-01 |
| publisher | Public Library of Science (PLoS) |
| record_format | Article |
| series | PLoS ONE |
| spelling | doaj.art-387a2ff6e5544c7fadc85057e42e0ca42022-12-22T03:05:48ZengPublic Library of Science (PLoS)PLoS ONE1932-62032022-01-01178e027221110.1371/journal.pone.0272211Subjects are not all alike: Eye-tracking the agent preference in Spanish.Beatriz Gómez-VidalMiren ArantzetaJon Paul LakaItziar LakaExperimental research on argument structure has reported mixed results regarding the processing of unaccusative and unergative predicates. Using eye tracking in the visual world paradigm, this study seeks to fill a gap in the literature by presenting new evidence of the processing distinction between agent and theme subjects. We considered two hypotheses. First, the Unaccusative Hypothesis states that unaccusative (theme) subjects involve a more complex syntactic representation than unergative (agent) subjects. It predicts a delayed reactivation of unaccusative subjects compared to unergatives after the presentation of the verb. Second, the Agent First Hypothesis states that the first ambiguous NP of a sentence will preferably be interpreted as an agent due to an attentional preference to agents over themes. It predicts a larger reactivation of agent subjects than themes. We monitored the time course of gaze fixations of 44 native speakers across a visual display while processing sentences with unaccusative, unergative and transitive verbs. One of the pictures in the visual display was semantically related to the sentential subject. We analyzed fixation patterns in three different time frames: the verb frame, the post-verb frame, and the global post-verbal frame. Results indicated that sentential subjects across the three conditions were significantly activated when participants heard the verb; this is compatible with observing a post-verbal reactivation effect. Time course and magnitude of the gaze-fixation patterns are fully compatible with the predictions made by the Agent First Hypothesis. Thus, we report new evidence for (a) a processing distinction between unaccusative and unergative predicates in sentence comprehension, and (b) an attentional preference towards agents over themes, reflected by a larger reactivation effect in agent subjects.https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0272211 |
| spellingShingle | Beatriz Gómez-Vidal Miren Arantzeta Jon Paul Laka Itziar Laka Subjects are not all alike: Eye-tracking the agent preference in Spanish. PLoS ONE |
| title | Subjects are not all alike: Eye-tracking the agent preference in Spanish. |
| title_full | Subjects are not all alike: Eye-tracking the agent preference in Spanish. |
| title_fullStr | Subjects are not all alike: Eye-tracking the agent preference in Spanish. |
| title_full_unstemmed | Subjects are not all alike: Eye-tracking the agent preference in Spanish. |
| title_short | Subjects are not all alike: Eye-tracking the agent preference in Spanish. |
| title_sort | subjects are not all alike eye tracking the agent preference in spanish |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0272211 |
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