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. 2016 Aug;40(6):1435-59.
doi: 10.1111/cogs.12277. Epub 2015 Nov 26.

Is Passive Syntax Semantically Constrained? Evidence From Adult Grammaticality Judgment and Comprehension Studies

Ben Ambridge  1 , Amy Bidgood  1 , Julian M Pine  1 , Caroline F Rowland  1 , Daniel Freudenthal  1
Affiliations

Is Passive Syntax Semantically Constrained? Evidence From Adult Grammaticality Judgment and Comprehension Studies

Ben Ambridge et al. Cogn Sci. 2016 Aug.

Abstract

To explain the phenomenon that certain English verbs resist passivization (e.g., *£5 was cost by the book), Pinker (1989) proposed a semantic constraint on the passive in the adult grammar: The greater the extent to which a verb denotes an action where a patient is affected or acted upon, the greater the extent to which it is compatible with the passive. However, a number of comprehension and production priming studies have cast doubt upon this claim, finding no difference between highly affecting agent-patient/theme-experiencer passives (e.g., Wendy was kicked/frightened by Bob) and non-actional experiencer theme passives (e.g., Wendy was heard by Bob). The present study provides evidence that a semantic constraint is psychologically real, and is readily observed when more fine-grained independent and dependent measures are used (i.e., participant ratings of verb semantics, graded grammaticality judgments, and reaction time in a forced-choice picture-matching comprehension task). We conclude that a semantic constraint on the passive must be incorporated into accounts of the adult grammar.

Keywords: Agent-patient; Autonomy of syntax; Child language acquisition; Experiencer-theme; Passive; Semantics; Theme-experiencer; Verb.

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Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Mean semantic ratings for all 475 verbs. Higher values on the Y axis indicate higher ratings of “affectedness” (i.e., of putative passive‐consistent semantics). The distribution of verbs along the X axis is arbitrary.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Mean grammaticality judgment score for (a) actives and (b) passives as a function of the semantic predictor (475 verbs; Study 2).
Figure 3
Figure 3
Mean grammaticality judgment score for (a) actives and (b) passives as a function of the semantic predictor (72 passivizable verbs; Study 3).
Figure 4
Figure 4
Mean reaction time for (a) actives and (b) passives as a function of the semantic predictor (72 passivizable verbs; Study 3).
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Ambridge, B. (2013). How do children restrict their linguistic generalizations?: An (un‐) grammaticality judgment study. Cognitive Science, 37(3), 508–543. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Ambridge, B. , Pine, J. M. , & Rowland, C. F. (2012). Semantics versus statistics in the retreat from locative overgeneralization errors. Cognition, 123(2), 260–279. - PubMed
    1. Ambridge, B. , Pine, J. M. , Rowland, C. F. , Freudenthal, D. , & Chang, F. (2014). Avoiding dative overgeneralization errors: Semantics, statistics or both? Language, Cognition and Neuroscience, 29(2), 218–243.
    1. Ambridge, B. , Pine, J. M. , Rowland, C. F. , & Young, C. R. (2008). The effect of verb semantic class and verb frequency (entrenchment) on children's and adults' graded judgements of argument‐structure overgeneralization errors. Cognition, 106(1), 87–129. - PubMed
    1. Bencini, G. M. L. , & Valian, V. V. (2008). Abstract sentence representations in 3 year‐olds: Evidence from language production and comprehension. Journal of Memory and Language, 59, 97–113.

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