What cross-linguistic variation tells us about information density in on-line processing

1
What cross-linguistic variation tells us about
information density in on-line processing

• John A. Hawkins
• UC Davis University of Cambridge

2

• Patterns of variation across languages provide
  relevant evidence for current issues in
  psychology on information density in on-line
  processing.

3

• Some background, first of all.
• I have argued (Hawkins 1994, 2004, 2009, to
  appear) for a Performance-Grammar Correspondence
  Hypothesis

4

• Performance-Grammar Correspondence Hypothesis
  (PGCH)
• Languages have conventionalized grammatical
  properties in proportion to their degree of
  preference in performance, as evidenced by
  patterns of selection in corpora and by ease of
  processing in psycholinguistic experiments.

5

• I.e. languages have conventionalized or fixed
  in their grammars the same kinds of preferences
  and principles that we see in performance,
• esp. in those languages in which speakers have
  alternatives to choose from in language use

6

• E.g. between
• alternative word orders
• relative clauses with or without a relativizer,
• with a gap or a resumptive pronoun
• extraposed vs non-extraposed phrases
• Heavy NP Shift or no shift
• alternative ditransitive constructions
• zero vs non-zero case markers
• and so on

7

• The patterns and principles found in these
  selections are, according to the PGCH, the same
  patterns and principles that we see in grammars
  in languages with fewer conventionalized options
  (more fixed orderings, gaps only in certain
  relativization environments, etc).

8

• If so, linguists developing theories of grammar
  and of typological variation need to look
  seriously at theories of processing, in order to
  understand which structures are selected in
  performance, when, and why, with the result that
  grammars come to conventionalize these, and not
  other, patterns.
• See Hawkins (2004, 2009, to appear)

9

• Conversely, psychologists need to look at
  grammars and at cross-linguistic variation in
  order to see what they tell us about processing.
  since grammars are conventionalized processing
  preferences.

10

• Alternative variants across grammars are also, by
  hypothesis, alternatives for efficient
  processing.
• And the frequency with which these alternatives
  are conventionalized is, again by hypothesis,
  correlated with their degree of preference and
  efficiency in processing.

11

• Looking at grammatical variation from a
  processing perspective can be revealing,
  therefore.

12

• E.g. Japanese, Korean, Dravidian languages do not
  move heavy and complex phrases to the end of
  their clauses, like English does, they move them
  to the beginning, in proportion to their
  (relative) complexity.
• If your psychological model predicts that all
  languages should be like English, then you need
  to go back to the drawing board and look at these
  different grammars, and at their performance,
  before you define and test your model further.

13

• Which brings me to todays topic
• What do grammars and typological variation tell
  us about information density in on-line
  processing?

14

• Let us define Information as
• the set of linguistic forms F (phonemes,
  morphemes, words, etc) and the set of
  properties P (ultimately semantic properties
  in a semantic representation) that are assigned
  to them by linguistic convention and in
  processing.

15

• Let us define Density as
• the number of these forms and properties that
  are assigned at a particular point in
  processing, i.e. the size of a given Fi-Pi
  pairing at point i in on-line comprehension
  or production.

16

• I see evidence for two very general and
  complementary principles of information density
  in cross-linguistic patterns.

17

• First, minimize Fi
• minimize the set Fi required for the
  assignment of a particular Pi or Pi
• I.e. minimize the number of linguistic forms that
  need to be processed at each point in order to
  assign a given morphological, syntactic or
  semantic property or set of properties to these
  forms on-line.

18

• The conditions that determine the degree of
  permissible minimization can be inferred from the
  patterns themselves and essentially involve
  efficiency and ease of processing in the
  assignment of Pi to Fi.

19

• Examples will be given from morphological
• hierarchies and from syntactic patterns such
  as
• word order and filler-gap dependencies.

20

• Second, maximize Pi
• maximize the set Pi that can be assigned to a
  particular Fi or Fi.
• I.e. select and arrange linguistic forms so that
  as many as possible of their (correct) syntactic
  and semantic properties can be assigned to them
  at each point in on-line processing.

21

• A set of linear ordering universals will be
  presented in which category A is systematically
  preferred before B regardless of language type,
  i.e. A B. Positioning B first would always
  result in incomplete or incorrect assignments of
  properties to B on-line, whereas positioning it
  after A permits the full assignment of properties
  to B at the time it is processed.
• These universals provide systematic evidence for
  maximize Pi.

22

• Consider first some grammatical patterns from
  morphology that support the minimize Fi
  principle
• minimize the set Fi required for the
  assignment of a particular Pi or Pi

23

• In Hawkins (2004) I formulated the following
  principle of form minimization based on parallel
  data from cross-linguistic variation and
  language-internal selection patterns.

24

• Minimize Forms (MiF)
• The human processor prefers to minimize the
  formal complexity of each linguistic form F (its
  phoneme, morpheme, word or phrasal units) and the
  number of forms with unique conventionalized
  property assignments, thereby assigning more
  properties to fewer forms. These minimizations
  apply in proportion to the ease with which a
  given property P can be assigned in processing to
  a given F.

25

• The basic premise of MiF is that the processing
  of linguistic forms and their conventionalized
  property assignments requires effort. Minimizing
  the forms required for property assignments is
  efficient since it reduces that effort by
  fine-tuning it to information that is already
  active in processing through accessibility, high
  frequency, and inferencing strategies of various
  kinds.

26

• MiF is visible in two sets of variation data
  across and within languages.
• The first involves complexity differences between
  surface forms (morphology and syntax), with
  preferences for minimal expression (e.g. zero
  morphemes) in proportion to their frequency of
  occurrence and hence ease of processing through
  degree of expectedness (cf. Levy 2008, Jaeger
  2006).

27

• E.g. singular number for nouns is much more
  frequent than plural, absolutive case is more
  frequent than ergative.
• Correspondingly singularity on nouns is expressed
  by shorter or equal morphemes, often zero (cf.
  English cat vs. cat-s), almost never by more.
  Similarly for absolutive and ergative case
  marking.

28

• A second data pattern captured in MiF involves
  the number and nature of lexical and grammatical
  distinctions that languages conventionalize.
• The preferences are again in proportion to their
  efficiency, including frequency of use.

29

• There are preferred lexicalization patterns
  across languages.
• Certain grammatical distinctions are
  cross-linguistically preferred
• certain numbers on nouns
• certain tenses
• aspects
• causativity
• some basic speech act types
• thematical roles like Agent, Patient
• etc

30

• The result is numerous hierarchies of lexical
  and grammatical patterns
• E.g. the famous color term hierarchy of Berlin
  Kay (1969), and the Greenbergian morphological
  hierarchies

31

• Where we have comparative performance and
  grammatical data for these hierarchies it is very
  clear that the grammatical rankings (e.g.
  Singular gt Plural) correspond to a frequency/ease
  of processing ranking, with higher positions
  receiving less or equal formal marking and more
  or equal unique forms for the expression of that
  category alone.

32

• Form Minimization Prediction 1
• The formal complexity of each F is reduced in
  proportion to the frequency of that F and/or the
  processing ease of assigning a given P to a
  reduced F (e.g. to zero).

33

• The cross-linguistic effects of this can be seen
  in the following Greenbergian (1966)
  morphological hierarchies (with reformulations
  and revisions by the authors shown)

34

• Sing gt Plur gt Dual gt Trial/Paucal (for
  number)
• Greenberg 1966, Croft 2003
• Nom/Abs gt Acc/Erg gt Dat gt Other (for case
  marking)
• Primus 1999
• Masc,Fem gt Neut (for gender) Hawkins 2004
• Positive gt Comparative gt Superlative Greenberg
  1966

35

• Greenberg pointed out that these grammatical
  hierarchies define performance frequency rankings
  for the relevant properties in each domain.
• The frequencies of number inflections on nouns in
  a corpus of Sanskrit, for example, were
•  
• Singular 70.3 Plural 25.1 Dual
  4.6

36

• By MiF Prediction 1 we therefore expect
• For each hierarchy H the amount of formal marking
  (i.e. phonological and morphological complexity)
  will be greater or equal down each hierarchy
  position.

37

• E.g. in (Austronesian) Manam
• 3rd Singular suffix on nouns 0
• 3rd Plural suffix -di,
• 3rd Dual suffix -di-a-ru
• 3rd Paucal -di-a-to (Lichtenberk
  1983)
• The amount of formal marking increases from
  singular to plural, and from plural to dual, and
  is equal from dual to paucal, in accordance with
  the hierarchy prediction.

38

• Form Minimization Prediction 2
• The number of unique FP pairings in a language
  is reduced by grammaticalizing or lexicalizing a
  given FP in proportion to the frequency and
  preferred expressiveness of that P in performance.

39

• In the lexicon the property associated with
  teacher is frequently used in performance, that
  of teacher who is late for class much less so.
  The event of X hitting Y is frequently selected,
  that of X hitting Y with Xs right hand less so.
• The more frequently selected properties are
  conventionalized in single lexemes or unique
  categories and constructions. Less frequently
  used properties must then be expressed through
  word and phrase combinations and their meanings
  must be derived by semantic composition.

40

• This makes the expression of more frequently used
  meanings shorter, that of less frequently used
  meanings longer, and this pattern matches the
  first pattern of less versus more complexity in
  the surface forms themselves correlating with
  relative frequency.
• Both patterns make utterances shorter and the
  communication of meanings more efficient overall,
  which is why I have collapsed them both into one
  common Minimize Forms principle.

41

• By MiF Prediction 2 we expect
• For each hierarchy H (A gt B gt C) if a language
  assigns at least one morpheme uniquely to C, then
  it assigns at least one uniquely to B if it
  assigns at least one uniquely to B, it does so to
  A.

42

• E.g.a distinct Dual implies a distinct Plural and
  Singular in the grammar of Sanskrit.
• A distinct Dative implies a distinct Accusative
  and Nominative in the case grammar of Latin and
  German
• (or a distinct Ergative and Absolutive in Basque,
  cf. Primus 1999).

43

• A unique number or case assignment low in the
  hierarchy implies unique and differentiated
  numbers and cases in all higher positions.

44

• I.e. grammars prioritize categories for unique
  formal expression in each of these areas in
  proportion to their relative frequency and
  preferred expressiveness.
• This results in these hierarchies for
  conventionalized categories whereby languages
  with fewer categories match the performance
  frequency rankings of languages with many.

45

• By MiF Prediction 2 we also expect
• For each hierarchy H any combinatorial features
  that partition references to a given position on
  H will result in fewer or equal morphological
  distinctions down each lower position of H.

46

• E.g. when gender features combine with and
  partition number, unique gender-distinctive
  pronouns often exist for the singular and not for
  the plural
• English he/she/it vs they
• the reverse uniqueness is not found (i.e. with a
  gender-distinctive plural, but gender-neutral
  singular).

47

• More generally MiF Prediction 2 leads to a
  general principle of cross-linguistic morphology
•  
• Morphologization
• A morphological distinction will be
  grammaticalized in proportion to the performance
  frequency with which it can uniquely identify a
  given subset of entities E in a grammatical
  and/or semantic domain D.

48

• This enables us to make sense of markedness
  reversals.
• E.g. in certain nouns in Welsh whose referents
  are much more frequently plural than singular,
  like leaves and beans, it is the singular
  form that is morphologically more complex than
  the plural
• deilen ("leaf") vs. dail ("leaves")
• ffäen ("bean") vs. ffa ("beans")
• Cf. Haspelmath (2002244).

49

• All of these data provide support for our
  minimize Fi principle
• minimize the set Fi required for the
  assignment of a particular Pi or Pi
• I.e. minimize the number of linguistic forms that
  need to be processed at each point in order to
  assign a given morphological, syntactic or
  semantic property or set of properties to these
  forms on-line.

50

• Either the surface forms of the morphology are
  reduced, in proportion to frequency and/or ease
  of processing.
• Or lexical and grammatical categories are given
  priority for unique formal expression, in
  proportion to frequency and/or preferred
  expression, resulting in reduced morpheme and
  word combinations for their expression.

51

• The result of both is more minimal forms in
  proportion to frequency/ease of
  processing/preferred expressiveness, i.e. fewer
  and shorter forms for the expression of the
  speakers preferred meanings in performance.

52

• Consider now some patterns from syntax that
  support the minimize Fi principle
• minimize the set Fi required for the
  
• assignment of a particular Pi or Pi
  

53

• In Hawkins (2004) I formulated a second
  minimization principle for the combination of
  forms and dependencies between them based on
  parallel data from cross-linguistic variation and
  language-internal selection patterns Minimize
  Domains (MiD).

54

• Minimize Domains (MiD)
• The human processor prefers to minimize the
  connected sequences of linguistic forms and their
  conventionally associated syntactic and semantic
  properties in which relations of combination
  and/or dependency are processed.

55

• E.g. in order to recognize how the words of a
  sentence are grouped together into phrases and
  into a hierarchical tree structure the human
  parser prefers to access the smallest possible
  linear string of words that enable it to make
  each phrase structure decision
• the principle of Early Immediate Constituents
  (EIC) (Hawkins 1994).

56

• more generally the processing of all syntactic
  and semantic relations prefers minimal domains
  (Hawkins 2004).

57

• Minimize Domains predicts that each Phrasal
  Combination Domain (PCD) should be as short as
  possible.
• A PCD consists of the smallest amount of surface
  structure on the basis of which the human
  processor can recognize (and produce) a mother
  node M and assign the correct daughter ICs to it,
  i.e. on the basis of which phrase structure can
  be processed.

58

• Some linear orderings reduce the number of words
  and their associated properties that need to be
  accessed for this purpose.
• The degree of this preference is proportional to
  the minimization difference for the same PCDs in
  competing orderings.

59

• I.e. linear orderings should be preferred that
  minimize PCDs by maximizing their IC-to-word
  ratios.
• The result will be a preference for short before
  long phrases in head-initial languages like
  English.

60

• (1) a. The man vpwaited pp1for his son
  pp2in the cold but not unpleasant wind
• 1 2 3 4
  5
• -----------------------------------
• b. The man vpwaited pp2in the cold but not
  unpleasant wind pp1for his son
• 1 2 3 4 5 6
  7 8 9
• ------------------------------------------
  -----------------------
• The three items, V, PP1, PP2 can be recognized
  and constructed on the basis of five words in
  (1a), compared with nine in (1b), assuming that
  (head) categories such as P immediately project
  to mother nodes such as PP, enabling the parser
  to construct them on-line.
• (1a) VP PCD IC-to-word ratio of 3/5 60
• (1b) ------------------------------------- 3/9
  33

61

• For experimental support (in production and
  comprehension) for short before long effects in
  English, see e.g. Stallings (1998), Gibson
  (1998), Wasow (2002).

62

• A Corpus Study Testing MiD in English
• Structures like (1ab) with vpV, PP1, PP2 were
  examined (Hawkins 2000) in which the two PPs were
  permutable with truth-conditional equivalence
  (i.e. the speaker had a choice).
• Only 15 (58/394) had long before short. Among
  those with at least a one-word weight difference,
  82 had short before long, and there was a
  gradual reduction in the long before short orders
  the bigger the weight difference (PPS shorter
  PP, PPL longer PP)

63

• (2) PPL gt PPS by 1 word by 2-4
  by 5-6 by 7
• V PPS PPL 60 (58) 86 (108)
  94 (31) 99 (68)
• V PPL PPS 40 (38) 14 (17)
  6 (2) 1 (1)

64

• For head-final languages long before short orders
  provide minimal domains for processing phrase
  structure
• (3) a. Mary ga kinoo John ga
  kekkonsi-ta tos it-tavp
• Mary SU yesterday John SU
  married that said,
• Mary said that John got married yesterday
• b. kinoo John ga kekkonsi-ta tos Mary
  ga it-tavp

65

• Why?
• Because placing longer before shorter phrases
  in Japanese positions constructing categories or
  heads (V, P, Comp, etc) close, or as close as
  possible, to each other, each being on the right
  of their respective phrasal sisters.
• Result PCDs are smaller

66

• (4) Some basic word orders of Japanese grammar
• a. Taroo ga vptegami o kaita NP-V
• T. SU letter DO wrote
• 'Taroo wrote a letter'
• b. Taroo ga ppTokyo kara ryokoosita NP-P
• T. SU Tokyo from travelled
• 'Taroo travelled from Tokyo'
• c. npTaroo no ie Gen-N
• Taroo 's house
• The heavier phrasal categories, e.g. NPs, occur
  to the left of their single-word (shorter) heads
  in Japanese, e.g. before V and P, and P and V are
  adjacent on the right of their respective sisters

67

• For experimental and corpus support for long
  before short phrases in Japanese and Korean when
  there is a plurality of phrases before V, see
  Hawkins (1994, 2004), Yamashita Chang (2001,
  2006), Choi (2007)

68

• An early corpus study testing long before short
  in Japanese (Hawkins 1994)
• NPo, PPm V
• (5) a. (Tanaka ga) Hanako karapp sono
  hon onp kattavp
• Tanaka SU Hanako from that
  book DO bought,
• 'Tanako bought that book from Hanako'
• b. (Tanaka ga) sono hon onp Hanako
  karapp kattavp

69

• ICS shorter Immediate Constituent ICL
  longer Immediate Constituent regardless of NP
  or PP status
• (6) ICLgtICS by 1-2 words by 3-4 by
  5-8 by 9
• ICS ICL V 34 (30) 28 (8) 17 (4) 9
  (1)
• ICL ICS V 66 (59) 72 (21) 83 (20) 91
  (10)
• Data from Hawkins (1994152), collected by Kaoru
  Horie.
• I.e. the bigger the weight difference, the more
  the heavy phrase occurs to the left the
  mirror-image of English

70

• Given these data from performance, we can now
  better understand
• (a) the Greenbergian word order correlations
• (b) why there are two, and only two, productive
  word order types cross-linguistically,
  head-initial and head-final
• (c) why and when there are exceptional
  departures from the expected head-initial and
  head-final orders

71

• The "Greenbergian" word order correlations
  (Greenberg 1963, Dryer 1992)
• (7) vpV, ppP, NP
• a. vptravels ppto the city b. the
  city topp travelsvp
• -------- --------
• c. vptravels the city topp d. ppto the
  city travelsvp
• ------------------
  -------------------
• The adjacency of V and P guarantees the smallest
  possible string of words for the recognition and
  cnstruction of VP and its two constituents (V and
  PP), see the underlinings.

72

• Language Quantities in Matthew Dryer's (1992)
  Cross-linguistic Sample
• (8) a. vpV ppP NP 161 (41) b. NP
  Ppp Vvp 204 (52)
• c. vpV NP Ppp 18 (5) d. ppP NP
  Vvp 6 (2)
• Preferred (a)(b) with consistent head ordering
  365/389 (94)

73

• Both head-initial (English) and head-final
  (Japanese) orders can be equally efficient for
  processing whether heads are adjacent to one
  another on the left of their respective sisters
  (English), or on the right (Japanese),
• hence two and only two highly word order
  productive types, as predicted by MiD

74

• MiD helps us to understand these
  cross-linguistic patterns and their frequencies.
  It also enables us to explain some systematic
  grammatical exceptions to these head-ordering
  universals.

75

• Dryer (1992) there are exceptions to the
  preferred consistent head ordering when the
  category that modifies a head is a single-word
  item, e.g. an adjective modifying a noun (yellow
  book).

76

• Many otherwise head-initial languages have
  non-initial heads with the adjective preceding
  the noun here (e.g. English), many otherwise
  head-final languages have noun before adjective
  (e.g. Basque).
• BUT when the non-head is a branching phrasal
  category (e.g. adjective phrase, cf. English
  books yellow with age) there are good
  correlations with the predominant head ordering.
  
• Why?

77

• When heads are separated by a non-branching
  single word, then the difference between, say,
• vpV Adj Nnp and vpV npN Adj
• read yellow book read book
  yellow
• is short, only one word. Hence the MiD
  preference for noun initiality (and for
  noun-finality in postpositional languages) is
  significantly less than it is for intervening
  branching phrases, and either less head ordering
  consistency or no consistency is predicted

78

• English yellow book but book yellow with
  age
• Romance languages have both prenominal and
  postnominal adjectives
• French grand homme / homme grand
• but postnominal adjective phrases like English

79

• Similarly, when there is just a one-word
  difference between competing domains in
  performance, e.g. in the corpus data of English
  and Japanese above, both ordering options are
  generally productive, and so too in grammars.

80

• Center embedding hierarchies and EIC
• The more complex a center-embedded constituent
  and the longer the PCD for its containing phrase,
  the fewer languages.
• E.g. in the environment ppP np__ N we have a
  center-embedding hierarchy, cf. Hawkins (1983).
• (9) Prep lgs AdjN 32 NAdj 68
• PosspN 12 NPossp 88 RelN
  1 NRel 99
• Mary traveled ppto npinteresting
  cities AdjN
• npthis countrys cities PosspN
• npI already visited cities RelN

81

• I.e. The Greenbergian word order universals
  support domain minimization and locality (Hawkins
  2004, Gibson 1998).
• There are minor and predicted departures from
  consistent ordering and head adjacency, as we
  have seen.
• There are also certain conflicts between MiD and
  other ease of processing principles, e.g. Fillers
  before Gaps, which result in e.g. NRel in certain
  (non-rigid) OV languages (Hawkins 2004, to
  appear).

82

• Apart from these, I see no evidence in grammars
  for any preference for non-locality of the kind
  that certain psycholinguists have argued for
  based on experimental evidence with head-final
  languages (e.g. Konieczny 2000, Vasishth Lewis
  2006).
• E.g. Konieczny showed in a self-paced reading
  experiment in German that the verb is read
  systematically faster when a NRel precedes it, in
  proportion to the length of Rel.

83

• This finding makes sense in terms of expectedness
  and predictability (Levy 2008, Jaeger 2006) the
  longer you have to wait for a verb in a
  verb-final structure, the more you expect to find
  one, making verb recognition easier.
• However, Konieczny found no evidence for this
  facilitation at the verb in his German corpus
  data (Uszkoreit et al. 1998). Instead the
  predictions made for the relevant structures by
  MiD and locality were strongly confirmed.

84

• In fact, corpus studies quite generally do not
  support non-locality none of the data from
  numerous typologically diverse language corpora
  reported in Hawkins (1994, 2004) support it.

85

• Nor do word order universals support it. The
  Greenbergian correlations strongly support
  locality, and the exceptions to Greenberg involve
  either small single-word non-localities or
  competitions with independently motivated
  preferences that do produce some non-localities
  in certain language types but not because
  non-locality is a good thing!

86

• The experimental evidence for greater ease of
  processing at the verb appears to be evidence,
  therefore, for a certain facilitation (arguably
  through predictability) at a single temporal
  point in sentence processing it tell us nothing,
  about processing load for the structure as a
  whole, and it does not implicate any preference
  for non-locality as such.

87

• Corpus data appear to reflect these overall
  processing advantages for alternative structures
  within which the verb may appear early or late.
  The predictions for these alternations are based
  squarely on the preferred locality of phrasal
  daughters and these predictions are empirically
  correct (Konieczny 2000, Uszkoreit et al. 1998).
  Non-locality arises only when the locality
  demands of two phrases are in conflict and cannot
  be satisfied at the same time.
• E.g. if N is adjacent to its Rel in German, then
  N is separated from a final V.

88

• Grammars also support locality in word order
  universals and provide no evidence for
  non-locality as an independent factor.
• Let us turn now to relative clauses and look at
  the cross-linguistic evidence for form and domain
  minimization in this area.

89

• Relative clauses in many languages (e.g. Hebrew)
  exhibit both a 'gap' and a 'resumptive pronoun'
  structure
• (10) a. the studentsi that I teach Oi Gap
• b. the studentsi that I teach
  themi Resumptive Pronoun
• In English we find relative clauses with and
  without a relative pronoun
• (11) a. the studentsi whomi I teach
  Oi Relative Pronoun
• b. the studentsi Oi I teach Oi Zero
  Relative

90

• Patterns in Performance
• The retention of the relative pronoun in English
  is correlated, inter alia,
• with the degree of separation of the relative
  clause from its head noun
• the bigger the separation, the more the rel pros
  are retained (Quirk
• 1957, Hawkins 2004153).

91

• (12) a. the studentsi whomi I teach Oi
  visited me
• b. the studentsi Oi I teach Oi
  visited me
• (13) a. the studentsi (from Denmark) whomi I
  teach Oi visited me
• b. the studentsi (from Denmark) Oi I
  teach Oi visited me
• (14) a. the studentsi (from Denmark) visited
  me whomi I teach Oi
• b. the studentsi (from Denmark)
  visited me Oi I teach Oi
• (12a) Rel Pro 60 (12b) Zero Rel 40
• (13a) Rel Pro 94 (13b) Zero Rel 6
• (14a) Rel Pro 99 (14b) Zero Rel 1

92

• The Hebrew gap is favored when the distance
  between head and gap is small, cf. Ariel (1999)
• (15) a. Shoshana hi ha-ishai she-nili
  ohevet Oi Gap Shoshana is the-woman
  that-Nili loves
• b. Shoshana hi ha-ishai she-nili
  ohevet otai Res Pro
• that-Nili loves her
• (15a) Gap 91 (15b) Res Pro 9

93

• Resumptive pronouns in Hebrew become more
  frequent in more complex relatives with bigger
  distances between the head and the position
  relativized on, as in (16b)
• (16) a. Shoshana hi ha-ishai she-dani siper
  she-moshe rixel she-nili ohevet Oi
• b. Shoshana hi ha-ishai she-dani siper
  she-moshe rixel she-nili ohevet otai
• Shoshana is the-woman that-Danny said
  that-Moshe gossiped that-Nili loves (her)
• For just 3 words separating head and position
  relativized on (i.e. gap or resumptive pronoun),
  many more pronouns, Ariel (1999)
• (16a) Gap 58 (16b) Res Pro 42

94

• Relative clauses with larger domains are more
  complex and harder to process. The harder to
  process relatives have the less minimal and more
  explicit form, in accordance with our minimize
  Fi principle above.

95

• Specifically, the explicit resumptive pronoun
  makes the relative easier to process because the
  position relativized on is now explicitly
  signaled and flagged, in contrast to the zero
  gap, and because the explicit pronoun shortens
  various domains for processing combinatorial and
  dependency relations within the relative clause
  (these processes must otherwise access the head
  noun itself), cf. Hawkins (2004)

96

• A Cross-linguistic Universal the Accessibility
  Hierarchy
• Keenan Comrie (1977) proposed an Accessibility
  Hierarchy (AH) for universal rules of
  relativization on different structural positions
  within a clause
• Subjects gt Direct Objects gt Indirect
  Objects/Obliques gt Genitives
• (17) a. the professori that Oi/hei wrote the
  letter SU
• b. the professori that the student knows
  Oi/himi DO
• c. the professori that the student
  showed the book to Oi/himi IO/OBL
• d. the professori that the student knows
  Oi/hisi son GEN

97

• Relative clauses "cut off" (may cease to apply)
  down AH, cf. (18) if a language can form a
  relative clause on any low position, it can
  (generally) relativize on all higher positions.
• (18) SU only Malagasy, Maori
• SU DO only Kinyarwanda,
  Indonesian
• SU DO IO/OBL only Basque, Catalan
• SU DO IO/OBL GEN English, Hausa
  
• (19) ny mpianatrai izay nahita ny vehivavy Oi
  (Malagasy)
• the student that saw the woman
• 'the student that saw the woman' (NOT the
  student that the woman saw)

98

• Distribution of gaps to resumptive pronouns
  across languages also follows the AH with gaps
  higher and pronouns lower
• If a gap occurs low on the hierarchy, it occurs
  all the way up if a pronoun occurs high, it
  occurs all the way down.

99

• Languages Combining Gaps with Resumptive Pronouns
  
• (data from Keenan-Comrie 1977)
• SU DO IO/OBL GEN
• Aoban gap pro pro pro
• Arabic gap pro pro pro
• Gilbertese gap pro pro pro
• Kera gap pro pro pro
• Chinese (Peking) gap gap/pro pro pro
• Genoese gap gap/pro pro pro
• Hebrew gap gap/pro pro pro
• Persian gap gap/pro pro pro
• Tongan gap gap/pro pro pro
• Fulani gap gap pro pro
• Greek gap gap pro pro
• Welsh gap gap pro pro
• Zurich German gap gap pro pro
• Toba Batak gap pro pro

100

• Keenan-Comrie argued that these grammatical
  patterns were ultimately explainable by declining
  ease of processing down the AH
• They hypothesized that the AH was a complexity
  ranking
• Cf. Hawkins 1999, 2004177-190, to appear for
  elaboration in terms of Minimize Forms and
  Minimize Domains

101

• Keenan (1987) gave data from English corpora
  showing declining frequencies of relative clause
  usage correlating with the AH positions
  relativized on

102

• Experimental evidence for SU gt (easier than) DO
  relativization (English)
• Wanner Maratsos (1978) first pointed to
  greater processing load for DO rels
• Ford (1983) longer lexical decision times in DO
  rels
• King Just (1991) lower comprehension accuracy
  and longer lexical decision times in self-paced
  reading experiments
• Pickering Shillcock (1992) significant
  reaction time differences in self-paced reading
  experiments, both within and across clause
  boundaries (i.e. for embedded and non-embedded
  gap positions)
• King Kutas (1992, 1993) neurolinguistic
  support using ERPs
• Traxler et al (2002) eye movement study
  controlling also for agency and animacy
• Frauenfelder et al (1980) and Holmes O'Regan
  (1981) similar (SU gt DO) results for French
• Kwon et al (2010) for an eye-tracking study of
  Korean and a recent literature review of the
  SU/DO asymmetry in English and other lgs

103

• Let us take stock
• We see in these studies a clear correlation
  between performance data measuring preferred
  selections in corpora and ease of processing in
  experiments, on the one hand, and the fixed
  conventions of grammars in languages with fewer
  options
• ? SU relatives have been shown to be easier to
  process than DO in English and certain other lgs
  - correspondingly lgs like Malagasy only have the
  SU option
• ? the distribution of resumptive pronouns to
  gaps across grammars follows the AH ranking, with
  pronouns in the more difficult environments, and
  gaps in the easier ones this reverse
  implicational hierarchy appears to be structured
  by ease of processing

104

• All of these data, morphological and syntactic,
  support minimize Fi, in proportion to the ease
  with which a given property Pi can be assigned in
  processing to a given Fi.

105

• Let is turn now to our second principle of
  Information Density, maximize Pi.
• maximize the set Pi that can be
• assigned to a particular Fi or Fi.

106

• In Hawkins (2004) I argued for a further very
  general principle of efficiency, in addition to
  Minimize Forms and Minimize Domains Maximimize
  On-line Processing.
• There is a clear preference for selecting and
  arranging linguistic forms so as to provide the
  earliest possible access to as much of the
  ultimate syntactic and semantic representation as
  possible.

107

• This principle also results in a preference for
  error-free on-line processing since errors delay
  the assignment of intended properties and
  increase processing effort.

108

• Maximize On-line Processing (MaOP)
• The human processor prefers to maximize the set
  of properties that are assignable to each item X
  as X is processed, thereby increasing O(n-line)
  P(roperty) to U(ltimate) P(roperty) ratios. The
  maximization difference between competing orders
  and structures will be a function of the number
  of properties that are unassigned or misassigned
  to X in a structure/sequence S, compared with the
  number in an alternative.

109

• Clear examples can be seen across languages when
  certain common categories A, B are ordered
  asymmetrically A B, regardless of the language
  type, in contrast to symmetries in which both
  orders are productive AB/BA, e.g. VerbObject
  VO and ObjectVerb OV.
• Some examples of asymmetries are summarized
  below

110

• Some Asymmetries (Hawkins 2002, 2004)
• (i) Displaced WH preposed to the left of its
  (gap-containing) clause
• almost exceptionless
• Whoi did you say Oi came to the party
• (ii) Head Noun (Filler) to the left of its
  (gap-containing) Relative Clause
• E.g. the studentsi that I teach Oi
• If a lg has basic VO, then NRel exceptions
  rare (Hawkins 1983)
• VO OV
• NRel (English) NRel (Persian)
• RelN RelN (Japanese)

111

• (iii) Antecedent precedes Anaphor highly
  preferred cross-linguistically
• E.g. John washed himself (SVO), Washed John
  himself (VSO), John himself washed (SOV)
  highly preferred over e.g. Washed himself John
  (VOS)
• (iv) Wide Scope Quantifier/Operator precedes
  Narrow Scope Q/O preferred
• E.g. Every student a book read (SOV lgs) ??
  preferred
• A book every student read (SOV lgs)
  ?? preferred

112

• In these examples there is an asymmetric
  dependency of B on A the gap is dependent on
  the head-noun filler in (ii) (for gap-filling),
  the anaphor on its antecedent in (iii) (for
  co-indexation), the narrow scope quantifier on
  the wide scope quantifier in (iv) (the number of
  books read depends on the quantifier in the
  subject NP in Every student read a book/Many
  students read a book/Three students read a book,
  etc).

113

• The assignment of dependent properties to B is
  more efficient when A precedes, since these
  properties can be assigned to B immediately in
  on-line processing. In the reverse B A there
  will be delays in property assignments on-line
  ("unassignments") or misanalyses
  ("misassignments").
• If the relative clause precedes the head noun the
  gap is not immediately recognized and there are
  delays in argument structure assignment within
  the relative clause if a narrow scope
  quantifier precedes a wide scope quantifier, a
  wide scope interpretation will generally be
  (mis)assigned on-line to the narrow scope
  quantifier and so on.

114

• I have argued that MaOP (in the form of Fillers
  before Gaps) competes with Minimize Domains to
  give asymmetries in relative clause ordering
• a head before relative clause preference is
  visible in both VO and OV languages, with only
  rigid V-final languages resisting this preference
  to any degree (Hawkins 2004203-10).

115

• MiD MaOP
• VO NRel
• VO RelN - -
• OV RelN -
• OV NRel -

116

• WALS data (Dryer 2005ab)
• Rel-Noun Noun-Rel or Mixed/Other
• Rigid SOV 50 (17) 50 (17)
• Non-rigid SOV 0 (0) 100 (17)
• VO 3 (3) 97 (116)

117

• Language Variation in Psycholinguistics
• What this all means for psycholinguistics is
  that grammatical patterns and rules provide data
  that can inform language processing theories
  (Hawkins 2007, Jaeger Norcliffe 2009).
• Conversely, processing can help us understand
  grammars better.

118

• We can now give an explanation for what has been
  simply observed and stipulated so far in
  grammatical models, e.g. the existence of a head
  ordering parameter, with head-initial (VO) and
  head-final (OV) lgs being roughly equally
  productive
• they are equally efficient for processing
  whether adjacent heads occur on the left of their
  sisters (English), or on the right (Japanese).

119

• Performance data motivate the Accessibility
  Hierarchy for relative clause formation, the
  cut-offs for relativization, the reverse
  implicational patterns for gaps and resumptive
  pronouns, and numerous other regularities and
  language-particular subtleties (Hawkins 1999,
  2004, to appear).

120

• This approach helps us understand exceptions to
  proposed universals (involving e.g. differential
  ordering for single-word versus phrasal modifiers
  of heads).
• I.e. linguists can benefit from the inclusion of
  processing ideas in their theories and
  descriptions.

121

• The leftward versus rightward movement of heavy
  phrases in different language types is directly
  relevant for processing theories, on the other
  hand (cf. the theory of de Smedt 1994 which
  predicts only rightward movements).
• As is the absence of any independent evidence for
  anti-locality in any word order universals.

122

• For theories of information density we have seen
  lots of cross-linguistic patterns and hierarchies
  in morphology and syntax that support two
  complementary principles
• minimize Fi and maximize Pi

123

• Minimize Fi
• minimize the set Fi required for the
• assignment of a particular Pi or Pi
• in proportion to the processing ease with which
  each Pi can be assigned.

124

• Maximize Pi
• Maximize the set Pi that can be
• assigned to a particular Fi or Fi
• at each point in on-line processing.

125

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129

• Acknowledgements
• Special thanks to the many collaborators and
  contributors to this research program as
  presented here, especially
• Gontzal Aldai Barbara Jansing
• Bernard Comrie Stephen
  Matthews
• Gisbert Fanselow Fritz Newmeyer
• Luna Filipovic Beatrice Primus
• Kaoru Horie Anna Siewierska
• Ed Keenan Lynne Stallings
• Lewis Lawyer Tom Wasow

130

• Financial Support
• has been received from the following sources
  for the research reported here and is gratefully
  acknowledged
• German National Science Foundation fellowship
  (DFG grant INK 12/A1)
• European Science Foundation small grant
• Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary
  Anthropology (Leipzig) research fellowships
  2000-04
• University of California Davis research funds
• University of Cambridge Research Centre for
  English and Applied Linguistics research funds
  and UCD teaching buy-outs 2007-10