Priming syntactic ambiguity resolution in children and adults

Naomi Havron; Camila Scaff; Maria Julia Carbajal; Tal Linzen; Axel Barrault; Anne Christophe

doi:10.1080/23273798.2020.1797130

Priming syntactic ambiguity resolution in children and adults

Naomi Havron, Camila Scaff, Maria Julia Carbajal, Tal Linzen, Axel Barrault, Anne Christophe

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

Abstract

Adults use their recent experience to disambiguate ambiguous sentences: Structures that have recently been primed are favoured in the resolution of different types of ambiguity, an example of structural priming. Research on children's use of recent information for disambiguation is scarce. Using a forced-choice task with a tablet, we asked whether 5–6-year-old French-speaking children could also be primed in the resolution of attachment ambiguities, as well as whether listeners are affected by the proportion of primes of each structure, and whether priming is cumulative. We found that both children and adults can be primed, and are sensitive to the proportion of structures in the input, and that priming effects cumulate as the experiment progresses. This is the first study showing priming of ambiguous sentences at 5–6 years, suggesting that children, like adults, use recent experience as a source of disambiguating information.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	1445-1455
Number of pages	11
Journal	Language, Cognition and Neuroscience
Volume	35
Issue number	10
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1080/23273798.2020.1797130
State	Published - Dec 2020
Externally published	Yes

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
This work was supported by a postdoctoral grant to the first author from the French Embassy in Israel and The Victor Smorgon Charitable Fund, and by the French Agence Nationale de la Recherche [grants n° ANR-13-APPR-0012 LangLearn, ANR-17-CE28-0007-01 LangAge, and ANR-17-EURE-0017 FrontCog]. We would like to thank Anne-Caroline Fiévet, our babylab manager for her help with recruitment and testing, and Marion Beretti and Alex de Carvalho for their help in testing. We thank Shravan Vasishth for statistical advice, Alex Cristia for allowing us to use the tablet application, Sharon Lim Sautarel for drawing the stimuli for the experiment, and the schools, parents and children for their collaboration.

Publisher Copyright:
© 2020 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.

Keywords

Adaptation
ambiguity
children
language
priming

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Language and Linguistics
Experimental and Cognitive Psychology
Linguistics and Language
Cognitive Neuroscience

Access to Document

10.1080/23273798.2020.1797130

Cite this

@article{2f874ee5e5924a6795a527aeab897060,

title = "Priming syntactic ambiguity resolution in children and adults",

abstract = "Adults use their recent experience to disambiguate ambiguous sentences: Structures that have recently been primed are favoured in the resolution of different types of ambiguity, an example of structural priming. Research on children's use of recent information for disambiguation is scarce. Using a forced-choice task with a tablet, we asked whether 5–6-year-old French-speaking children could also be primed in the resolution of attachment ambiguities, as well as whether listeners are affected by the proportion of primes of each structure, and whether priming is cumulative. We found that both children and adults can be primed, and are sensitive to the proportion of structures in the input, and that priming effects cumulate as the experiment progresses. This is the first study showing priming of ambiguous sentences at 5–6 years, suggesting that children, like adults, use recent experience as a source of disambiguating information.",

keywords = "Adaptation, ambiguity, children, language, priming",

author = "Naomi Havron and Camila Scaff and Carbajal, {Maria Julia} and Tal Linzen and Axel Barrault and Anne Christophe",

note = "Funding Information: This work was supported by a postdoctoral grant to the first author from the French Embassy in Israel and The Victor Smorgon Charitable Fund, and by the French Agence Nationale de la Recherche [grants n° ANR-13-APPR-0012 LangLearn, ANR-17-CE28-0007-01 LangAge, and ANR-17-EURE-0017 FrontCog]. We would like to thank Anne-Caroline Fi{\'e}vet, our babylab manager for her help with recruitment and testing, and Marion Beretti and Alex de Carvalho for their help in testing. We thank Shravan Vasishth for statistical advice, Alex Cristia for allowing us to use the tablet application, Sharon Lim Sautarel for drawing the stimuli for the experiment, and the schools, parents and children for their collaboration. Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2020 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.",

year = "2020",

month = dec,

doi = "10.1080/23273798.2020.1797130",

language = "English",

volume = "35",

pages = "1445--1455",

journal = "Language, Cognition and Neuroscience",

issn = "2327-3798",

publisher = "Taylor and Francis Inc.",

number = "10",

}

TY - JOUR

T1 - Priming syntactic ambiguity resolution in children and adults

AU - Havron, Naomi

AU - Scaff, Camila

AU - Carbajal, Maria Julia

AU - Linzen, Tal

AU - Barrault, Axel

AU - Christophe, Anne

N1 - Funding Information: This work was supported by a postdoctoral grant to the first author from the French Embassy in Israel and The Victor Smorgon Charitable Fund, and by the French Agence Nationale de la Recherche [grants n° ANR-13-APPR-0012 LangLearn, ANR-17-CE28-0007-01 LangAge, and ANR-17-EURE-0017 FrontCog]. We would like to thank Anne-Caroline Fiévet, our babylab manager for her help with recruitment and testing, and Marion Beretti and Alex de Carvalho for their help in testing. We thank Shravan Vasishth for statistical advice, Alex Cristia for allowing us to use the tablet application, Sharon Lim Sautarel for drawing the stimuli for the experiment, and the schools, parents and children for their collaboration. Publisher Copyright: © 2020 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.

PY - 2020/12

Y1 - 2020/12

N2 - Adults use their recent experience to disambiguate ambiguous sentences: Structures that have recently been primed are favoured in the resolution of different types of ambiguity, an example of structural priming. Research on children's use of recent information for disambiguation is scarce. Using a forced-choice task with a tablet, we asked whether 5–6-year-old French-speaking children could also be primed in the resolution of attachment ambiguities, as well as whether listeners are affected by the proportion of primes of each structure, and whether priming is cumulative. We found that both children and adults can be primed, and are sensitive to the proportion of structures in the input, and that priming effects cumulate as the experiment progresses. This is the first study showing priming of ambiguous sentences at 5–6 years, suggesting that children, like adults, use recent experience as a source of disambiguating information.

AB - Adults use their recent experience to disambiguate ambiguous sentences: Structures that have recently been primed are favoured in the resolution of different types of ambiguity, an example of structural priming. Research on children's use of recent information for disambiguation is scarce. Using a forced-choice task with a tablet, we asked whether 5–6-year-old French-speaking children could also be primed in the resolution of attachment ambiguities, as well as whether listeners are affected by the proportion of primes of each structure, and whether priming is cumulative. We found that both children and adults can be primed, and are sensitive to the proportion of structures in the input, and that priming effects cumulate as the experiment progresses. This is the first study showing priming of ambiguous sentences at 5–6 years, suggesting that children, like adults, use recent experience as a source of disambiguating information.

KW - Adaptation

KW - ambiguity

KW - children

KW - language

KW - priming

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85088561396&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1080/23273798.2020.1797130

DO - 10.1080/23273798.2020.1797130

M3 - Article

AN - SCOPUS:85088561396

VL - 35

SP - 1445

EP - 1455

JO - Language, Cognition and Neuroscience

JF - Language, Cognition and Neuroscience

SN - 2327-3798

IS - 10

ER -

Priming syntactic ambiguity resolution in children and adults

Abstract

Bibliographical note

Keywords

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Access to Document

Other files and links

Fingerprint

Cite this