Fourteen young adults participated in a cross-modal picture priming study. Perspective shift processing, in four types of relative clause sentences and in control sentences, was assessed using reaction times. Predictions were: 1) the easier the perspective shifts, the faster the reaction times and 2) subject relative clauses would reveal a priming effect versus attenuated or no priming in object relative clauses due to difficulty following perspective. A priming effect was observed for 1- switch relative clause sentences and for control sentences, while no priming effect was observed for 0 switch, 1+ switch, or 2 switch sentences. Results suggest that variations in local syntactic constructions and word order facilitated relative clause processing. Violations of semantic expectations and noun-noun-verb distance in following perspective can both contribute to the complexity of relative clause processing.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:USF/oai:scholarcommons.usf.edu:etd-2670 |
| Date | 30 June 2010 |
| Creators | Jones, Nicola C |
| Publisher | Scholar Commons |
| Source Sets | University of South Flordia |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | Graduate Theses and Dissertations |
| Rights | default |
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