Simple shifts within the syntactic structure of a sentence can have significant effects on the cognitive processes involved in language comprehension (Deckert, 2015; Ellis, 2002; Ferreira, 2003). Modifier position is one such syntactic element that has shown the importance of structure as demonstrated by Karimi et al. (2019). Post-modified words (e.g., a “peasant who was highly educated”) are encoded more robustly and are retrieved more easily than pre-modified words (e.g., a “highly educated peasant”). We explored the potential influence of modifier position on statement believability, namely, how much people believe a statement they have not heard before in Experiment 1. In Experiment 2 we examined how linear modification affects the perceptual qualities being transferred to the target noun phrase. Our results from both experiments illustrate a strong effect of Likelihood (familiarity) and provide interesting insight into the modification effect, and how modifiers may enhance target noun phrases.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:MSSTATE/oai:scholarsjunction.msstate.edu:td-7206 |
| Date | 10 May 2024 |
| Creators | Weber, Peter John, II |
| Publisher | Scholars Junction |
| Source Sets | Mississippi State University |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | Theses and Dissertations |
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