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What are the processing and learning mechanisms, the diachronic/typological effects, and the cognitive and evolutionary roots of the way human languages distinguish agents and patients in events
Contact: Caroline Andrews and Arrate Isasi-Isasmendi
Team: Sebastian Sauppe, Caroline Andrews, Vanessa Wilson, Arrate Isasi-Isasmendi, Eva Huber, Balthasar Bickel, Martin Meyer; former member: Aitor Egurtzegi
This project collaborates closely with the Work Package SemanticRoles of the NCCR Evolving Languangeand the SNSF Project Origins of Syntax at U Neuchâtel (hence we call it "E3+"). The project also collaborates with Lilia Rissman (Rochester Institute of Technology) and Marina Kalashnikova (BCBL research center). Additionally, the project and its members hold an active role in setting up and running fieldwork in Pucallpa (Peru) and Batangas (Philippines).
Selected publications:
Sauppe, S., Næss, Å., Roversi, G., Meyer, M., Bornkessel-Schlesewsky, I., and Bickel, B. (2023). An agent-first preference in a patient-first language during sentence comprehension. Cognitive Science, 47(9):e13340. doi: 10.1111/cogs.13340
Huber, E., Sauppe, S., Isasi-Isasmendi, A., Bornkessel-Schlesewsky, I., Merlo, P., and Bickel, B. (2023). Surprisal from language models can predict ERPs in processing predicate-argument structures only if enriched by an Agent Preference principle. Neurobiology of Language. doi: 10.1162/nol_a_00121
Isasi-Isasmendi, A., Sauppe, S., Andrews, C., Laka, I., Meyer, M., and Bickel, B. (2023). Incremental sentence processing is guided by a preference for agents: EEG evidence from Basque. Language, Cognition and Neuroscience. doi: 10.1080/23273798.2023.2250023
Sauppe, S., Andrews, C., and Norcliffe, E. (2023). Experimental research in cross-linguistic psycholinguistics. In Zufferey, S. and Gygax, P., editors, Routledge Handbook of Experimental Linguistics, chapter 10, pages 156–172. Routledge, London. doi: 10.4324/9781003392972-12
Isasi-Isasmendi, A., Andrews, C., Flecken, M., Laka, I., Daum, M. M., Meyer, M., Bickel, B.*, and Sauppe, S.* (2023). The agent preference in visual event apprehension. Open Mind, 7:240–282. doi: 10.1162/opmi_a_00083
Sauppe, S., K.K. Choudhary, N.R. Giroud Rickenbacher, D.E. Blasi, E.Norcliffe, S. Bhattamishra, M. Gulati, A. Egurtzegi, I. Bornkessel-Schlesewsky, M. Meyer & B. Bickel 2021. Neural signatures of syntactic variation in speech planning. PLoS Biology, 19(1):e3001038
Sauppe, S. and Flecken, M. 2021. Speaking for seeing: Sentence structure guides visual event apprehension. Cognition 206:104516. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2020.104516
Bickel, B., A. Witzlack-Makarevich, K. K. Choudhary, M. Schlesewsky & I. Bornkessel-Schlesewsky. 2015. The neurophysiology of language processing shapes the evolution of grammar: Evidence from case marking. PLoS ONE 10. e0132819. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0132819
Bickel, B., T. Zakharko, L. Bierkandt & A. Witzlack-Makarevich. 2014. Semantic role clustering: An empirical assessments of semantic role types in non-default case assignment. Studies in Language 38. 485 – 511
Wang, L., M. Schlesewsky, B. Bickel & I. Bornkessel-Schlesewsky. 2009. Exploring the nature of the ‘subject’-preference: evidence from the online comprehension of simple sentences in Mandarin Chinese. Language and Cognitive Processes 24. 1180–1226. https://doi.org/10.1080/01690960802159937
