Basque Word Order Processing Lightened by Case

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Date

2016-03-09

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Udako Euskal Unibertsitatea

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Description

In a self paced reading experiment, we measured the reading times of four word orders (SOV, SVO, OSV, and OVS) in Basque. Our results suggest that SOV is the canonical word orders as already has been attested (Ortiz de Urbina, 1989; Erdocia et al., 2009; Erdocia et al., 2012). The verb medial word orders (SVO and OVS) showed a great processing cost at sentence final position which is not found in verb final orders, favouring the preference of Basque speakers for verb final structures. Futher, the OSV word order showed an increase in reading times at S position in comparison with SOV. That results could be interpreted as a syntactic reanalysis in OSV word order. That reanalysis effect has not been observed in SVO and OVS word orders, suggesting that both word orders are not canonical. Further, we obser- ved that unmarked absolutive objects (-Ø) are always processed faster than ergative subjects (-k).
Euskarazko lau hitz-hurrenkeraren (SOV, OSV, SVO eta OVS) prozesamendua ikertuz, erakutsi dugu euskarazko subjektu ergatiboek objektu absolutiboek baino prozesatze-denbora handiagoa behar dutela beti, ergatiboa markatua delako (-k) eta absolutiboa markatugabea (-Ø). Gainera, gure emaitzek, lehenago ere argudiatu den bezala (Ortiz de Urbina, 1989; Erdocia et al., 2009; Erdocia et al., 2012), iradokitzen dute euskarazko hitz-hurrenkera kanonikoa SOV dela. Euskaraz, aditz-amaierako egiturek (SOV eta OSV) kanonikotzat jotzeko aukera erakusten dute, eta bi horietatik, OSV hurrenkeran Oren ondoren S irakurtzeak eragiten duen irakurketa-denboren areagotzeak iradokitzen du SOV dela kanonikoa euskaraz. Aldiz, aditza erdian duten hurrenkeren lehenengo bi hitzen artean elkarrekintzarik ez topatzeak, eta aditzaren ondoren S edo O topatzeak eragiten duen irakurketa-denboren handitzeak, iradokitzen dute SVO eta OVS hurrenkerak ez direla kanonikoak.

Keywords

Psikohizkuntzalaritza · Perpausen hitz-hurrenkera · Kasu- sistema (ergatiboa-absolutiboa), Psycholinguistics · Sentence word order · Case system (ergative- absolutive)

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