Journal

Volume 25, Issue 4 (December 31, 2024)

5 articles

• Applications of Convexity in Semantics for Natural Language
  by Peter Gärdenfors
  J. CS. 2024, 25(4), 431-458;
  Abstract The purpose of the article is to present an overview of how convexity serves as a constraint on the semantics of natural language. I begin by presenting four question that a semantic theory should be able to answer. The semantic theory I propose is based on conceptual spaces, which are geometrical o... [Read more].
  Abstract The purpose of the article is to present an overview of how convexity serves as a constraint on the semantics of natural language. I begin by presenting four question that a semantic theory should be able to answer. The semantic theory I propose is based on conceptual spaces, which are geometrical or topological structures provided with a betweenness relation. Previously, I have proposed the criterion that a natural concept is a convex region in a conceptual space. I show how this criterion can be expanded to an analysis of how convexity plays a role in the semantics of different word classes. I will show that the convexity criterion also improves the learnability of word meanings. Voronoi tessellations based on prototypes of categories can function as an efficient mechanism behind such learning processes. For many applications, a Euclidean or a city-block metric provides this relation, but for some word classes, for example color words and prepositions, polar convexity is required. Another topic concerns how the mappings between words and regions in conceptual spaces can be aligned between different individuals – in other words, how we know that we mean the same things when we use a word. If continuity and convexity of the mappings are assumed, Brouwer’s fixpoint theorem assures that there exist “meetings of minds” as regards word meanings. [Collapse]
• Integration of Syntactic and Semantic Information during Incremental Processing in Head-final Korean
  by Kum-Jeong Joo & Hyunwoo Kim
  J. CS. 2024, 25(4), 459-482;
  Abstract It is well-established that comprehenders rapidly integrate incoming information incrementally during sentence processing. While extensive research has explored this phenomenon in Indo-European languages, the processing dynamics in typologically distinct languages, particularly those with head-final... [Read more].
  Abstract It is well-established that comprehenders rapidly integrate incoming information incrementally during sentence processing. While extensive research has explored this phenomenon in Indo-European languages, the processing dynamics in typologically distinct languages, particularly those with head-final structures like Korean, remain underexplored. To address this gap, this study investigates real-time anaphora processing in Korean, focusing on how speakers establish agreement between reflexives and antecedent in the presence of structural and semantic constraints. In two self-paced reading experiments, we examined the processing of the Korean reflexive “caki,” investigating how Korean speakers’ anaphora resolution is modulated by syntactic and semantic information encountered during real-time sentence processing. In Experiment 1, we observed a clear tendency toward associating caki with a third-person referent. In Experiment 2, we found that this preference was further influenced by the semantic information of the following verb. These findings lend support to pre-head attachment accounts, which posit that speakers of head-final languages actively integrate incoming cues to construct linguistic representations. [Collapse]
• L1 Korean Speakers’ Morphological Errors with L2 English Causative Verbs: Traces of L1 Influence
  by A Young Chung & Kitaek Kim
  J. CS. 2024, 25(4), 483-522;
  Abstract This study examines the morphological errors made by L1 Korean speakers with L2 English causative verbs—change of state verbs and psych verbs—in the argument structure alternation (i.e., causative/inchoative alternation) to identify possible influence from their L1. Driven by Montrul’s (2001) findin... [Read more].
  Abstract This study examines the morphological errors made by L1 Korean speakers with L2 English causative verbs—change of state verbs and psych verbs—in the argument structure alternation (i.e., causative/inchoative alternation) to identify possible influence from their L1. Driven by Montrul’s (2001) findings, where L1 Turkish-L2 English learners transferred their L1 morphological patterns with psych verbs but did not do so with change of state verbs, we aim to partially replicate the experimental design of Montrul (2001) to examine whether her results of Turkish speakers are repeated with Korean speakers in our study given the resemblance between Turkish and Korean. A picture-based acceptability judgment task was implemented to see whether Korean speakers are biased towards certain morphological verb forms, possibly constrained by their L1 patterns. The results align with those of Montrul (2001) as traces of L1 influence were discovered with psych verbs while only marginal of them were observed with change of state verbs. Indeed, in case of change of state verbs, Korean speakers’ strong preferences for morphologically marked verb forms in intransitive contexts (e.g., The door got opened) suggest that L2-developmental factors (viz., overpassivization) may have played a greater role in their morphological errors. [Collapse]
• C-command in the Processing of Korean 3rd Person Caki
  by Chung-hye Han & Keir Moulton
  J. CS. 2024, 25(4), 523-552;
  Abstract While it is commonly assumed that a bound variable pronoun that covaries with a quantified phrase must be c-commanded by its quantified antecedent (Reinhart 1983), there are many counterexamples reported in the literature that show that c-command is not a requirement for covariation (Barker 2012). I... [Read more].
  Abstract While it is commonly assumed that a bound variable pronoun that covaries with a quantified phrase must be c-commanded by its quantified antecedent (Reinhart 1983), there are many counterexamples reported in the literature that show that c-command is not a requirement for covariation (Barker 2012). In processing, there is suggestive evidence that c-command has an effect in variable binding (Cunnings et al. 2015, Kush et al. 2015). Moulton and Han (2018) found that bound pronouns can access c-commanding quantified antecedents early in processing, but not non-c-commanding antecedents—even when a bound variable interpretation is possible. Lakhani and Schwarz (2024), however, report that when Moulton and Han’s test sentences were modified to facilitate the covarying interpretation of the pronoun, the processing difference between c-commanded and non-c-commanded pronouns disappeared. In this paper, we test the processing effect of c-command on the 3rd person long distance anaphor caki in Korean. Caki typically gets its meaning from an antecedent in the same sentence. It is a dedicated bound variable (Han and Storoshenko 2012), and can be bound by a c-commanding antecedent or a non-c-commanding antecedent (Kim 2000, O’Grady 1987). In one acceptability rating study and two self-paced reading studies, we found processing costs for non-c-commanded caki in comparison to c-commanded caki in sentences that involve covariation as well as in sentences that do not. [Collapse]
• Factivity Alternation, Expletive Constructions, and Imaginative Worlds
  by Chungmin Lee
  J. CS. 2024, 25(4), 553-590;
  Abstract Cognitive (and emotive) factive predicates like know and remember (or be surprised) embed factively presupposed complement clauses, but presupposition for the cognitive category can be cancelled, yielding the factivity alternation phenomenon. This paper examines cross-linguistic data on factivity al... [Read more].
  Abstract Cognitive (and emotive) factive predicates like know and remember (or be surprised) embed factively presupposed complement clauses, but presupposition for the cognitive category can be cancelled, yielding the factivity alternation phenomenon. This paper examines cross-linguistic data on factivity alternation, with special attention to its types (non-veridical operators, as in English, complement endings, as in Korean and other Altaic languages) and the function of focus marking for alternation in general, and pragmatic (Protagonist Projection) perspective shift helps resolve alternation for [+say]C(omplementizer), as in English. We note that the distinction between the covert/overt FACT (Kiparsky&Kiparsky 1972) and the [+say]C for the non-factive alternant and doxastic category, including imagine, in general. The non-canonical type of polar interrogative complementizer whether (or not) construction is argued to be in parallel with the polar interrogative expletive negation complement in Korean (K) and Japanese (J). In form, both are unexpected. But the expletive negation complement in K and J is unanimously accepted by native speakers, although the English counterpart is not that unanimous in acceptability and interpretation, despite White (2021). However, our survey supports a rather high acceptability and some tendency supporting our claim that the unusual constructions reveal positive bias and hedge in interpretation even in English, imagine whether is also included in our claim. This paper shows how lexical primitives and complement heads together give rise to factivity and its alternation and finally deals with the important world-creating function of imagine. [Collapse]