7 Results
7.3 Comprehension study
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speakers, and a main effect of antecedent ( = β.178, SE= 0.67γ, γ.βγ6, p< .005). Longer fixations were directed to the repetition of antecedent 1 than to antecedent 1 itself.
To summarise, reflexive pronouns were not fixated shorter when the context provided two antecedents (CO R) compared to reflexive pronouns that had only one accessible antecedent.
The analyses of the regressions to the antecedents and also the total times at the antecedents did not show that the conditions differed. It can be concluded that L2 speakers were not to interrupted in their processing of the pronominal element by the number of accessible antecedents.
151 between the studies is, that the interpretation, but not the processing of pronominal elements in picture NPs, has been investigated. The reason for doing so was that so far, only a few studies were conducted to investigate how pronominal elements in picture NPs are interpreted. Moreover, this has only been done for English. Theoretical approaches like Principles A and B (Chomsky, 1981) and Reflexivity (Reinhart and Reuland, 1993) provide insight into how pronominal elements should be bound. However, empirical research (e.g.
Sturt, 2001) has shown that the way how pronominal elements are interpreted does not fit theoretical approaches.
The comprehension study was carried out in German and Dutch with the aim to get an impression of reflexive and personal pronouns in these languages are interpreted. Pronominal elements in three types of picture NP-constructions were investigated. These were pronominal elements in PNPs like (165), p-PNPs (166) and s-PNP (167).
(165) Jan en Frank staan voor de boekenkast. Frank bevestigt dat een nieuw boek over zichzelf/hem mogelijk in de lente zal worden gepubliceerd
“Jan and Frank were standing in front of the bookshelf. Frank confirms that a new book over himself/him will probably published in spring”
(166) Jan en Frank staan voor de boekenkast. Jan bevestigt dat Frank’s nieuwe boek over zichzelf/hem mogelijk in de lente zal worden gepubliceerd.
“Jan and Frank were standing in front of the bookshelf. Jan confirms that Frank’s new book over himself/him will probably be published in spring”
(167) Jan en Frank staan voor de boekenkast. Jan bevestigt dat Frank een nieuw boek over zichzelf/hem mogelijk in de lente zal publiceren.
“Jan and Frank were standing in front of the bookshelf. Jan confirms that Frank will probably sell new books over himself/him in spring”
In the PNP with a reflexive pronoun, the L1 German speakers should judge that sentence ungrammatical and therefore an interpretation of that sentence should be impossible. L1 Dutch speakers should judge the PNP grammatical and interpret the reflexive pronoun as referring to Jan. The personal pronoun should be bound by Jan in Dutch and German according to Principle B (Chomsky, 1981). In the case of p-PNPs Principles A and B would predict that the reflexive pronoun should be interpreted as the possessor Frank and the
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personal pronoun as a someone who is not the possessor Frank. In s-PNPs the reflexive pronoun in both Dutch and German should refer to Frank, but Frank should not be the antecedent of the personal pronoun, as it would be predicted by Principles A and B (Chomsky, 1981) and Condition B (Reinhart and Reuland, 1993).
The first task of the comprehension study was the grammaticality judgement task. Graphs 34 and 35 show the grammaticality divided by condition, pronountype and group.37 As can be seen, the German and Dutch participants judged the PNP structure with a reflexive pronoun worst. The German participants judged PNPs with a personal pronoun as most grammatical and the Dutch group the p-PNPs with a personal pronoun. Overall, the Dutch group rated more items grammatical than the German group. Graphs 36 and 37 display the grammaticality of s-PNPs with a reflexive and personal pronoun. These conditions were judged equally well by the German and Dutch group. S-PNPs with a reflexive pronoun were judged equally well as with personal pronouns.
Graph 34: Grammaticality in German Graph 35: Grammaticality in Dutch
• PNP R: PNP with a reflexive pronoun, PNP P: PNP with a personal pronoun, p-PNP R: p-PNP with a reflexive pronoun, p-PNP P: p-PNP with a personal pronoun
37 For this analysis only the fillers have been removed. Each condition contains 24 items.
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
1
D Grammaticality PNP and p-PNP
PNP R PNP P p-PNP R p-PNP P
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
1
NL Grammaticality PNP and p-PNP
PNP R PNP P p-PNP R p-PNP P
153 Graph 36: Grammaticality in German Graph 37: Grammaticality in Dutch
• s-PNP R: s-PNP with a reflexive pronoun, s-PNP P: s-PNP with a personal pronoun, p-PNP R: p-PNP with a reflexive pronoun, p-PNP P: p-PNP with a personal pronoun
The interpretation of reflexive and personal pronouns in the PNP and p-PNP for German is shown in graph 38. Graph 38 displays that personal pronouns in a PNP (PNP P) were interpreted frequently as Jan and reflexive pronouns (PNP R) were interpreted predominantly as Jan as well38. Graph 39 also shows that personal pronouns in a p-PNP (p-PNP P) were interpreted as Jan in most cases and reflexive pronouns (p-PNP R) as Frank.
Graph 38: Interpretation of pronominal elements in PNPs and p-PNPs in German
38 It has to be kept in mind that reflexive pronouns in a PNP were judged as ungrammatical for German. The interpretation of the reflexive pronouns in German is only based on 2 out of 24 items.
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
1
D Grammaticality p-PNP and s-PNP
s-PNP R s-PNP P p-PNP R p-PNP P
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
1
NL Grammaticality p-PNP and s-PNP
s-PNP R s-PNP P p-PNP R p-PNP P
0 0,1 0,2 0,3 0,4 0,5 0,6 0,7 0,8 0,9 1
PNP P PNP R p-PNP P p-PNP R
Jan, Frank and someone else
Jan and Frank someone else Frank Jan
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• PNP R: PNP with a reflexive pronoun, PNP P: PNP with a personal pronoun, p-PNP R: p-PNP with a reflexive pronoun, p-PNP P: p-PNP with a personal pronoun
Several statistical analyses, chi-square tests, were carried out comparing the choices of antecedents within the conditions and between conditions. For German, the difference between Jan and Frank as antecedents for the personal pronoun in a PNP (PNP P) was significant (p< .001) and also in a p-PNP (p-PNP P) (p< .001), displaying that the antecedent Jan was chosen more frequently than Frank. The interpretation of the reflexive pronoun in a p-PNP (p-PNP/REF) as Frank compared to Jan was also significant (p< .001), showing that Frank was chosen more often than Jan. The interpretation of reflexive pronouns compared to personal pronouns in a PNP was different (PNP: p< .005) which has also been the case in p-PNPs (p-PNP: p< .001), meaning that the pronominal elements within the structures have been interpreted differently.
Graph 39 displays the choices of antecedents of pronominal elements in PNPs and p-PNPs for Dutch. It can be seen, that the personal pronoun has been interpreted in a PNP as Jan or Frank or Jan and Frank. This is different to German, as the choices were directed more frequently towards Jan. The reflexive pronoun was clearly interpreted as Jan in a PNP. The personal pronoun in a p-PNP was predominantly interpreted as Jan, but not exclusively. The possessor Frank also seems to be accessible. The reflexive pronoun in a p-PNP was interpreted as the possessor Frank.
Graph 39: Interpretation of pronominal elements in PNPs and p-PNPs in Dutch
• PNP R: PNP with a reflexive pronoun, PNP P: PNP with a personal pronoun, p-PNP R: p-PNP with a reflexive pronoun, p-PNP P: p-PNP with a personal pronoun
0 0,1 0,2 0,3 0,4 0,5 0,6 0,7 0,8 0,9 1
PNP P PNP R p-PNP P p-PNP R
Jan and someone else Jan and Frank someone else Frank Jan
155 In Dutch, the comparison of Jan with Frank as antecedent for the personal pronoun in a PNP does not reach significance (p> .05), neither does the comparison between Jan, Frank and Jan and Frank (p> .05). This means that none of the antecedents was chosen more frequently over the others. The difference between Jan and Frank was significant for the reflexive pronoun in a PNP (p< .001) and p-PNP (p< .001), highlighting that Jan was chosen more often than Frank. In the p-PNP condition with a personal pronoun, Jan was chosen significantly more often than Frank and Jan and Frank (p< .001). The comparison of the interpretation of pronominal elements in a PNP and PNP showed significant differences (PNP: p< .005, PNP: p< .001). Pronominal elements in a PNP took different antecedents and as well in a p-PNP.
The comparison of the condition between German and Dutch showed that personal pronouns in a PNP were interpreted significantly different in both languages (p<. 001) which had also been the case of reflexive pronouns in PNPs (p< .001). The comparison of reflexive pronouns in a p-PNP between German and Dutch reached significance (p< .001). The interpretation of the personal pronoun in a p-PNP was also different between German and Dutch (p< .001).
This analysis showed that pronominal elements in German and Dutch took different antecedents in PNPs and p-PNPs.
Graph 40 shows the interpretation of the pronominal elements in s-PNPs and p-PNPs for German. The personal pronoun in an s-PNP was predominantly interpreted as Jan and the reflexive pronoun in the same structure was interpreted as Frank. In both conditions, other choices seem also to be possible.
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Graph 40: Interpretation of pronominal elements in s-PNPs and p-PNPs in German
• s-PNP R: s-PNP with a reflexive pronoun, s-PNP P: PNP with a personal pronoun, p-PNP R: p-PNP with a reflexive pronoun, p-PNP P: p-PNP with a personal pronoun
The analyses revealed that Jan was significantly different from Frank in both the s-PNP with a personal pronoun (p< .001) and a reflexive pronoun (p< .001), meaning that reflexive pronouns more often took Frank and not Jan as antecedent and personal pronouns took Jan, but not Frank. The comparison of Jan and Frank as antecedents was also significant for the pronominal elements in p-PNPs (p-PNP R: p< .001, p-PNP P: p< .001). Reflexive pronouns in p-PNPs were significantly different interpreted from personal pronouns.
Graph 41 displays the interpretation of pronominal elements in s-PNPs and p-PNPs for Dutch.
The interpretation of the personal pronoun in s-PNPs is not clearly directed towards one particular antecedent. Jan and Jan and Frank were chosen most frequently. The interpretation of the reflexive pronoun is directed primarily towards Frank.
0 0,1 0,2 0,3 0,4 0,5 0,6 0,7 0,8 0,9 1
p-PNP P p-PNP R s-PNP P s-PNP R
Jan and someone else Jan, Frank and someone else
Frank and someone else Jan and Frank
someone else Frank Jan
157 Graph 41: Interpretation of pronominal elements in s-PNPs and p-PNPs in Dutch
• s-PNP R: s-PNP with a reflexive pronoun, s-PNP P: s-PNP with a personal pronoun, p-PNP R: p-PNP with a reflexive pronoun, p-PNP P: p-PNP with a personal pronoun
Statistical analyses revealed that Jan and Frank significantly differed from each other in the interpretation of personal pronouns (p< .001) and reflexive pronouns (p< .001) in s-PNPs. In s-PNPs with a reflexive pronoun Frank, but not Jan, was chosen more often as antecedent and with a personal pronoun Jan but not Frank. The interpretation of Jan and Frank reached significance for reflexive pronouns in p-PNPs (p< .001) and personal pronouns in p-PNP (p<
.001). Personal pronouns took Frank as antecedent and reflexive pronouns took Jan.
The comprehension of the pronominal elements in s-PNPs was compared between German and Dutch. The comparison showed that the interpretation of the personal pronoun and the reflexive pronoun in s-PNPs was different between languages (s-PNP P: p< .001, s-PNP R: p<
.001). Also, the interpretation of personal pronouns in p-PNPs was different between German and Dutch (p< .05), as was the interpretation of reflexive pronouns (p< .001). These significant effects display that pronominal elements in s-PNPs and p-PNPs in German and Dutch were interpreted differently.
7.3.1 Summary
Pronominal elements in PNPs, s-PNPs and p-PNPs were judged grammatical in Dutch. This also holds for German with the exception of reflexive pronouns in PNPs. In both languages, reflexive pronouns more often take the local element as antecedent and personal pronouns were interpreted more often as the non-local antecedent. However, these choices were not absolute, meaning that the reflexive pronoun could also take the non-local element as
0 0,1 0,2 0,3 0,4 0,5 0,6 0,7 0,8 0,9 1
p-PNP P p-PNP R s-PNP P s-PNP R
Jan and someone else Jand, Frank and someone else
Jan and Frank someone else Frank Jan
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antecedent and personal pronoun could take the local person. Thus, the interpretation of pronominal elements in the three types of structures were guided by syntactic and discourse factors. German and Dutch seem to differ especially in the interpretation of personal pronouns. More variation in the choices of antecedents is visible for the Dutch group.
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