The word as a unit of internal predictability
The word as a unit of internal predictability
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作为内部可预测性单位的单词
作者：
John Mansfield
摘要语言学中的一个长期问题是如何定义词。比另一个基于可预测性和信息的概念更像是单词。内部可预测性是一个构造元素的熵与另一个元素降低的程度。免费元素。所有语言问题。
Abstract A long-standing problem in linguistics is how to define word. Recent research has focused on the incompatibility of diverse definitions, and the challenge of finding a definition that is crosslinguistically applicable. In this study I take a different approach, asking whether one structure is more word-like than another based on the concepts of predictability and information. I hypothesize that word constructions tend to be more “internally predictable” than phrase constructions, where internal predictability is the degree to which the entropy of one constructional element is reduced by mutual information with another element. I illustrate the method with case studies of complex verbs in German and Murrinhpatha, comparing verbs with selectionally restricted elements against those built from free elements. I propose that this method identifies an important mathematical property of many word-like structures, though I do not expect that it will solve all the problems of wordhood.