A cross-linguistic investigation of meaning-driven combinatorial restrictions in clausal embedding

语言学家和认知学家的广泛共识是，人类语言包括一个决定如何将单词组合成语法结构的“组合系统”，以及一个解释这种语法结构的“语义系统”。然而，对于这两个系统之间的确切关系，人们并没有达成共识。特别是，目前还不清楚组合系统和语义系统是否完全独立运行，或者某些组合模式是否实际上是意义驱动的。为了解决这个问题，“思考”和“惊奇”等“嵌入从句的谓词”提供了一个重要的测试案例。这些谓词所能搭配的补语类型各不相同。例如，“Think”只与陈述性从句(如“That Jo Left”)连用，而“Wonder”只与疑问从句(如“Who Left”(谁离开))连用。此外，只有一些短语可以与名词短语组合在一起(例如，“Believe the Lomour”是文法上的，而“Think the Lumor”不是)。在西班牙语等语言中，补语的语法语气(指示语或虚拟语气)也会有所不同。有初步证据表明，这些组合模式和这些谓词的细粒度语义属性之间存在系统联系。例如，表达一个未实现的愿望的谓词(如“希望”、“愿望”)从不与疑问从句结合(如“希望”、“希望”)。“Jo Hope Who Left”是不合乎语法的)。然而，由于缺乏对多种语言之间这种联系的系统研究，也没有一个统一的理论框架，这使得人们无法彻底理解这种潜在的意义驱动的组合制约。本项目将通过多语言数据收集和心理语言学实验以及统一的理论分析相结合的方法，寻求一种综合的方法来研究从句嵌入领域中组合系统和语义系统之间的关系和相互作用。它将利用该领域的最新发展：新的语义理论使阐明意义和组合限制之间的关系成为可能，以及新的心理语言学方法提供细粒度的数据来评估这些假设。具体地说，该项目将1)收集来自世界各地14种语言的数据，从句嵌入谓词的组合和语义属性，2)发展复杂的理论假设，从句嵌入潜在意义驱动的组合模式的机制，3)基于心理语言学实验对这些假设进行定量评估。这一结果将对组合系统和语义系统如何在人类语言能力中共同运作的基本问题提供新的认识。由此产生的数据将公之于众，为进一步的研究和计算应用服务。

There is a broad consensus among linguists and cognitive scientists that human language involves a "combinatorial system" that determines how words can be combined to form grammatical structures, and a "semantic system" that interprets such grammatical structures. However, there is no consensus on the precise relationship between these two systems. In particular, it is still unclear whether the combinatorial and the semantic system operate completely independently, or whether certain combinatorial patterns are in fact meaning-driven.To address this question, "clause-embedding predicates" such as "think" and "wonder" provide an important test case. These predicates vary in the types of complements they can combine with. For instance, "think" only combines with declarative clauses (e.g., "that Jo left") while "wonder" only combines with interrogative clauses (e.g., "who left"). Also, only some of them can combine with a noun phrase (e.g. "believe the rumour" is grammatical but "think the rumour" is not). In languages like Spanish, they furthermore vary with respect to the grammatical mood of their complements (indicative or subjunctive). There is preliminary evidence for a systematic link between such combinatorial patterns and the fine-grained semantic properties of these predicates. For example, predicates expressing an unfulfilled desire (e.g. "hope", "wish") never combine with interrogative clauses (e.g. "Jo hopes who left" is ungrammatical). However, the lack of a systematic investigation of such connections across multiple languages, and of a unified theoretical framework, have so far prevented a thorough understanding of such potential meaning-driven combinatorial restrictions.This project will pursue an integrated approach to investigate the relation and interaction between the combinatorial and the semantic system in the area of clause-embedding, by combining multi-lingual data-collection and psycho-linguistic experiments with the development of unified theoretical analyses. It will make use of recent developments in the field: novel semantic theories that make it possible to articulate very precise hypotheses about the relationship between meaning and combinatorial restrictions, and novel psycho-linguistic methods that deliver fine-grained data to evaluate such hypotheses.Concretely, the project will 1) collect data from 14 languages around the world on the combinatorial and semantic properties of clause-embedding predicates, 2) develop sophisticated theoretical hypotheses about the mechanisms underlying potential meaning-driven combinatorial patterns in clausal embedding, and 3) quantitatively evaluate these hypotheses based on psycho-linguistic experiments. The results will shed new light on the fundamental question of how the combinatorial and the semantic system operate together in the human language faculty. The resulting data will be made publicly available to serve further research and computational applications.