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Semantic influences on pronoun assignment in aphasia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 November 2008

Ellen Grober  and
Lucia Kellar
Ellen Grober*
Affiliation:
New York University Medical Center
Lucia Kellar
Affiliation:
New York University Medical Center
*
Ellen Grober, Department of Neurology, New York University Medical Center, 550 First Avenue, New York, New York 10016
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Abstract

Semantic factors affecting pronoun assignment were studied in a group of aphasie patients. Their ability to assign reference in sentences of the type John telephoned Bill because he needed some information was facilitated by the causal bias of the main verb known to influence the direction of pronoun assignment in normal speakers. The addition of gender constraints (e.g., John telephoned Sue because he needed some information) improved their performance as well. Explicit mention of the referent's name (e.g., John telephoned Bill because John needed some information) did not improve performance any more than did the addition of gender constraints. When these cues were eliminated so that pronoun assignment required a full syntactic analysis, their performance dropped to chance.

Type
Articles
Information
Applied Psycholinguistics , Volume 2 , Issue 3 , August 1981 , pp. 253 - 268
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1981

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