Memory access in language: how we store and retrieve linguistic information

ERC Consolidator project

To be able to talk and to understand each other, we have to continuously store and retrieve linguistic information. In linguistics, the dominant approach to studying the processes of storing and recall of linguistic information from short-term memory assumes that we can access all items in parallel and that the most highly activated items are the most likely to be retrieved. Activation, in turn, can be boosted by the requirements of the current cognitive context.

This model is related to theories of memory developed independently of linguistics. In linguistics, it has been supported by rich research on production and comprehension. The model, however, has been applied very narrowly. It focuses only on the recall of some syntactic items, for instance, the recall of arguments during the processing of a verb. Other functions of memory fall outside the approach.

The project’s core idea is that the memory model can be applied to many other cases in which memory has a decisive role. We will do this by linking the model to theories of other language phenomena developed in linguistics, cognitive sciences and artificial intelligence. First, we will link it to computational models of lexical knowledge, which will enable us to fully and formally represent what the current cognitive context is and to build an indiscriminate and general approach to memory access. Second, we will link it to computational models of grammatical knowledge to understand how we store and recall grammatical rules. Finally, we will link it to discourse theories to have an analysis of storage and recall of textual information.

The project will lead to a new view on the memory model, one that is general and cross-domain. It will provide a more principled account of how memory affects language, will give us a new insight into why the theories of lexical knowledge, grammatical knowledge and discourse theories work, and it will make it possible to tie together accounts that are often treated as independent.

A short description of the project can be found here.

A short interview for Utrecht University about the project (English, Dutch).

An integrated semantic and cognitive model of presuppositional dependencies

NWO Open Competition project (with Rick Nouwen)

Language does not come to us instantaneously, but instead in the shape of a stream of input (a stream of written words or spoken sounds). When we make sense of linguistic input, we incrementally build an interpretation. This project studies the processes that underly incremental interpretation. In particular, the project aims to build computational models of the working memory processes involved. To this end, the focus is on so-called presuppositions, a phenomenon where sentences signal that some bit of information was established earlier in the discourse. Presuppositions allow us to use semantic theories of the dynamics of interpretation at the linguistic end of our models, allowing the theory-internal concepts to become predictive factors in the cognitive architecture used to model the comprehension process. The models will be based on a series of eye-tracking and self-paced reading experiments conducted to identify the retrieval processes at play in presupposition resolution, with both theory-internal as well as theory-external features as manipulations. To test the models, we will annotate a large eye-tracking corpus with information about presuppositional content.

This research aims to pioneer the processing of the linguistically controlled information flow in discourse. The research results will be connected to both existing work on retrieval in syntactic dependency processing and to semantic theories of presupposition resolution. By providing a model that combines semantics and processing, the project will be able to deliver a vital baseline for future research into the incremental comprehension of language.

More details can be found here.