In the Chomskyian tradition, a clear distinction is made between competence and performance (Chomsky Reference Chomsky1965), and linguistic theorization has been primarily concerned with native speaker's metalinguistic judgments of sentences. Branigan & Pickering (B&P) depart from this tradition and argue that grammar is directly accessed during language processing, so processing evidence is as relevant for linguistic theorization as acceptability judgments are. To be specific, B&P argue that structural priming can be taken as evidence for linguistic representation. We agree with B&P that structural priming is a useful tool in the study of language; however, we would like to point out that structural priming also has the issue of “source ambiguity” (similarly to acceptability judgments noted by B&P; Chomsky Reference Chomsky, Akmajian, Culicover and Wasow1977), crucially in the context of structural representation assumed in the proposal.
When the processing of input A affects the processing of input B, which shares an aspect of linguistic structure with input A but otherwise is unrelated, the phenomenon is viewed as an instance of structural priming. What if there is more than one aspect that both input A and B share? In this case, the source of the priming effect remains ambiguous. Unfortunately, most evidence taken in support of structural priming has this source ambiguity issue – in particular, ambiguity between sequential and hierarchical relations. For example, although structural priming effects were reported in many studies of structural alternations without meaning change – e.g., alternations between prepositional/double-object sentences (henceforth, POs/DOs), passive/active sentences, different orderings of the auxiliary and main verb, and different positions of a particle in phrasal verbs (Bock Reference Bock1986, Reference Bock1989; Hartsuiker & Westenberg Reference Hartsuiker and Westenberg2000; Konopka & Bock Reference Konopka and Bock2009; Messenger et al. (Reference Messenger, Branigan, McLean and Sorace2012b); Pickering & Branigan Reference Pickering and Branigan1998), the prime and target sentences in these studies shared both linear ordering and hierarchical argument structure (cf. Hare & Goldberg [Reference Hare, Goldberg, Hahn and Stones1999] for discussion of potential semantic influences). Thus, in these cases, it is not clear whether structural priming effect arises due to linear or hierarchical relations.
B&P ambiguously state that syntactic representations that they assume are “shallow” and “monostratal” such that they “represent hierarchical and linear relations simultaneously” (sect. 2.1, para. 7, 8). Under this assumption, the priming effects found with PO/DO or passive/active alternations above would not have “source ambiguity” as distinction of linear vs. hierarchical relations becomes irrelevant, a notion with which we do not agree. An alternative account, however, is that priming is sensitive to cognitive computations of linear relations but may not be so sensitive to hierarchical relations of linguistic representation. Under this hypothesis, the priming evidence with the potential source ambiguity discussed above is accounted for straightforwardly in terms of priming of linear ordering, which is also consistent with the findings of Pickering et al. (Reference Pickering, Branigan and McLean2002), in which sentences that share hierarchical but not linear relations did not prime each other.
Word order is closely related to hierarchical argument structures; however, we believe that these two cannot be equated. Take sentences with a reflexive (e.g., “John
i
told Tom
k
to be kind to himself
*i/k
” vs. “John
i
seemed to Tom
k
to be kind to himself
i/*k
”; cf. Sturt & Kwon Reference Sturt and Kwon2015). Although local proximity is a factor, these examples clearly illustrate that the proximity is defined in terms of hierarchical relations and not linear ordering (Reinhart Reference Reinhart1983; cf. Langacker Reference Langacker, Reibel, Schane and Cliffs1969). Thus, syntax cannot be reduced to simple sequential structure, and hierarchical relationships are an integral aspect of human language syntax. As such, we believe that we need clear evidence in support of priming of hierarchical relations for the proposal of B&P to work (cf. Scheepers et al. Reference Scheepers, Sturt, Martin, Myachykov, Teevan and Viskupova2011).
Thus, while structural priming seems convincing with many replications in various languages and participant populations, its nature remains unclear, and therefore, the use of priming experiments in lieu of (or alongside) acceptability judgments is a limited approach to understanding grammatical structure. The proposed approach would benefit greatly from experimental results using various syntactic constructions with which the priming of hierarchical structure can be clearly evaluated independently of linear ordering. In short, clearer evidence of priming of hierarchical argument structure as well as word order is necessary before it can be argued that priming paradigms can be used to answer questions of structure, a core feature of human language syntax.
In the Chomskyian tradition, a clear distinction is made between competence and performance (Chomsky Reference Chomsky1965), and linguistic theorization has been primarily concerned with native speaker's metalinguistic judgments of sentences. Branigan & Pickering (B&P) depart from this tradition and argue that grammar is directly accessed during language processing, so processing evidence is as relevant for linguistic theorization as acceptability judgments are. To be specific, B&P argue that structural priming can be taken as evidence for linguistic representation. We agree with B&P that structural priming is a useful tool in the study of language; however, we would like to point out that structural priming also has the issue of “source ambiguity” (similarly to acceptability judgments noted by B&P; Chomsky Reference Chomsky, Akmajian, Culicover and Wasow1977), crucially in the context of structural representation assumed in the proposal.
When the processing of input A affects the processing of input B, which shares an aspect of linguistic structure with input A but otherwise is unrelated, the phenomenon is viewed as an instance of structural priming. What if there is more than one aspect that both input A and B share? In this case, the source of the priming effect remains ambiguous. Unfortunately, most evidence taken in support of structural priming has this source ambiguity issue – in particular, ambiguity between sequential and hierarchical relations. For example, although structural priming effects were reported in many studies of structural alternations without meaning change – e.g., alternations between prepositional/double-object sentences (henceforth, POs/DOs), passive/active sentences, different orderings of the auxiliary and main verb, and different positions of a particle in phrasal verbs (Bock Reference Bock1986, Reference Bock1989; Hartsuiker & Westenberg Reference Hartsuiker and Westenberg2000; Konopka & Bock Reference Konopka and Bock2009; Messenger et al. (Reference Messenger, Branigan, McLean and Sorace2012b); Pickering & Branigan Reference Pickering and Branigan1998), the prime and target sentences in these studies shared both linear ordering and hierarchical argument structure (cf. Hare & Goldberg [Reference Hare, Goldberg, Hahn and Stones1999] for discussion of potential semantic influences). Thus, in these cases, it is not clear whether structural priming effect arises due to linear or hierarchical relations.
B&P ambiguously state that syntactic representations that they assume are “shallow” and “monostratal” such that they “represent hierarchical and linear relations simultaneously” (sect. 2.1, para. 7, 8). Under this assumption, the priming effects found with PO/DO or passive/active alternations above would not have “source ambiguity” as distinction of linear vs. hierarchical relations becomes irrelevant, a notion with which we do not agree. An alternative account, however, is that priming is sensitive to cognitive computations of linear relations but may not be so sensitive to hierarchical relations of linguistic representation. Under this hypothesis, the priming evidence with the potential source ambiguity discussed above is accounted for straightforwardly in terms of priming of linear ordering, which is also consistent with the findings of Pickering et al. (Reference Pickering, Branigan and McLean2002), in which sentences that share hierarchical but not linear relations did not prime each other.
Word order is closely related to hierarchical argument structures; however, we believe that these two cannot be equated. Take sentences with a reflexive (e.g., “John i told Tom k to be kind to himself *i/k ” vs. “John i seemed to Tom k to be kind to himself i/*k ”; cf. Sturt & Kwon Reference Sturt and Kwon2015). Although local proximity is a factor, these examples clearly illustrate that the proximity is defined in terms of hierarchical relations and not linear ordering (Reinhart Reference Reinhart1983; cf. Langacker Reference Langacker, Reibel, Schane and Cliffs1969). Thus, syntax cannot be reduced to simple sequential structure, and hierarchical relationships are an integral aspect of human language syntax. As such, we believe that we need clear evidence in support of priming of hierarchical relations for the proposal of B&P to work (cf. Scheepers et al. Reference Scheepers, Sturt, Martin, Myachykov, Teevan and Viskupova2011).
Thus, while structural priming seems convincing with many replications in various languages and participant populations, its nature remains unclear, and therefore, the use of priming experiments in lieu of (or alongside) acceptability judgments is a limited approach to understanding grammatical structure. The proposed approach would benefit greatly from experimental results using various syntactic constructions with which the priming of hierarchical structure can be clearly evaluated independently of linear ordering. In short, clearer evidence of priming of hierarchical argument structure as well as word order is necessary before it can be argued that priming paradigms can be used to answer questions of structure, a core feature of human language syntax.