Karimi Hossein, Fukumura Kumiko, Ferreira Fernanda, Pickering Martin J
University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC, USA,
Mem Cognit. 2014 Aug;42(6):993-1009. doi: 10.3758/s13421-014-0400-7.
The length of a noun phrase has been shown to influence choices such as syntactic role assignment (e.g., whether the noun phrase is realized as the subject or the object). But does length also affect the choice between different forms of referring expressions? Three experiments investigated the effect of antecedent length on the choice between pronouns (e.g., he) and repeated nouns (e.g., the actor) using a sentence-continuation paradigm. Experiments 1 and 2 found an effect of antecedent length on written continuations: Participants used more pronouns (relative to repeated nouns) when the antecedent was longer than when it was shorter. Experiment 3 used a spoken continuation task and replicated the effect of antecedent length on the choice of referring expressions. Taken together, the results suggest that longer antecedents increase the likelihood of pronominal reference. The results support theories arguing that length enhances the accessibility of the associated entity through richer semantic encoding.
研究表明，名词短语的长度会影响句法角色分配等选择（例如，该名词短语是作主语还是宾语）。但是，长度是否也会影响不同指代表达形式之间的选择呢？三项实验采用句子续写范式，研究了先行词长度对代词（如he）和重复名词（如the actor）之间选择的影响。实验1和实验2发现先行词长度对书面续写有影响：当先行词较长时，与先行词较短时相比，参与者使用的代词更多（相对于重复名词）。实验3采用口语续写任务，并重现了先行词长度对指代表达选择的影响。综合来看，结果表明较长的先行词会增加使用代词指代的可能性。这些结果支持了一些理论，这些理论认为长度通过更丰富的语义编码提高了相关实体的可及性。
