Proximity in agreement errors

Barbara Hemforth and Lars Konieczny
Freiburg University

It is well known by now that occasionally subjects erroneously produce plural verbs following a plural modifier in constructions like (1; quoted form Bock & Miller, 1991; see Bock, 1995, for an overview).

(1) The readiness of our conventional forces are at an all-time low.

The mechanism underlying this error is attributed to the marked plural feature percolating up the tree too far (Vigliocco & Nicol, 1995). This account is substantiated by the fact that no comparable singular/plural mismatch effect for constructions with marked plural heads has been established so far.

Very recently, Haskell and MacDonald (2002) proposed a principle of proximity as an alternative explanation. They showed that in disjunctions like (2), subjects have a strong preference to match the number marking on the verb with the more local noun.

(2) a. The hat or the gloves is/are red.
b. Is/are the hat or the gloves red?

We ran a series of four written production experiments to test the proposed mechanisms in German. In all experiments subjects received a booklet with constructions missing an auxiliary which they had to fill in (see materials 1-16). In Experiment I, we established the usual asymmetry between singular and plural head nouns with a mismatch effect showing up for singular head nouns but not for plural head nouns. Similar to Branigan et al. (1995) and Hölscher & Hemforth (2000), more errors were found following plural head nouns but there was no effect of the number marking on the modifier.

In Experiment II we could show that our subjects were highly sensitive to the number marking on the local noun in disjunctions, although there was a general tendency for plural verbs. The proximity principle assumed by Haskell and MacDonald clearly seems to be at work in disjunctions in German as well.

In Experiments III and IV, we wanted to find out in how far the proximity effect extends to different structures. In German sub-clauses the unmarked ordering of constituents is subject < object < verb. We presented our subjects with unambiguous orderings, disambiguated by case marking in Experiment III and by plausibility in Experiment IV. If a close plural marked noun has an effect on number marking on the verb, there should be an increased number of errors in sentences like (10) or (14) where a singular subject is followed by a plural object. However, no effect of the number
marking on the object is expected if the "percolation-approach" is assumed. There is just no way the number marking on the object could percolate to the subject of the sentence. No mismatch effect was established for sentences with singular subjects which is more consistent with Vigliocco and Nicol's approach.

However, in contrast to Experiment I, we found a locality effect for sentences with plural subjects. There were more errors (incorrectly produced singular verbs) following a singular object noun phrase than after a plural object noun phrase. We will argue that this mismatch effect is due to the monitoring component, where the basic tendency to produce a singular verb even with plural subjects is inhibited by the plural marking on the object noun phrase.

We are currently testing in how far these results extend to oral production. We are also running comprehension experiments (eyetracking), to see whether comprehension is affected by comparable principles.

Examples:

Experiment I

1. Die Farbe auf der Leinwand __________ trocken. 2.2 % errors The colour on the canvas __________ dry.
2. Die Farbe auf den Leinwänden _________ trocken. 5.2 % errors The colour on the canvasses _________ dry.
3. Die Farben auf der Leinwand _________ trocken. 13.9 % errors The colours on the canvas _________ dry.
4. Die Farben auf den Leinwänden _________ trocken. 14.2 % errors The colours on the canvasses _________ dry.

Experiment II

5. Der Hut oder die Handschuhe _________ rot. 6.7 % singular The hat or the gloves _________ red.
6. Die Handschuhe oder der Hut _________ rot. 24.4 % singular The gloves or the hat _________ red.
7. _________ der Hut oder die Handschuhe rot? 45.1 % singular _________ the hat or the gloves red?
8. _________ die Handschuhe oder der Hut rot? 4.7 % singular _________ the gloves or the hat red.

Experiment III

9. Ich habe gehört, dass der Mann die Frau besucht _________. 1.6 % errors I have heard that the man the woman visited _________.
10. Ich habe gehört, dass der Mann die Frauen besucht _________. 1.7 % errors I have heard that the man the women visited _________.
11. Ich habe gehört, dass die Frauen den Mann besucht _________. 9.9 % errors I have heard that the men the woman visited _________.
12. Ich habe gehört, dass die Frauen die Männer besucht _________. 6.7 % errors I have heard that the men the women visited _________.

Experiment IV

13. Es ist unwahrscheinlich, dass die Krankenschwester die Spritze vergessen _________. 4.4 % errors It is not probable that the nurse the injection forgotten _________.
14. Es ist unwahrscheinlich, dass die Krankenschwester die Spritzen vergessen _________. 4.4 % errors It is not probable that the nurse the injections forgotten _________.
15. Es ist unwahrscheinlich, dass die Krankenschwestern die Spritze vergessen _________. 14.6 % errors It is not probable that the nurses the injection forgotten _________.
16. Es ist unwahrscheinlich, dass die Krankenschwestern die Spritzen vergessen _________. 9.3 % errors It is not probable that the nurses the injections forgotten _________.