On the Starting Point of Syntactic Analysis:Constraints of the Short-term Memory Span on Linguistic Constructions
Lu Bin · Hanyu xuexi · 2012
On-line chunking is the most basic and universal phenomenon in language processin g.It can therefore serve as the starting point of syntactic analysi s.The chunking process is restricted by the short-term memory span(7±2) during the entire process of decodin g.It therefore can be taken as part of language device,instead of just a performance facto r.To segment a linguistic construction into fewer than 7 components,a fixed head is necessar y.The construction is composed of these 7 components and the head is an orbit-layered one,which represents the conceptual space of a semantic relatio n.Since it does not contain temporal precedence,it is a construction simpler than a surface structure with temporal precedenc e.Thus,it is can be taken as the starting point or the axiom of syntactic analysi s.