Distinguishing syntactic operations in the brain: Dependency and phrase-structure parsing

Alessandro Lopopolo; A. van den Bosch; Karl-Magnus Petersson; Roel Willems

doi:10.1162/nol_a_00029

Distinguishing syntactic operations in the brain: Dependency and phrase-structure parsing

Alessandro Lopopolo, A. van den Bosch, Karl-Magnus Petersson, Roel Willems

Meertens Institute

Research output: Contribution to journal/periodical › Article › Scientific › peer-review

18 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Finding the structure of a sentence — the way its words hold together to convey meaning — is a fundamental step in language comprehension. Several brain regions, including the left inferior frontal gyrus, the left posterior superior temporal gyrus, and the left anterior temporal pole, are supposed to support this operation. The exact role of these areas is nonetheless still debated. In this paper we investigate the hypothesis that different brain regions could be sensitive to different kinds of syntactic computations. We compare the fit of phrase-structure and dependency structure descriptors to activity in brain areas using fMRI. Our results show a division between areas with regard to the type of structure computed, with the left ATP and left IFG favouring dependency structures and left pSTG favouring phrase structures.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	1-64
Journal	Neurobiology of Language
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1162/nol_a_00029
Publication status	Published - 26 Nov 2020

Access to Document

10.1162/nol_a_00029Licence: CC BY

Cite this

@article{1a8dddbf57ae4c5ca241a13ee61e9232,

title = "Distinguishing syntactic operations in the brain: Dependency and phrase-structure parsing",

abstract = "Finding the structure of a sentence — the way its words hold together to convey meaning — is a fundamental step in language comprehension. Several brain regions, including the left inferior frontal gyrus, the left posterior superior temporal gyrus, and the left anterior temporal pole, are supposed to support this operation. The exact role of these areas is nonetheless still debated. In this paper we investigate the hypothesis that different brain regions could be sensitive to different kinds of syntactic computations. We compare the fit of phrase-structure and dependency structure descriptors to activity in brain areas using fMRI. Our results show a division between areas with regard to the type of structure computed, with the left ATP and left IFG favouring dependency structures and left pSTG favouring phrase structures.",

author = "Alessandro Lopopolo and {van den Bosch}, A. and Karl-Magnus Petersson and Roel Willems",

year = "2020",

month = nov,

day = "26",

doi = "10.1162/nol_a_00029",

language = "English",

pages = "1--64",

journal = "Neurobiology of Language",

issn = "2641-4368",

publisher = "MIT Press",

}

TY - JOUR

T1 - Distinguishing syntactic operations in the brain

T2 - Dependency and phrase-structure parsing

AU - Lopopolo, Alessandro

AU - van den Bosch, A.

AU - Petersson, Karl-Magnus

AU - Willems, Roel

PY - 2020/11/26

Y1 - 2020/11/26

N2 - Finding the structure of a sentence — the way its words hold together to convey meaning — is a fundamental step in language comprehension. Several brain regions, including the left inferior frontal gyrus, the left posterior superior temporal gyrus, and the left anterior temporal pole, are supposed to support this operation. The exact role of these areas is nonetheless still debated. In this paper we investigate the hypothesis that different brain regions could be sensitive to different kinds of syntactic computations. We compare the fit of phrase-structure and dependency structure descriptors to activity in brain areas using fMRI. Our results show a division between areas with regard to the type of structure computed, with the left ATP and left IFG favouring dependency structures and left pSTG favouring phrase structures.

AB - Finding the structure of a sentence — the way its words hold together to convey meaning — is a fundamental step in language comprehension. Several brain regions, including the left inferior frontal gyrus, the left posterior superior temporal gyrus, and the left anterior temporal pole, are supposed to support this operation. The exact role of these areas is nonetheless still debated. In this paper we investigate the hypothesis that different brain regions could be sensitive to different kinds of syntactic computations. We compare the fit of phrase-structure and dependency structure descriptors to activity in brain areas using fMRI. Our results show a division between areas with regard to the type of structure computed, with the left ATP and left IFG favouring dependency structures and left pSTG favouring phrase structures.

U2 - 10.1162/nol_a_00029

DO - 10.1162/nol_a_00029

M3 - Article

SN - 2641-4368

SP - 1

EP - 64

JO - Neurobiology of Language

JF - Neurobiology of Language

ER -

Distinguishing syntactic operations in the brain: Dependency and phrase-structure parsing

Abstract

Access to Document

Fingerprint

Cite this