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Processing ambiguous Spanish se in a

minimal chain
a b c
Enrique Meseguer , Carlos Acuña-Fariña & Manuel Carreiras
a
Universidad de La Laguna, Tenerife, Spain
b
Universidad de Santiago de Compostela, Santiago de Compostela, Spain
c
Available online: 27 Mar 2009
To cite this article: Enrique Meseguer, Carlos Acuña-Fariña & Manuel Carreiras (2009): Processing ambiguous
Spanish se in a minimal chain, The Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 62:4, 766-788
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THE QUARTERLY JOURNAL OF EXPERIMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY
2009, 62 (4), 766 – 788
Processing ambiguous Spanish se in a minimal chain
Enrique Meseguer
Carlos Acuña-Fariña
Universidad de Santiago de Compostela, Santiago de Compostela, Spain
Manuel Carreiras
Downloaded by [University of La Laguna Vicerrectorado] at 15:46 06 July 2011
The recovery of pieces of information that are not linguistically expressed is a constant feature of the
process of language comprehension. In the processing literature, such missing information is generally
referred to as “gaps”. Usually, one resolves gaps by finding “fillers” in either the sentence or the
context. For instance, in Peter seemed to be upset, Peter is really the subject of being upset but appears as
surface subject of seems. Sometimes constituents move, leaving gaps behind. Various Romance languages
such as Spanish or Italian have a grammatical particle se/si, which, as it is extremely ambiguous, licenses
different sorts of gaps. In Spanish, se can encode at least reflexive, impersonal, and passive meanings. In an
eye-tracking experiment we contrast reflexive structures containing postverbal subjects with impersonal
structures with no subjects (GAP se vendó apresuradamente el corredor/“the runner bandaged himself hur-
riedly” vs. GAP se vendó apresuradamente al corridor/“(someone) bandaged the runner hurriedly”). In a
second manipulation we contrast the presence of an extra argument with se-passives (GAP se vendó el
tobillo el corredor/“the runner bandaged his ankle” vs. GAP se vendó el tobillo al corridor/“the runner’s
ankle was bandaged”). Our comparisons involve contrasting standard transitive structures with nonstan-
dard word order (postverbal subject and a preverbal subject gap) against inherently complex and less
habitual structures such as impersonals (with no subject) or se-passives (with subjects in canonical
object position). We evaluate the minimal chain principle (de Vincenzi, 1991), according to which displa-
cement is costly because it entails complex (derivational) “chains” that must be undone before phrasal
packaging can commence. We show the minimal chain principle to be essentially correct when contrast-
ing more complex but more frequent structures with less complex but less frequent structures. A note-
worthy feature of this research is that the gaps appear before the fillers in the structures that we analyse.
Keywords: Eye tracking; Minimal chain principle; Ambiguous Spanish se; Movement; Impersonals;
Reflex-passives; Reflexives.
Understanding language involves the constant pronounced or written but are nevertheless under-
recovery of missing material—that is, of constitu- stood to be latent. For instance, in John hoped at
ents of the coded predications that are not actually the time to be able to go to London with all his
Correspondence should be addressed to Enrique Meseguer, Departamento de Psicologı́a Cognitiva, Campus de Guajara,
Universidad de La Laguna, Tenerife 38205, Spain. E-mail: emesegue@ull.es
Preparation of this article was supported by Grants SEJ2004-07680-C02-02/PSIC, SEJ2006-09238/PSIC, and SEJ2005-08911
from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Education and Grant PGIDT01PXI20401PR from the Autonomous Government of Galicia.
766 # 2008 The Experimental Psychology Society

http://www.psypress.com/qjep DOI:10.1080/17470210802215228
PROCESSING AMBIGUOUS SPANISH SE
family, the infinitive “to go” has no expressed its negation) in a linguistically formal way (e.g.,
subject, but language users still know who is able Chomsky, 1981, 1986; Gazdar, Klein, Pullum, &
to go to London. Usually, missing elements are Sag, 1985) one must assume that, in reference to a
recovered by either looking back into the context hypothesized subject–verb–object (SVO) word
or looking at other parts of the sentence. In the pre- order, when something moves it leaves some sort
vious example, the missing subject of the infinitival of gap behind. From a psycholinguistic perspective,
clause is recovered by looking back to the subject of therefore, movement implies at least one form of
the main clause: John. So, John is the agent of both filler-gap dependency. Formal theories of parsing
the “hoping” predication and the “being able” predi- presuppose that there are mechanisms for identify-
cation, but since the two predications share the ing, representing, and resolving such dependencies.
same agent, it is only coded once (in the main Two well-known gap-filling theories are the active
clause). By contrast, in eating foreign food may be filler hypothesis (Clifton & Frazier, 1989; Frazier,
dangerous, the missing subject of “eating” must be 1987; Frazier & Flores d’Arcais, 1989) and the
recovered pragmatically (using knowledge of the minimal chain principle (de Vincenzi, 1991, 1998).
world, etc.), so this “gap” can only be resolved by Here we focus on the latter.
looking outside the sentence. Since these “gaps” Using a government & binding approach to
are the rule, rather than the exception, languages grammar (Chomsky, 1981, 1986), De Vincenzi
typically invest heavily in their regulation, especially (1991) postulates her minimal chain principle as
if they are to be resolved inside the sentence. The follows:
movement or displacement of sentence constituents
Minimal Chain Principle: Avoid postulating unnecessary chain
usually brings about momentary gaps. For instance, members at S-structure, but do not delay required chain
in that girl I wouldn’t be caught dead going out with, members.
we understand “that girl” to be the complement of
the preposition “with” (i.e., going out with that Based on Rizzi (1990), she defines a chain as a “set
girl), but that complement has been displaced of elements nondistinct in indices, bearing one
from its canonical position and has therefore left a thematic role and one grammatical case. . . ”.
gap behind (right after “with”). In Romance Informally, a chain is an anaphoric connection
languages, such movement operations are extremely between two or more positions in syntactic trees,
common, and they typically involve the most salient a sort of discontinuous constituent with a unitary
argument in predications: the subject. Thus, for thematic role (agent, patient, etc.) and a unitary
instance, in the Spanish sentence creo que mañana function (subject, object, etc.). One particular pre-
por la mañana va a venir Juan (“I think Juan is diction of the minimal chain principle is that the
coming tomorrow morning”), the subject of the parser prefers to postulate a singleton chain to
subordinate clause, “Juan”, is moved to the very postulating multimember chains. For instance, it
end of the sentence, which means that the subordi- predicts that in the ambiguous Italian construction
nate clause starts with an empty subject position. with pro (the abstract, missing subject of tensed
Usually such movements are driven by information clauses) in (1):
structure necessities. In the case at hand, Spanish 1. Ha chiamato Gianni
language users would interpret “Juan” to be new a. pro has called Gianni “he/she/it has called
information (Lambrecht, 1994). Here we focus on Gianni”
these sorts of gaps. b. proi has called Giannii “Gianni has called”
One obvious way of approaching a psycholin-
guistic study of structures involving subject gaps the parser will opt for (a) because in (b), assuming
that are not to be resolved contextually consists in that Italian is a subject –verb –object language, the
measuring the processing cost of the displacement movement of Gianni from the canonical preverbal
of the missing subject inside the sentence. subject position to the displaced position after the
Independently of how one captures movement (or verb must be undone. More specifically, notice
THE QUARTERLY JOURNAL OF EXPERIMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY, 2009, 62 (4) 767

MESEGUER, ACUÑA-FARIÑA, CARREIRAS
that (1a) – (1b) involve choosing between two element as being in its deep-structure position,
different empty pro subjects: a context-linked full that is, in the position where it directly receives a
pro with specific case and thematic role, like any thematic role” assigned by the verb (de Vincenzi,
other explicit pronoun (he, she, etc), which there- 1991, p. 14), as Gianni is in (1a) above. In other
fore forms a singleton chain by virtue of the fact words, the parser has “a general preference to
that it is in a position where it can directly posit unmoved elements over moved ones”
receive such case and thematic role (say, Maryi (p. 124). This is a suggestion that de Vincenzi
got the phone; proi (she) has called Gianni); and an herself traces back to Fodor’s (1979) “superstrat-
expletive (dummy) pro, which forms a chain with egy”. The motivation for such a strategy is compu-
the inverted subject to which it transmits case tational economy: Only after the parser has been
and thematic role (hence the shared index and able to sort out the thematic and case features of
the complexity of the chain). The first kind of a constituent (that is, what kind of role it has in
pro gap amounts to an instruction saying, the predication) can it structure that constituent
“subject missing because you know who I am in a phrasal package and send it to the semantic
talking about”. The second, expletive pro entails processor, instead of holding it unstructured. In
a different instruction, “subject missing but it is a multimember chains the parser has to link all the
new entity: Wait for it until after the verb”. In members of the chain (undo movement) before
the government & binding terms that de phrasal packaging can start.
Vincenzi uses, the first pro has content (like De Vincenzi’s (1991) comments on the diffi-
other pronouns: he, she, etc.); the second is just a culty of processing “complex derivations” are to
place-holder for the moved subject (like the first be seen also in the same context where others
“there” in there is a book there). De Vincenzi’s such as Hemforth (1993), or Featherston, Gross,
theory may give way to research agendas that are Munte, and Clahsen (2000) have referred to the
too dependent on the specifics of specific linguistic cognitive cost of derivations, and to current
theories. Here we are concerned with the simple linguistic theorizing by Chomsky (1995) that
notion that displacement of an entity (such as sees movement as an extremely costly operation
Gianni) leaves a gap in the vacated position and also in terms of grammar. According to
thus creates the need for the gap and the displaced Featherston et al. (2000), for instance, their
entity to be co-indexed somehow (Clifton & event-related potentials study of noun phrase
Frazier, 1989). At this level of description, when trace and PRO (the missing subject of infinitivals
an element moves it forms a complex chain with and gerunds, as in shei would like PROi to come)
its gap (as in 1b). If it does not move overtly, the provides electrophysiological evidence that trace-
deep-to-surface mapping is direct and therefore filler coindexing is costly for the mind. Using
not complex. An anonymous reviewer points out raising constructions such as the sheriffi seemed (ti)
that it is not clear whether de Vincenzi intended to be able to sentence the offender (where the sheriff
the minimal chain principle to apply to anaphoric has moved to matrix subject position from the sub-
chains without movement as well as to obvious ordinate clause subject position, leaving a trace
cases of movement and that she probably intended behind) and control constructions like the sheriffi
it to apply to both. Here we take the notion of a hoped PROi to be able to sentence the offender
complex chain to apply when there is obvious (where the sheriff is also the true subject of hope
overt movement of the subject in the surface struc- and therefore has not moved there from any-
ture of the sentence, as in (1b), where Gianni where), they found that their raising constructions
appears postverbally. This notion of movement is elicited a significantly stronger P600 effect
therefore tangible and less theory driven. than their control constructions. In line with pre-
As de Vicenzi has commented, the one- vious event-related potentials results that
member chain preference actually “amounts to show that the amplitude of the P600 reflects the
saying that the parser prefers to analyze an cost of syntactic processing (Osterhout, 1994),
768 THE QUARTERLY JOURNAL OF EXPERIMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY, 2009, 62 (4)

they concluded that the extra processing cost of or another is measured by noticing the effects of
noun phrase trace is due to the fact that it requires moving a subject constituent and leaving a gap
“an extra computational operation which is not behind. So it is overt movement, rather than
required in control constructions” (Featherston overt case, that we intend to study here.
et al., 2000, p. 153): what we have been defining We proceed now to a description of the struc-
here as a chain. This line of reasoning sits well tures under analysis here. Various Romance
with de Vincenzi’s (1991) formulation of the languages such as Spanish or Italian have a gram-
minimal chain principle (notice that the German matical particle se/si, which can be used to form a
effects apply even in the absence of the overt wide variety of structures (see Cinque, 1988, 1995,
surface movement that is evident in the Italian for Italian, and Sánchez López, 2002, for
construction in (1b), so they involve “reconstruc- Spanish). A reflexive pronoun, as in (2) and (3),
tion” of a more fine-grained nature). Using Spanish se is also used in impersonals such as (4)
event-related potentials and functional magnetic and reflex passives such as (5). (In the following
resonance imaging, Fiebach, Schlesewsky, and sentences, DO ¼ direct object; V ¼ verb;
Friederici (2001, 2002) also provide evidence IO ¼ indirect object.)
that maintaining wh-fillers (“unintegrated syntac-
2. Two-argument reflexive:
tic information”) in working memory delays pro-
Se vendó apresuradamente el corredor
cessing, but that the strain is different in cases of
DO V ADJUNCT SUBJECT
object wh-fillers (as opposed to subject fillers)
“Himself bandaged hurriedly the runner”.
despite unambiguous case marking. Several
The runner bandaged himself hurriedly.
German studies have also served to make the
3. Three-argument reflexive:
point that the rationale of the minimal chain prin-
Se vendó el tobillo el corredor.
ciple might not simply be a heuristic that grants
IO V DO SUBJECT
rapid access to argument structure. Since an
“To himself bandaged the ankle the runner”.
advantage of subject – object (SO) word order
The runner bandaged his ankle.
over OS order has been documented in verb-last
4. Impersonal:
German sentences, the minimal chain principle
Se vendó apresuradamente al corredor.
might also reflect a structural parsing preference
Clitic V ADJUNCT DO
that works independently of verb information
“Bandaged hurriedly to-the runner”.
(Frisch, Schlesewsky, Saddy, & Alpermann,
The runner was bandaged hurriedly.
2002; see also Frazier & Flores d’Arçais, 1989,
5. Passive:
and Lamers, 2001, on Dutch; and Sekerina,
Se vendó el tobillo al corredor.
1997, 2003, on Russian). Most of these studies
Clitic V SUBJECT IO
capitalize on case and/or agreement to resolve
“Was bandaged the ankle to-the runner”.
ambiguities that exist in strings where, keeping
The runner’s ankle was bandaged.
the position of nominal phrases constant, case
alone is often not enough to avoid ambiguity When the reflexive structures have displaced post-
because of morphological syncretism. This means verbal subjects as in (2) and (3), they differ from
that the word order advantage of the subject read- impersonals and passives only minimally.
ings over the object readings is measured against (Compare 2– 4 and 3– 5.) The difference
the tendency of the language at large (a NOM- between the two reflexive structures is that (1) is
marked þ ACC-marked configuration is usually made up of a direct object reflexive pronoun (se),
read faster than an ACC-marked þ NOM- the verb (vendó), an adjunct (apresuradamente),
marked one, where NOM ¼ nominative, and and a displaced subject (el corredor), while (3),
ACC ¼ accusative). In the Gianni case mentioned which has no adjunct after the verb, has an extra
above, as well as in the sentences used in our manip- argument (el tobillo) that takes on the direct
ulations (see below), preference for one word order object function and forces the reflexive pronoun

to be reanalysed as an indirect object. As the verb is tensed, so the latent presence of a subject
English translation shows, English does not have is justified.
the corresponding three-argument reflexive. As A crucial feature of our se examples is that their
for the difference between the impersonal and subject gaps are found before any phrase can be
the passive, the impersonal, which has an optional evaluated as a possible filler. This means that the
adjunct (apresuradamente), has no subject, while in form of gap filling that we are examining is not
the passive the postverbal noun phrase el tobillo is filler driven. Indeed, most gap-filling experiments
the subject that agrees with the verb (se vendó el have been carried out with English materials and
tobillo al corredor vs. se vendaron los tobillos al corre- contain structures involving wh-traces, where the
dor). As the examples show, the only difference wh-word appears first (this applies to the
between the two-argument reflexive and the Fiebach et al., 2001, 2002, data as well). This
impersonal is the segment el (nonaccusative) makes these experiments more amenable to an

versus al (accusative). Likewise, the only difference approach in line with the active filler hypothesis
between the three-argument reflexive and the (Frazier, 1987; Frazier & Flores d’Arcais, 1989).
passive is also el versus al. This is the disambiguat- For instance, in which booki did John read—i that
ing region for both pairs of structures. Note that al summer at junior camp? the filler which book
is a contraction of preposition a (“to”) and the defi- announces the imminent presence of a gap. This
nite article el (“the”). A phrase headed by al can is indeed a stable property of wh-words: to
therefore never be a subject phrase: It can only announce that something is not in place (move-
be a direct or an indirect object phrase. ment). The active filler hypothesis is thus designed
Importantly also, a phrase headed by el cannot be to account for structures whose fillers are clearly
an object in the passive sentences. If we discard recognizable as such before their gaps show up,
nonprimary constituents first, after “se vendó el which means that gaps are easy to predict
tobillo” a phrase headed by “el” can only be a (Osterhout & Swinney, 1993). This is not
subject, the reason being that the previous “el” the case in our structures. A major concern of
phrase (el tobillo) makes it impossible both to the present study, therefore, is to study how the
have two subject noun phrases (NPs) or a passive parser copes with the filling of a gap that cannot
subject (el tobillo) followed by an object phrase be so predicted.
headed by “el” (one cannot have “se vendó el In sum, the basic aim of this research is to study
tobillo el corredor” with el corredor being the reci- the minimal chain principle in Spanish, since there
pient of the action: That would require “al”). This is no comparable study in this language. However,
means that el corredor is as unambiguous as al even similar languages like Italian and Spanish
corredor once it occurs after el tobillo. This is not differ in complex and subtle ways. This means
the case when there is only one “el” phrase, since that the application of general strategies like the
this is, in principle, ambiguous between nomina- minimal chain principle may interact with the spe-
tive and accusative forms. cifics of each new structure in unexpected ways.
All the four structures under analysis (the two- For instance, the Italian Gianni structure where a
argument reflexive and the impersonal on the one postverbal NP can be a direct object or a displaced
hand, and the three-argument reflexive and the subject is not possible in Spanish because animate
passive on the other) are declaratives that start direct objects in Spanish require a preposition,
out without any subject noun phrase before the while subjects, displaced or not, obviously do not
verb (as se is a direct or indirect object in the reflex- (pro ha llamado a Juan/pro has called (to) Juan).
ive structures and a verbal clitic in the passive and In the same way, the very complex reflex passive
the impersonal). Assuming a basic subject – verb – of Spanish in (5) contains a postverbal inanimate
object order, the fact that a subject must be recov- NP that may momentarily be a passive subject or
ered implies that the preverbal position has some a typical active direct object in situ, a fact with
sort of gap that must be filled. Notice that the potentially interesting consequences for a fuller

evaluation of the minimal chain principle. In short, 1996) intervening between the gap and the filler,
in the light of the peculiarities of the structures in thus making the movement operation apply over a
the present analysis, the following specific objec- segment with more stringent integration/storage
tives are pursued here: needs. Integration costs in connection with storage
The first objective is to measure the processing needs have often been emphasized. For instance,
cost of displaced material in very simple structures Gibson’s syntactic prediction locality theory (Gibson,
such as the two-argument reflexive in (2) above, 1998) uses both an integration cost component
which is compared with the impersonal in (4), and a memory cost component. Integration cost is
from which it differs minimally (el vs. al). Just like hypothesized to increase with the distance
Italian, Spanish is a pro-drop language. This between the constituents to be integrated, with
means that the simplest reading is in principle one distance being measured in terms of intervening
in which the subject has been dropped (and is there- discourse referents. The passive structure in (5)
fore discourse linked), thereby leading to a minimal has an extra discourse referent as compared to the
chain in de Vincenzi’s (1991) formulation. Note impersonal in (4). Likewise, the three-argument
that there is evidence from a recent study on reflexive in (3) has an extra discourse referent as
Turkish to suggest that pro-drop structures are compared to the two-argument reflexive in (2).
highly acceptable even in the absence of a specific, Given the minimal chain principle (“avoid move-
supporting context (see especially Demiral, ment”) and integration/storage cost logic (“avoid
Schlesewsky, & Bornkessel-Schlesewsky, 2008, intervening referents”), the prediction is that (a)
but also Carminati, 2005). Like the Gianni the passive will be easier than the three-argument
example, the reflexive construction has a displaced reflexive because the latter involves movement,
subject, whereas the impersonal sentence has no and (b) the effects of undoing movement in the
subject but nothing is displaced. The reflexive struc- three-argument reflexive should be greater than
ture therefore involves the same kind of expletive pro those in the two-argument reflexive because of the
as that found in the Gianni example (1b). Since, at increased integration cost due to the extra referent.
least in the intuitive conception of chains invoked Given the privileged role of subjects in predications,
here, it involves a complex chain, the prediction is it is important not to lose sight of the fact that inte-
that it should be slower to process, according to gration and memory costs are at work while looking
the minimal chain principle. Alternatively, the lin- for a subject constituent in particular (i.e., the
guistic complexity of a type of structure (the imper- unique external argument), not for any kind of
sonal) where the absence of a subject (explicit or constituent.
implicit) has been strangely grammaticalized Notice that this series of predictions rests on two
might make this structure harder to deal with. It peculiarities of our structures. The first is that since
is interesting that English has no corresponding we are dealing with gap-before-filler parsing, inte-
construction, as in this non-pro-drop language gration cost involves storing a gap in memory
every thematically empty subject position must be (instead of a filler) while the left-to-right gap-
announced by the insertion of expletives like there filling process unfolds. The second has to do with
or it (as in there is a man at the door, where there movement itself. Recall that, at least under the
does not mean anything, or in it is essential that interpretation of the minimal chain principle
you be here in time, where it has the sole function adopted here, both reflexives involve movement
of anticipating the extraposed subject clause that because, as in the Gianni example, the gap in the
you be here in time). subject position is in a complex chain with material
Our second objective involves a comparison yet to come (el corredor/“the runner”). By contrast,
between the three-argument reflexive in (3) and impersonals like (4) are simply subjectless by defi-
the passive in (5). It consists in measuring the cost nition, which means that there is no overt move-
of complex chain coindexing in structures where ment in them. As for passives, government &
there is more primary material (Frazier & Clifton, binding theory assumes that an empty slot (e)

occupies the subject position in these. In English to whether the parser is sensitive to its functional
passives this (e) position is filled by the movement shift. In English-style periphrastic passives the
of the active object (see below). Irrespective of the functional shift from object to subject is
linguistic technicalities, however, since in Spanish accompanied by a clear configurational shift (i.e.,
se-passives the active object remains postverbal, movement), as the postverbal noun phrase object
there is no overt movement in these, either. In in the active becomes the preverbal noun phrase
sum, the two reflexives should be more problematic subject in the passive:
than both passives and impersonals due to move-
6. I killed the tiger ACTIVE TRANSITIVE
ment in the former. Additionally, the three-argu-
7. The tiger was killed (by me) PASSIVE
ment reflexive should prove the most difficult due
to movement along a more demanding integration Notice that the noun phrase cannot remain
path. These predictions hold if the minimal chain postverbally: was killed the tiger by me. A configur-
principle and integration cost hold: If there is move- ationally defined principle like the minimal chain
ment there is extra difficulty, and if there are more principle is able to handle that movement directly
obstacles along the movement path, then there is through the notion of a complex chain: Movement
even more difficulty. creates a complex chain, and chain complexity
Our third objective involves subjecting the delays processing (e.g., noun phrase trace;
minimal chain principle to a tighter test than the Featherston et al., 2000). But, crucially, there is no
Gianni structure tested by de Vincenzi (1991). such configurational shift in Spanish se-passives:
Notice that assuming a discourse linked pro as a
8. Juan se vendó los tobillos (John bandaged his
default strategy in pro-drop languages in general
ankles) ACTIVE TRANSITIVE
entails reprocessing in both the three-argument
9. Se (le) vendaron los tobillos a Juan (John’s
reflexive and the reflex passive. Thus, in the
ankles were bandaged) PASSIVE
former, as soon as the subject phrase el corredor
appears, the pro-drop reading must of course be Thus, the contrast between the three-argument
abandoned as sentences cannot have two subjects. reflexive and the reflex passive allows us to see
In the latter, as soon as the indirect object phrase whether the parser finds it more difficult to deal
appears (al corredor), the discourse-linked interpret- with a reflexive structure that simply has a displaced
ation whereby somebody bandages himself must be subject, or with a passive structure where nothing is
discarded too (?? “somebody bandaged himself (to) displaced in reference to the deep order, but where
the runner”). Now, since reprocessing is mandatory, the surface subject is in a deep object position. If
what are the predictions we can make? Notice that el the passive were to prove easier to process, that
tobillo is a temporarily ambiguous phrase: In the would mean that the parser is able to “see” its
reflexive structure it occupies a direct object position perfect deep SVO order and ignore the surface func-
after the verb in reference to a hypothetical under- tion of the first postverbal phrase. It would also
lying subject–verb–object template. This means mean that the apparently simple overt movement
that it is in a simple object chain and should there- operation in the reflexive would be problematic
fore be invisible to the search for a subject filler. In simply because it violates the deep word order pre-
the passive, however, el tobillo is a subject, not an ference. Although cross-linguistic comparisons are
object, but there is an interesting twist—that difficult, it might be relevant to remember that in
subject function is not signalled by an overt change a series of experiments looking at phrase structure
of position since in se-passives subjects are normally revision and revision of case making in German,
postverbal (80% of the time, according to Bornkessel, McElree, Schlesewsky, and Friederici
Barrenechea & Manacorda de Rossetti, 1977; see (2004) have recently shown that these two processes
also Sepúlveda Barrios, 1988; intuition clearly are associated with two different event-related
confirms this). That postverbal noun phrase is now potential (ERP) components: Structure revision
the segment of interest, and the question arises as was associated with a P600 component while

revision of case marking was associated with an online parsing preferences of readers, but to evalu-
N400 component. Their ERP and behavioural ate the frequency with which these structures
data might be taken to indicate that structural rea- occur in Spanish.
nalysis, and especially reconstruction of expected
underlying word order, takes a greater toll than
functional reanalysis (as signalled by case markers), Corpus study
even in a morphologically rich language like Since se is such a frequent and polysemic word in
German. Spanish, the possibility that strong co-occurrence
In sum, our predictions are in line with the phil- propensities might explain a particular processing
osophy of the minimal chain principle in the sense bias is a serious one, so we conducted a corpus
that we expect the two reflexive structures to incur a study of the structures under consideration.
processing cost due specifically to the movement of Additionally, we wanted to verify whether the
the displaced subject in both. They are also in line general pro-drop reflexes of Spanish were evident
with the logic of integration cost in that we also in the particular structures under investigation, as
expect movement to be made more difficult if it our predictions rest on the assumption that the
takes place along a path filled with referential com- preferred reading in the structures tested is one
petition. However, our structures also allow us to that is not satisfied in any: that of a discourse-
examine filler-gap coindexing in a language where linked full pro due to pro-drop. Our corpus
functional roles and configurationality tend to contains about 450,000 words extracted from
diverge much more than in English, and where different books, newspapers, and magazines in
overt configurationality cannot therefore be relied Spanish. We found 2,395 occurrences of the
upon as a safe clue to the establishment of the different types of the word se. The results are
correct thematic relations among the various con- shown in Table 1.
stituents of the sentence. For these structures (se- As the table shows, the vast majority of the se
passives), it will be interesting to see whether occurrences in our corpus appear in the category
easy-to-recognize overt movement causes more “others”. This category is comprised almost
problems than hard-to-recognize deep-to-surface entirely of se that co-occurs with Spanish verbs
functional mismatches. like “ir” (go), “beber” (drink), or “marchar”
On the other hand, there is a particular type (leave)—that is, aspectual se, which disappears in
of model that may predict that the opposite the English translation (“Juan se fue”/John left).
should happen. Recently, some theories have It also contains middle uses of verbs such as
proposed that parsing is highly influenced by the “secar” (dry) as in “la ropa se secó rápidamente”,
frequency with which a given structure occurs which also disappear in the translation (the clothes
in the language (e.g., constraint-based models: dried quickly). The fact that they disappear when
MacDonald, Pearlmutter, & Seidenberg, 1994; translated means that the reflexive, passive, or
Trueswell & Tanenhaus,1994; the tuning hypoth-
esis: Mitchell, Cuetos, Corley, & Brysbaert, 1995).
Table 1. Frequency and percentage of the occurrence of the different
In general, these models assert, although with
types of Spanish se
important differences between them, that resol-
ution of structural ambiguities will be determined Type of se Frequency Percentage Cumulate percentage
by the frequencies with which alternative disambi-
Reflexive 335 14.0 14.0
guations occur in the language. Thus, if it turns Impersonal 178 7.4 21.4
out to be true that reflexive structures are more fre- Passive 191 8.0 29.4
quent than passive structures, these models would Indirect 65 2.7 32.1
make the opposite prediction to that of the Reciprocal 75 3.1 35.2
Other 1,551 64.8 100
Minimal Chain Principle hypothesis. Therefore,
Total 2,395 100
it is very important not only to investigate the

impersonal meanings that we are interested in are for their participation in this experiment. All the
not involved in such uses of se. participants were native Spanish speakers with
As can be seen from the table, reflexive se appears normal, uncorrected vision, and they were naive
as often as impersonal and passive se combined. with respect to the purposes of the experiment.
However, only 11 out of 335 types of se in our
corpus have displaced subjects like those we have
Design and materials
used with our reflexive structures. Due to the multi-
A total of 40 groups of sentences similar to those
layered nature of language, it is hard to imagine the
in Table 2 were constructed. The design of the
grain that ought to be privileged for statistical analy-
experiment was a 2 2 with repeated measures
sis, if any. Despite the displaced character of the
on the factors: (a) type of sentence: reflexive sen-
subjects of the reflexive structures used in our exper-
tences, with presence of el versus reflex passive or
iments, reflexives are an instance of a general syntac-

impersonal sentences, with presence of al, and (b)
tic mould (the transitive) that is much more
type of postverbal phrase: postverbal noun phrase
frequent than the passive or any other major struc-
versus postverbal adjunct, which could be an
tural type. Additionally, the reflexives in our
adverb or a prepositional phrase. Thus, each sen-
corpus appear much more often without a subject
tence had four conditions (see Table 2): postverbal
than with a subject (postverbal or not); that is,
adjunct reflexive (el sentence); postverbal noun
they typically co-occur with a silent pro: 238
phrase reflexive (el sentence); postverbal adjunct
without subject, 86 with a preverbal subject, and
impersonal (al sentence); and postverbal noun
11 with a postverbal one. This confirms the
phrase reflex passive (al sentence).
general pro-drop tendency of Spanish and adds to
The participants read 10 experimental sen-
the body of evidence uncovered by Demiral et al.
tences in each condition. The four experimental
(2008) and others to sustain our view that the
conditions were counterbalanced so that each par-
natural reading of all our structures involves a
ticipant read each experimental sentence only in
missing pronominal subject with full content (that
one condition. All experimental sentences were
is, one in a singleton chain, in de Vincenzi’s, 1991,
presented on one line, as is shown in Table 2.
terminology). In any case, it is nevertheless also
The slashes in the sentences in Table 2 represent
true that reflexive sentences do not usually appear
the regions into which they were split for data
with explicit displaced subject, so we offer these
analysis purposes. The slashes were not visible
data but remain agnostic on the grain problem.
during the experiment. The 40 experimental sen-
The fact is that if lexical frequency is taken to
tences were presented to the participants randomly
exert its influence even before syntactic templates
intermixed with 100 unrelated sentences.
are recognized, then it is clear that only aspectual
se of the sort not examined here (with a 65%
overall frequency) would have a right to claim the Apparatus
benefit from frequency, followed by the reflexive The sentences were presented in lower-case letters
se, and then all the other types of se, including (with upper-case letters where appropriate) on a
passive and impersonal. video screen interfaced with a compatible personal
computer. The participants were seated 70 cm
away from the monitor, and three characters
equalled 1º of visual angle. A Fourward
EXPERIMENT
Technologies Dual Purkinje Image Eyetracker
interfaced with a computer was used to record
Method
the participants’ eye movements. The eye tracker
Participants had a resolution of 10 arcmin (half a character).
A total of 44 undergraduate students of the Viewing was binocular, but eye position was
University of La Laguna received course credit recorded only from the right eye. The signal

Table 2. Sample sentences used in the experiment
Condition Sample sentence
1. Postverbal adjunct reflexive (el) Se vendó/ apresuradame/nte el/ corredor/ de fondo/ antes de empezar la carrera./
The long distance runner bandaged himself hurriedly before the race.
2. Postverbal noun phrase reflexive (el) Se vendó/ el tobi/llo el/ corredor/ de fondo/ antes de empezar la carrera./
The long distance runner bandaged his ankle before the race.
3. Postverbal adjunct impersonal (al) Se vendó/ apresuradame/nte al/ corredor/ de fondo/ antes de empezar la carrera./
The long distance runner was bandaged hurriedly before the race.
4. Postverbal noun phrase reflex passive (al) Se vendó/ el tobi/llo al/ corredor/ de fondo/ antes de empezar la carrera./
The long distance runner’s ankle was bandaged before the race.
Note: Slashes indicate the limits of the regions used for the data analyses. They were not present during the reading task of the
experiment.
from the eye tracker was sampled every millisecond were: “Antes de la carrera/Después de la carrera”
by the computer. (Before the race/After the race). When a question
appeared on the screen, the participant had to
Procedure press one of two buttons to state which answer
When a participant arrived for the experiment, he was the correct one (left button for the left
or she was seated in front of the monitor. A chinr- answer and right button for the right answer).
est and a headrest with a securing strap were used Half of the questions had the correct answer on
to prevent head movements. The participants were the right, and half had the correct answer on the
asked to silently read the sentences displayed on left. No feedback was given about question –
the monitor. They were told that they would be answer accuracy.
asked questions about the sentences and that After the participants completed each third of
they should read for comprehension. Once the the experiment, they were given a break. After
instructions were given, the eye-tracking system each break, the equipment was recalibrated, and
was calibrated, which took about 5 min. Each par- the experiment was resumed at the point at
ticipant then read 10 practice sentences in order to which it had been interrupted. Apart from the
become familiar with the procedure. When the two routine recalibrations, if a failure in calibration
participant pressed a button to begin a trial, a sen- was detected before any sentence, the exper-
tence immediately appeared on the screen. After imenter recalibrated the apparatus.
reading the sentence, the participant pressed a
response button, which resulted either in the pres-
Results
entation of a question in the centre of the screen,
with the two alternative answers below it (one at The mean question –answer accuracy rate was
the right and the other at the left of the screen), 95%. The participants had a maximum of 12
or in the row of calibration check boxes for the errors out of the total 70 comprehension questions
next trial. Questions were asked in one third of in the experiment, which represents a minimum
the experimental trials and in half of the filler accuracy rate of 83%. In the experimental
trials. Questions in the experimental items were sentences, the participants had a maximum of 5
always related to the last part of the sentence, so errors out of the 20 comprehension questions,
they had no relation to the manipulations. For which represents a minimum accuracy rate of 79%.
the sentence in our example the question was: For analysis purposes, the experimental sen-
“¿Cuándo se vendó al/el corredor?” (When was tences were divided into six regions, as can be
the runner bandaged?/When did the runner seen in Table 2. Data are reported only for the
bandage himself?). The two alternative answers initial four regions, as we did not find results of

interest in the two last regions. The first region time, time spent in previous parts of the sentence
always contained the word Se plus the main verb following any regressive eye movements, and
of the sentence, which was an optional transitive time due to refixations coming from the left
verb in singular, third person, simple past form. before the eyes move past the region. A very
The second region contained the postverbal noun important contribution to this measure, and (as
phrase—for Conditions 2 and 4—or the postver- we will see) a very significant one, is the time
bal adjunct of the matrix verb (an adverb or a pre- spent at the left of the region considered. We
positional phrase)—for Conditions 1 and 3— call this measure regression path time to the left,
except for its three last characters. The third and it includes only time spent in the previous
region contained the three last characters of the parts of the sentence between the moment the
preceding word plus the word el (Conditions 1 region is first entered and the moment the eyes
and 2) or al (Conditions 3 and 4) and included go past it. As a last measure we consider second-
the space between this word and the previous pass time as the summed duration of the fixations
one. The fourth region included the recipient of in which the region was refixated once it was left
the action expressed by the matrix verb—for rightwards. Trials with no fixations in the region
Conditions 3 and 4—or the subject noun being analysed were eliminated in calculating all
phrase—for Conditions 1 and 2. In the four con- measures, except the second-pass time measure
ditions this word was always the same. The in which no fixated regions contributed in
reason for extending the third region three charac- durations of zero.
ters to the left (four including the space) was to The first-pass time is classically considered as
incorporate in the measures for this region the an “early” measure that can provide information
duration of fixations that can be parafoveally sen- about the very first processes, both lexical and syn-
sitive to the al/el manipulation. It is well known tactic, that occur when a word is fixated. Although
that short words are skipped frequently because the other measures are all normally considered as
they can be easily processed during a fixation “late”, we can distinguish among them according
close to their left (Ehrlich & Rayner, 1983; to their different temporal and spatial resolutions.
Garrod, Freudenthal, & Boyle, 1994; Van From this point of view, regression path measures
Gompel & Majid, 2003). So, we could keep a can inform us about the point of the sentence at
more accurate track of the effect of our manipula- which readers had problems in left to right
tions by enlarging the al/el region a few characters reading, and second-pass measures can inform us
to the left. about where readers went to solve those problems
(Meseguer, Carreiras, & Clifton, 2002). These
Measures two types of measure provide a sharper temporal
In this experiment we report the data of five definition than the classic total time measure,
dependent variables related to the eye movements which does not distinguish between first- and
during the reading of the experimental sentences: second-pass times. This is why we take these
measures into account as well as the more standard
First-pass reading time. This is the sum of the dur- measures.
ations of the fixations made in a region from the
moment participants first fixate the region until Analyses
they leave the region in a backward direction or Table 3 shows the values of the measures that we
look at a later region. Total time is the sum of used in the four regions of interest. The statistical
the durations of all the fixations made in a analyses of the five measures in the four regions of
region without restrictions. Regression path time interest are included in Tables 4 –7. (For the sake
is the summed fixation duration from the of simplicity only significant results are included).
moment the region is first fixated until the eyes The most important effects found in our exper-
first move past the region; this includes first-pass iment are highlighted in Tables 4 – 7 in bold type.

Table 3. Means of eye movement measures by region and condition
Region
Measure Condition R1 R2 R3 R4
First-pass time PVAd el 690 477 250 397

(ms) PVNP el 712 371 251 381
PVAd al 722 487 265 407
PVNP al 707 376 281 385
Total time PVAd el 927 715 370 545
(ms) PVNP el 968 563 379 539
PVAd al 949 718 365 543
PVNP al 885 506 399 523

Regression PVAd el 682 687 377 556
path time (ms) PVNP el 709 550 428 588
PVAd al 711 687 408 546
PVNP al 696 524 392 536
Regression path time PVAd el — 106 92 116
to the left (ms) PVNP el — 103 150 145
PVAd al — 102 111 92
PVNP al — 88 80 104
Second-pass PVAd el 238 153 125 87
time (ms) PVNP el 267 145 154 89
PVAd al 232 142 115 83
PVNP al 189 107 129 71
Note: PVAd: postverbal adjunct conditions. PVNP: postverbal noun phrase conditions. el: reflexive conditions. al: impersonal/passive
conditions. R1–R4 are the four regions of interest: R1 ¼ Se þ verb; R2 ¼ PVAd/PVNP – 3 characters; R3 ¼ 3 characters þ el/al;
R4 ¼ noun.
As can be seen in Table 7 (Region 4), a preference effects in the same direction as that found in
for the impersonal/passive versions (Conditions 3 & Regions 1, 2, and 3 (Tables 4 –6). In first region
4: sentences with al) versus the reflexive versions (Se þ main verb) readers spent more time reread-
(Conditions 1 & 2: sentences with el) appeared in ing reflexive versions (Conditions 1 & 2, el:
Region 4 (noun) in regression path time (541 ms 253 ms) than passive/impersonal versions
vs. 572 ms), although this preference was only mar- (Conditions 3 & 4, al: 211 ms). In the second-
ginally significant in the analysis by participants. As pass time of this first region we also found an
we pointed out previously, an important contri- interaction of the two variables, which we
bution to this measure comes from the time that comment on later. The same main effect was
readers spend in regressions to previous parts of the found in the rereading of the second and third
sentence, which is captured by regression path time regions. The second-pass reading time was
to the left. A clearly reliable preference in Region 4 longer in the second region (postverbal noun
(noun) for the impersonal/passive versions in this phrase/postverbal adjunct minus 3 characters; see
measure (98 ms for impersonal/passive vs. 131 ms Table 5) when it was followed by el (reflexive con-
for reflexive) demonstrates that readers spent more ditions: 149 ms) than when it was followed by al
time in regressions from that region in reflexive (impersonal/passive conditions: 125 ms). The
versions than in the impersonal/passive versions. third region (three characters plus al or el ) pre-
The preference for the impersonal/passive (al ) sented a tendency, only marginally significant in
versions is confirmed by the second-pass time the by-participants analysis, to be refixated more

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THE QUARTERLY JOURNAL OF EXPERIMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY, 2009, 62 (4)
Table 4. Statistically reliable effects of the two factors in the first region of interest
R1 (Se þ main verb)
F1 F2 F1 F2
F0 F0
Effects F1 df MSE F2 df minF 0 df Simple effects F1 df MSE F2 df minF 0 df
First pass
Total time interaction 7.28 1, 43 16,284 6.03 1, 39 3.29( ) 1, 80 PVNPpass , PVNPrefl 7.88 1, 43 19,036 4.76 1, 39 2.96( ) 1, 75
PVNPpass , PVAdpass 5.19 1, 43 16,934 4.10 1, 39 2.29 1, 80
Regr. path time
Regr. path time
to the left
Second pass imp/pass < refl 8.34 1, 43 9,475 8.50 1, 39 4.21 1, 82 PVNPpass , PVNPrefl 10.2 1, 43 13,245 17.2 1, 39 6.38 1, 79
interaction 5.23 1, 43 10,779 4.56 1, 39 2.62 1, 82 PVNPpass , PVAdpass 4.44 1, 43 9,026 4.39 1, 39 2.2 1, 82
Note: PVAd: postverbal adjunct conditions; PVNP: postverbal noun phrase conditions. Refl: reflexive conditions (el ); imp/pass: impersonal/passive conditions (al ).
( )p , .07; p , .05; p , .01.
Table 5. Statistically reliable effects of the two factors in the second region of interest
R2 (PVNP/PVAd – 3 characters)
F1 F2
F0
Effects F1 df MSE F2 df minF 0 df

First pass PVNP , PVAd 104 1, 43 4981 15.9 1, 39 13.7 1, 51
Total time PVNP , PVAd 132 1, 43 11037 25 1, 39 21 1, 53
Regr. path time PVNP , PVAd 68.03 1, 43 14581 16.58 1, 39 13.3 1, 57
Regr. path time to the left
Second pass imp/pass , refl 4.46 1, 43 5983 4.23 1, 39 2.17 1, 82
Note: PVAd: postverbal adjunct conditions; PVNP: postverbal noun phrase conditions. Refl: reflexive conditions (el ); imp/pass:
impersonal/passive conditions (al ).

p , .05; p , .01.
often in the reflexive el conditions than in the (Condition 4, postverbal noun phrase passive:
impersonal/passive al conditions (140 ms vs 885 ms) took less total time than the first region
122 ms; see Table 6). of the el sentences (Condition 2, postverbal noun
Up to this point we have presented the results phrase reflexive: 968 ms). Post hoc analyses also
of five measures informing about a preference for showed that al sentences took less total time when
the impersonal/passive (al) versions of the sen- they had a postverbal noun phrase (Condition 4,
tences versus the reflexive (el) versions. It seems postverbal noun phrase passive: 885 ms) than
that all these effects have their origin in the when they had an adjunct (Condition 3, postverbal
noun after al or el. But before these effects take adjunct passive: 949 ms). This pattern of results,
place, we can observe an interaction of the two and its resemblance to that of regression path time
variables in three related measures: regression to the left, seems to indicate that when readers
path time to the left of the third region, and had trouble in Region 3 they returned to the begin-
total time and second-pass time of the first region. ning of the sentence to reread it.
Chronologically speaking, the first place where This interpretation is supported by the effects
we can find this interaction is in the regression found in the second-pass time measure of the
path time to the left of the third region (3 characters first region; actually, a similar interaction (already
plus al/el; see Table 6). Paired comparisons showed mentioned) appeared here (see Table 4). As in
that readers spent less time to the left of the third the other two measures, paired comparisons
region in sentences with a postverbal noun phrase showed that participants spent less time rereading
when it was followed by al (Condition 4: postverbal the first region of the postverbal noun phrase sen-
noun phrase passive; 80 ms) than when it was tences when they were passive (Condition 4, post-
followed by el (Condition 2: postverbal noun verbal noun phrase passive—al—189 ms) than
phrase reflexive; 150 ms). None of the other when they were reflexive (Condition 2, postverbal
paired comparisons showed reliable effects. noun phrase reflexive —el—267 ms). As happened
Total time measure showed an effect in Region 1 in total time, in second-pass time we also found
(se plus main verb) similar to that found in Region 3 that the first region of the al sentences was reread
for regression path time to the left: a reliable inter- faster when it contained a postverbal noun phrase
action between the two factors, (see Table 4). As we (Condition 4: 189 ms) than when it contained a
found in the previous measure, paired comparisons postverbal adjunct (Condition 3: 232 ms).
showed that in sentences with a postverbal noun Apart from all the above results (those high-
phrase the first region of the al sentences lighted in Tables 4 –7) we obtained another set

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THE QUARTERLY JOURNAL OF EXPERIMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY, 2009, 62 (4)
Table 6. Statistically reliable effects of the two factors in the third region of interest
R3 (3 characters þ al/el)
F1 F2 F1 F2
F0 F0
Effects F1 df MSE F2 df minF 0 df Simple effects F1 df MSE F2 df minF 0 df
First pass imp/pass . refl 9.73 1,43 2,330 5.51 1,39 3.51( ) 1,74
Total time
Regr. path time
Regr. path time interaction 5.0 1, 43 17,732 4.65 1, 39 2.4 1, 81 PVNPpass , PVNPrefl 4.11 1, 4 26,548 5.49 1, 39 2.35 1, 81
to the left
Second pass imp/pass , refl 4.0( ) 1,43 3,738 2.46 1,39 1.52 1,76
Note: PVAd: postverbal adjunct conditions; PVNP: postverbal noun phrase conditions. Refl: reflexive conditions (el); imp/pass: impersonal/passive conditions (al ).
( )p , .07; p , .05; p , .01.
Table 7. Statistically reliable effects of the two factors in the fourth region of interest
R4 (noun)
F1 F2
F0
Effects F1 df MSE F2 df minF 0 df
First pass
Total time
Regr. path time imp/pass < refl 3.71( ) 1,43 11440 1.93 1,39 1.26 1,72
Regr. path time to the left imp/pass < refl 6.85 1,43 8970 7.8 1,39 3.64( ) 1,82
Second pass
Note: PVAd: postverbal adjunct conditions; PVNP: postverbal noun phrase conditions. Refl: reflexive conditions (el ); imp/pass:
impersonal/passive conditions (al ).
( )p , .07; p , .05; p , .01.
of results not related to our manipulations but with four results. On the one hand, the three effects of
uncontrolled factors such as word length and fre- preference of postverbal noun phrase versus postver-
quency. We present these results below, but as bal adjunct in the second region can be easily
they are of little or no interest for our research, explained by the significantly higher average fre-
we do not comment on them in the Discussion quency of the words in the postverbal noun phrase
section. (13,370 occurrences per million) than the frequency
In the first-pass time measure we found that of those in the postverbal adjunct (5.37 occurrences
reading time for the second region (postverbal per million), t(39) ¼ 6.46, p , .0001; and by the
noun phrase/postverbal adjunct minus 3 characters) significantly lower average length of the postverbal
was longer for the adjunct versions (Conditions 1 noun phrase (7.15 characters) than the average
and 3: 482 ms) than for the noun phrase versions length of the postverbal adjunct (10.5 characters),
(Conditions 2 and 4: 374 ms; see Table 5). It was t(39) ¼ –5.75, p , .0001. On the other hand, the
also found that in the third region (3 characters first-pass time effect of preference for the reflexive
plus al/el) the first-pass reading time for the al (el) versions found in the third region (3 characters
versions (Conditions 3 and 4: 273 ms) was longer plus al/el) can be explained by the higher lexical
than that for the el versions (Conditions 1 and 2: frequency of the article el (24,696 occurrences per
251 ms; see Table 6). No other effects were found million) than of the contraction al (4,436 occur-
for first-pass time in any of the other regions in rences per million).
which the sentences were divided.
In regression path time we found the same effect
as in first-pass time in Region 2 (postverbal noun
Discussion
phrase/postverbal adjunct minus 3 characters). An interaction between the two factors was found
Again postverbal noun phrase conditions (2 and 4) in several measures. Planned comparisons showed
took less time (537 ms) than postverbal adjunct con- a preference for postverbal noun phrase al sen-
ditions (1 and 3; 687 ms; Table 6). And again the tences versus postverbal noun phrase el sentences,
same effect was found in the total time of the and no differences in the postverbal adjunct con-
second region. Postverbal noun phrase conditions ditions between al and el sentences was found, as
(2 and 4) took less time (535 ms) than postverbal well as a preference for both al (impersonal/
adjunct conditions (1 and 3; 717 ms). passive) conditions versus the el (reflexive) con-
As we previously pointed out, lexical frequency ditions. We found these effects distributed along
and length factors can account for all these last the four regions of the sentence in four out of

the five measures used: total time, regression path allows us to discard two other possible interpret-
time, regression path time to the left, and second- ations. On one hand, it could be claimed that the
pass time. fact that reflexives were harder than impersonal/
The interaction is apparent in three related passives may reflect the markedness of out-of-the-
measures: the regression path time to the left of blue postverbal subject structures, without further
the third region (3 characters plus al or el) and discourse support. However, this hypothesis would
second-pass and total times of the first region (Se predict differences only between the reflexives and
plus main verb). What can be seen in those inter- the impersonals, since both the passive sentences
actions is an effect of the al versus el manipulation and the reflexives with postverbal phrases hold post-
only in the sentences with a postverbal noun verbal subjects. In contrast, what we found was an
phrase. Apparently, when readers reach the disam- overall effect of el versus al, which was earlier in
biguation they have problems in the reading of the the case of the two sentences with postverbal sub-
reflexive (el) version that has a postverbal noun jects. Another possible alternative hypothesis
phrase, and, consequently, they return to the begin- could be that the eye-movement patterns may
ning of the sentence to reread it. On the contrary, in reflect the difficulty of identifying the correct struc-
the adjunct versions readers do not show any diffi- tures based on the available bottom-up information.
culties in the disambiguating region (third region: 3 When readers see “al corredor” the dative preposi-
characters plus al or el), but then, as they keep tion “a” provides a direct cue to the syntactic parse
reading past it, a second type of effect appears. of the NP. In contrast, when they see “el corredor”
Now what we have is a main effect of the al in the critical region more steps are needed in
versus el, with a preference for the al version, order to determine that this is a subject NP. An
without an interaction with the postverbal noun NP of the form “el N” is, in principle, ambiguous
phrase versus postverbal adjunct factor. This effect between nominative and accusative forms.
appears twice: in a measure that implies going out However, this is only the case when contrasting
to the left of a region, regression path time to the reflexives and impersonals with postverbal adjuncts.
left of the fourth region (disambiguation plus 1); As we have argued earlier, el corredor is as unambigu-
and in a measure that implies receiving refixations ous as al corredor once it occurs after el tobillo. If we
mainly from the right: second-pass time of discard nonprimary constituents first, after “se
Regions 2 and 3. The same main effect was found vendó el tobillo” a phrase headed by “el” can only
for the second-pass time of the first region, be a subject, the reason being that the previous
although in this case, as has already been pointed “el” phrase (el tobillo) makes it impossible both to
out, there was also an interaction between both have two subject NPs or a passive subject (“el
factors. It is possible that the first region received tobillo”) followed by an object phrase headed by
refixations from the disambiguation and from sub- “el” (one cannot have “se vendó el tobillo el corre-
sequent regions, producing both the interaction and dor” with el corredor being the recipient of the
the main effect mentioned. action). Thus, assuming an incremental parser, the
These effects fit quite well with our predictions: reflexive and the passive sentences become equally
that the reflexive el conditions ought to present unambiguous when reaching el or al.
more reading problems than the impersonal/
passive al conditions, and that these effects should
be stronger in the postverbal noun phrase sentences GENERAL DISCUSSION
than in the sentences with postverbal adjuncts.
What we found was quite an early effect of the al The gist of the effects we found is that the struc-
versus el manipulation only in the postverbal noun tures involving displaced subjects (the reflexives)
phrase condition, while a main effect of this variable are harder to process than the structures without
was found later, as a spillover, in postdisambiguat- displaced subjects, and that the difficulty increases
ing regions. This is an interesting effect, which if there are more referential constituents along the

path of the moved phrase. As noted in the intro- from simple. In fact, linguists have debated about
duction, there is recent evidence that processing them for a long time (see Jaeggli, 1986, and
is disturbed when the sequential order of the Sánchez López, 2002, for reviews), and only a
linguistic input does not correspond to the minimal consensus on their structures and proper-
unmarked word order of a language, which ties has been reached. Passives—of whatever
seems to indicate that word order per se has an type—always involve a degree of complexity relative
important role in the shaping of processing to the active subject–verb–object template from
biases. According to Featherston et al. (2000), which they are usually derived. For instance, the
for instance, the processing of noun phrase trace passive “se” is linguistically very complex because
is more difficult than the processing of PRO (the among other reasons, (a) it has postverbal subjects
hypothesized silent subject of infinitives) because that look like active objects; (b) the subject position
of movement in the former (even if this movement remains therefore empty in S-structure; (c) subjects
is “derivational”—that is, leading from something of se passives display the typical properties of unac-
analogous to a deep structure to the actual surface cusatives (including subject-postposition and
form). This is consistent both with de Vincenzi’s freedom to dispense with determiners), which
(1991) minimal chain principle and the active testify to their “deep” object status (Burzio, 1981;
filler strategy (Frazier & Flores D’Arcais, 1989) Levin & Rappaport-Hovav, 1995; for a minimalist
and backs up de Vincenzi’s general idea that move- account, see Raposo & Uriagereka, 1996).
ment is costly for processing. Fiebach et al. (2001, As for impersonals, they embody the strange
2002) also provide electrophysiological evidence grammaticalization of an a priori ungrammatical
that maintaining object wh-fillers in working string (Blevins, 2003): one with no subject, full or
memory disturbs processing. In the present dummy. Otero’s (1986) asterisked pro , as well as
study, the most obvious finding is that the struc- other similar explanatory manoeuvres, simply
tures involving displaced subjects, similar to testify to the fact that it is odd for the system of
those of de Vincenzi’s Experiment 1, also incur a grammar to give its seal of approval to a tensed struc-
processing cost. ture with no recoverable subject (something imposs-
It appears that the essence of the minimal chain ible in English, for instance). The asterisked pro
principle is therefore well founded. In what follows, (like the passive “e” in part as well) means that
however, we aim to go a little further by examining (lacking content) some “form” (a place holder or a
specific aspects of the structures that we have dummy) ought to be there, but there is none. That
analysed and its consequences for the minimal is, full pro is a contentful pronoun like any other
chain principle. Recall that a critical difference pronoun (he, she, etc). Expletive pro inherits
between the Fiebach et al. (2001, 2002) and the content via coindexation with a displaced lexical
Featherston et al. (2000) data on the one hand filler (the Gianni example). But impersonal pro is
and ours on the other is that in our structures it is inherently contentless (it means “one” or “someone
the appearance of the gap that first prompts the unspecified”; that is, it does not have specific referen-
search for the filler, instead of the other way tiality), something one might expect to pose
around (like a wh-phrase, for instance). problems for a parser.
Our results suggest that displacement is such a Given the asymmetric comparisons that we
disturbing process that it causes the parser to allo- have established in terms of theoretical linguistic
cate more resources to dealing with its effects than complexity, it is quite impressive that plain reflex-
to dealing with structures that are complex and ive structures have come out the losers just because
deviant in themselves. The two reflexive patterns their subjects were not in place. All the more
that we have used are very simple transitive struc- impressive is the fact that such processing cost be
tures. Conversely, the special kind of se reflex- demanded in a language like Spanish, which is
passive and the very special kind of impersonal se not characterized by extreme structural rigidity.
that we have contrasted with the reflexives are far In Spanish, subjects bearing the focus of

information are routinely displaced. Displacement integration process. Relative to the impersonal and
is in fact the means that most Romance languages the two-argument reflexive, in the three-argument
have of accommodating information structure in reflexive and the passive an additional third argu-
order to express the informational content that ment of the verb must be integrated into the
English typically expresses using stress focus ongoing structural representation of the sentence
(Lambrecht, 1994). while the subject noun phrase gap must at the
Notice that, as our corpus study showed, it is same time be kept in memory until a filler is
unlikely that the results of our experiments can found. The full integration of all the tree nodes
be explained as a consequence of frequency seems to take place a little after the displacement
biases. Although the level at which statistical operation has been sorted out, as the minimal
propensities should count is unknown, the fact chain principle would predict. We conclude this
remains that both at the lexical and at the syntac- from the interaction that we have found in the
tic level nothing in the corpus suggests that the total time and the second-pass time in the first
difficulties that subjects had with the two reflex- region where differences affect the comparison
ive patterns are due to frequency of occurrence. between the three-argument reflexive and the
Morphosyntactically, reflexive se is more fre- passive, but not that between the two-argument
quent than either impersonal se or passive se. reflexive and the impersonal. It appears that in
Syntactically, reflexive se is a member of a large both reflexives there is an effect of movement but
family of active transitive structures, whereas that only in the second, three-argument reflexive is
the impersonal construction and the se passive this effect followed by greater integration cost.
construction are relatively marginal. Lexically, We proceed now to consider how the infor-
only aspectual types of se of the kind not investi- mation from the eye-tracking methodology
gated here (with over 65% of overall occurrence) may be interpreted in connection with our third
would seem to be solid candidates for the objective—whether the mind would somehow
benefits of entrenchment and accompanying pro- register or find trouble with the functional shift
cessing speed. All in all, the fact that reflexive se that the first postverbal noun phrase (el tobillo)
does not tend to have displaced subjects in the experiences in the passive, relative to a hypotheti-
corpus does not seem to compensate for all the cally more basic subject –verb –object active transi-
other counts, especially since another count tive structure (where the same noun phrase would
shows that the vast majority of reflexive struc- be a canonical object). The minimal chain prin-
tures do not even have a phonetically realized ciple, as a configurational principle, is not expected
subject, displaced or not, because of pro-drop. to deal with such cases a priori. Relative to an
Thus, although one cannot conclusively rule active subject – verb – object kernel, in the passive
out a frequency reading of our results, the accu- nothing moves, at least overtly. Since Spanish is
mulated evidence gathered by our corpus study a pro-drop language, the first option that the
makes it less convincing. minimal chain principle would favour for both
A second, more specific conclusion we can reach the passive and the three-argument reflexive
is that comparing the two-argument reflexive and would be one in which a full pro is recognized as
the impersonal on the one hand and the three- filling the subject gap. That would most likely be
argument reflexive and the passive on the other somebody latent in a putative context: say Ana in
reflects an effect of integration cost. Gibson’s 1. Ana se casó /Ana got married. 2. (pro) Está encan-
(1998) syntactic prediction locality theory differentiates tada/(She) is thrilled. In fact, Demiral et al. (2008)
between an integration cost component and a have recently proved that a full pro is invoked by
memory cost component (see also Grodner, the parser even in the absence of a supporting
Gibson, & Tunstall, 2002). The integration cost is context (see also Carminati, 2005) This is
increased if more intervening referents exist along because such a pro (licensed by the verb’s inflec-
the path hit by the parsing scan during the tion) is simply like a subject pronoun placed in

the habitual position right before the verb (from and that chain delays processing, in the classic de
which it receives case and thematic role). The dis- Vincenzi formulation. This also lends further cre-
course-linked full pro option is, however, realized dence to the view that pro-drop structures are
in neither of the two structures, a fact that highly acceptable even in the absence of a specific,
becomes apparent in the disambiguating region: supporting context, since postulating a null subject
The nonaccusative/nominative phrase el corredor seems to be easier than repositioning a present
in the reflexive means that the true subject is one (Demiral et al., 2008). This interpretation is
there now (its displaced position thus causing a also compatible with ERP and behavioural data (a
complex chain); the accusative phrase al corredor speed–accuracy trade-off task) by Bornkessel et al.
in the passive means that full pro must also be (2004), which suggests that structural reanalysis is
ruled out as it involves analysing se as indirect more costly than functional reanalysis, even in a
object (“somebody bandaged the ankle ‘to’ morphologically rich language like German.
himself”), and now the accusative introduces the This need for syntactic orderliness and the effect
true indirect object (“somebody bandaged the of integration costs in the structures with more
ankle to the runner”). One may assume that arguments is cognitively intriguing. One might
since reanalysis is necessary in both structures, contend that theories such as Gibson’s syntactic
and since the initial subject gap cannot come prediction locality theory, for instance, simply rede-
from a previous context (and a full pro), the scribe the facts, and that what is really needed is a
subject gap must be reevaluated, and a search for psychological explanation for why an additional
a filler must be initiated inside the sentence. constituent engenders a cost. Gibson (1998) has
Faced with this situation, how can we make emphasized decay as the source of processing com-
sense of the fact that it seems easier for the parser plexity, but there seems to be no solid evidence
to recover from its initial reflex to build full pro in for that. Alternatively, other researchers like van
the passive sentence than in the reflexive sentence? Dyke and McElree (2006) have studied interference
Notice that in the pro ha chiamato Gianni sentences effects in sentence comprehension in a cue-based
that de Vincenzi (1991) studied, once the parser parsing framework (van Dyke & Lewis, 2003)
realizes that pro is coindexed with a displaced aimed at resolving situations where the available
Gianni, reanalysis becomes mandatory but straight- cues cannot distinguish among competitors. In
forward, and it affects only the complex chain such a framework, grammatical relations are
interpretation. However, in our comparisons reana- created via cue-based retrieval of necessary constitu-
lysis is necessary in both, and still the passive is less ents. Grammatical heads thus provide retrieval cues
problematic than the reflexive. We suggest that that identify necessary properties of the parsed con-
what may be happening is that the parser is able stituent (such as clause function, grammatical case,
to immediately “see” the postverbal phrase in an or meaning), which are then combined in parallel to
underlying SVO template, ignoring its surface access a single retrieval probe. Similarity-based
function. However, what the parser seems to have interference arises when there are distractor items
trouble ignoring is the fact that in the reflexive sen- very similar to the target item vis-à-vis the retrieval
tence, a NP subject appears displaced at the end, as probe. Gordon, Hendrick, and Johnson (2004) also
this involves a complex chain that must suddenly be study interference effects in a line of research that is
undone. Put differently, even though the NP usually designed to show that the memory system
“el tobillo” is functionally ambiguous, the phrase that subserves language comprehension draws
is in its correct “deep” order, which makes it non- from the same pool of resources as that used for
ambiguous to a parser committed to looking for other domains. In fact, in principle, Gordon
“deep” patterns. There is nothing functionally et al.’s work might seem more appropriate for
ambiguous with the subject phrase “el corredor”. present purposes because they specifically deal
However, its position entails the creation of a with referential NPs creating competition. We
complex chain that relates it to the preverbal gap, cannot discard effects caused by different cues in

our experiments. For instance, as one reviewer parsers, as the literature we have reviewed shows,
points out, even if our three-argument reflexive and this includes German and Spanish, two
sentences are completely unambiguous at the final languages with rather liberal word order. What
relevant segment (“el corredor”), the bottom-up we mean, therefore, is that being a subject NP is
cues from a nominal phrase like “el corredor” not the same kind of cue as so many other potential
might still be less informative than those provided cues, although this is of course something to be
by “al corredor”. However, one positive aspect of properly measured.
the tested manipulations is that in our structures Part of the theoretical importance of these
there is really no referential competition because findings has to do with the seemingly unavoidable
the referential properties of the distractor items conclusion that reconstruction of word order is
are identical (el tobillo in all cases), and the gap more imperative than reconstruction of clausal
itself is the same in all conditions. In fact, maybe function, or that it is at least more essential to
the most favourable cue for a passive reading of the proper understanding of sentence structure.
the ambiguous segment is absent: The clitic “le”, Since word order and function are two very differ-
which would normally be used in the passive, was ent things, no doubt linguists will find the present
not used in our sentences for reasons of experimen- results of interest. Note that in some linguistic
tal design. Finally, in decontextualized transitive, models, such as generative grammar, in all its his-
reflexive structures, as the sentence unfolds, and torical and current forms, function is a derivative
the unique external argument of the predication is notion: It comes about only as a result of phrases
not in sight yet, the mere appearance of a nomina- previously occupying the right place in an under-
tive-compatible “el” phrase might be taken to be the lying and “tidy” phrase marker. So the object
best possible cue for the successful completion of function, for instance, is derived from a verb
the predication. In that sense, one could argue phrase (VP) internal configuration when a NP is
that the nominative-compatible cue is primed by to the right of the V. Relational grammarians
the incrementality of the reading process. and lexical-functional grammarians, as well as
While cue-based research is nevertheless broadly several types of European functionalism, hold a
compatible with our findings, here we would like to different view. As noted, it is interesting that
take a more linguistic stance to stress the fact that this word-order toll be demanded in a language
the gap that we are dealing with is a subject gap, with relatively liberal word order such as
not just any kind of ellipsis. This is the same in Spanish. Since subjects bearing the focus of infor-
all conditions. Subjects are privileged constituents mation are usually postponed in this language (as
in grammar, and languages normally go to great in most Romance languages), the question arises
lengths to grammaticalize them. In English, for as to whether a contextual manipulation of infor-
instance, dummy (i.e., semantically empty) there mation flow could be enough to make the dis-
or it (there is a book on the table there / it is important placed phrase more predictable. That is a
that she stays in charge the whole period) must be sum- question that we are working on, but which for
moned to fill the subject position when this is not the moment remains open.
thematically easy to fill (because it is a whole predi- In sum, we believe that the general validity of
cation, for instance: that she stays in charge the whole the minimal chain principle has now been
period is important ¼ it is important that she stays in strengthened by evidence from a different
charge the whole period). In generative grammar, it language than Italian, using a methodology (eye
has always been mandatory to generate the so- tracking) that is well suited to gauge the temporal
called “external argument” of the predication in a dynamics of syntactic processing.
very precise (and early, cyclic) way in the derivation,
and there can be no derivation without a subject. In Original manuscript received 20 June 2007
most Indo-European languages, a NP to the left of Accepted revision received 22 April 2008
First published online 21 August 2008
the verb constitutes a very strong expectation of

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Processing ambiguous Spanish se in a

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Processing ambiguous Spanish se in a minimal chain

766 # 2008 The Experimental Psychology Society

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impersonal is the segment el (nonaccusative) makes these experiments more amenable to an

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iments, reflexives are an instance of a general syntac-

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Table 2. Sample sentences used in the experiment

Condition Sample sentence

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Table 3. Means of eye movement measures by region and condition

First-pass time PVAd el 690 477 250 397

PVNP al 885 506 399 523

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MESEGUER, ACUÑA-FARIÑA, CARREIRAS

R1 (Se þ main verb)

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MESEGUER, ACUÑA-FARIÑA, CARREIRAS

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REFERENCES Featherston, S., Gross, M., Munte, T. F., & Clahsen,

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