The sausage machine: A new two-stage parsing model

By Lyn Frazier, Janet D. Fodor. 1978

Abstract It is proposed that the human sentence parsing device assigns phrase structure to word strings in two steps. The first stage parser assigns lexical and phrasal nodes to substrings of roughly six words. The second stage parser then adds higher nodes to link these phrasal packages together into a complete phrase marker. This model of the parser is compared with ATN models, and with the two-stage models of Kimball (1973) and Fodor, Bever and Garrett (1974). Our assumption that the units which are shunted from the first stage to the second stage are defined by their length, rather than by their syntactic type, explains the effects of constituent length on perceptual complexity in center embedded sentences and in sentences of the kind that fall under Kimball's principle of Right Association. The particular division of labor between the two parsing units allows us to explain, without appeal to any ad hoc parsing strategies, why the parser makes certain ‘shortsighted’ errors even though, in general, it is able to make intelligent use of all the information that is available to it.

Subfields: Natural Language Processing

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Using DeepSpeed and Megatron to Train Megatron-Turing NLG 530B, A Large-Scale Generative Language Model (2022, background): “The cases which proved most problematic for the model are often also confusing to humans, for example garden path sentences with temporary ambiguity [16] such as: “The professors heard the artist performed → The professors heard the artist”, or past participle constructions in which relative…”
Consequences of the Now-or-Never bottleneck for signed versus spoken languages (2015, methodology): “For example, the sausage machine parsing model (Frazier & Fodor 1978) proposes that a preliminary syntactic analysis is carried out phrase-by-phrase, but in complete isolation from semantic or pragmatic factors.”
Processing empty categories in a second language: When naturalistic exposure fills the (intermediate) gap* (2012, background): “According to this approach, the resolution of a long-distance dependency is lexically mediated, and any effects at the intermediate gaps signify a refreshment of all preceding arguments upon the identification of the clause boundary (see also Frazier & Fodor, 1978).”
The extended argument dependency model: a neurocognitive approach to sentence comprehension across languages. (2006, background): “…structure and minimal dependencies have been formulated in a number of approaches in the psycholinguistic literature (e.g., de Vincenzi, 1991; Frazier & Fodor, 1978; Gibson, 1998; Gorrell, 1995; Schlesewsky & Friederici, 2003; Sturt & Crocker, 1996), the notion of minimality at all levels…”
Contributions of memory circuits to language: the declarative/procedural model. (2004, background): “E-mail address: michael@georgetown.edu (M.T. Ullman).”
Syntactic parsing and working memory: The effects of syntactic complexity, reading span, and concurrent load (2001, methodology): “These results t into the two-stage parsing model of Frazier (1979; see also Frazier & Flores d’Arcais, 1989; Frazier & Fodor, 1978), in which the parser initially computes the simplest structure justi ed by the input.”
Separating syntactic memory costs and syntactic integration costs during parsing: the processing of German WH-questions (2002, background): “…Syntax; Working memory; Sentence processing; WH-questions; ERPs Sentence comprehension critically depends upon the reconstruction of grammatical relations between the arguments and the predicate of a sentence by assigning a hierarchical structure to the input of words (e.g., Frazier & Fodor, 1978).”
Children's Processing of Ambiguous Sentences: A Study of Relative Clause Attachment (2003, background): “(Gibson et al. (1996, 26)) Like other cross-linguistically, well-attested parsing strategies such as Minimal Attachment (Frazier and Fodor (1978)) or the Minimal Chain Principle (De (5) (6) Vincenzi (1991)), the Recency principle is thought to reflect the parser’s effort to minimize processing cost ”
Rapid Expectation Adaptation during Syntactic Comprehension (2013, background): “That is, reading times (RTs) in the disambiguating region spike when the ambiguity is resolved towards the relative clause interpretation (1c), compared to unambiguous RCs (1d) [40–42].”
A symbolic-connectionist theory of relational inference and generalization. (2003, background): “Examples of relational thinking include the ability to appreciate analogies between seemingly different objects or events (Gentner, 1983; Holyoak & Thagard, 1995), the ability to apply abstract rules in novel situations (e.g., Smith, Langston, & Nisbett, 1992), the ability to understand and learn la”
More than words: Frequency effects for multi-word phrases (2010, background): “…Myers, & Lotocky, 1997; MacDonald, Pearlmutter, & Seidenberg, 1994); co-occurrence relations between verbs and specific arguments (Trueswell, Tanenhaus, & Garnsey, 1994); as well as the overall frequency of syntactic structure (e.g. main clause vs. reduced relative, Frazier & Fodor, 1978).”
Syntactic structure assembly in human parsing: a computational model based on competitive inhibition and a lexicalist grammar. (2000, background): “…we refer to the various surveys of the literature on aspects of human syntactic parsing that have been published over the past few years (e.g. Frazier & Clifton, 1996; Garrod & Pickering, 1999; Gibson, 1998; Gorrell, 1995; Kempen, 1996; MacDonald et al., 1994; Mitchell, 1994; Pritchett , 1992).”
Effects of merely local syntactic coherence on sentence processing (2004, background): “Frazier and Fodor (1978) is an early proposal, according to which, information is transmitted to the parser via a fixed-width buffer.”