Modularity of L2 Sentence Processing:Prosody, Context, and Morphology in Relative Clause Ambiguity inEnglish-French Interlanguage

Fodor (1983) argued that the mind includes a module devoted to sentence processing that operates on the representations themselves, but crucially not on sentence-external information. Universal Grammar (UG) conceivably provides the contents of this universal, domain-specific processor, which is supplemented by a parameterized lexicon (Fodor, 2000; Schwartz, 1999). Crocker (1996) modeled such a processor, a universal parser, as constitutive of the theory of UG in the Principles and Parameters framework, augmented with a performance theory, the principle of incremental comprehension: “The Sentence Processor operates in such a way as to maximize comprehension of the sentence at each stage of processing” (p. 106). This principle requires immediate processing in each module as input is encountered. All modules operate concomitantly, each according to its principles of combination and in accordance with interface relations specified by UG. Speed is achieved by breaking down the large task into domain-dependent, autonomous, smaller processing tasks. Processing in each submodule is limited to a certain domain of grammar: phonology-prosody, semantics, phrase structure, thematic structure, and chain representations, inter alia—each assigning a partial grammatical representation following its own vocabulary and governed by interface relations as each input expression is identified (e.g., Crocker). Furthermore, sentence processing deals with ambiguity by following pre-designated routes, even if they result in garden paths (e.g., Crocker; Fodor & Inoue, 1998, 2000; Frazier, 1987; Frazier & Clifton, 1996; Frazier & Rayner, 1988). According to the principle of incremental comprehension, any input must therefore receive a syntactic analysis in the syntactic modules, a prosodic analysis in the phonological module, and a semantic representation in the interpretive module—in the limits of the computations inherent in each module and interface. Focusing on phrase structure relations, Fodor and Inoue (2000) argued that the parser adopts whichever syntactic attachment is computed most rapidly and proposed the condition called attach quickly, which stipulates: “On receiving a word of the input sentence connect it to the current partial phrase marker as quickly as possible” (p. 23). Constituents are thus attached as they are encountered, and the resulting structure is verified against the grammar. Fodor and Inoue characterized this integration, which has no regard for eventual outcome, with the condition attach (anyway): “On receiving a word of the input sentence, connect it to the current partial phrase marker for the sentence wherever it least severely violates the grammar, subject to preference principles” (p. 26). Therefore, at each step in processing, the parser constructs the most economical syntactic representation that permits a full interpretation of the input so far. Parsing strategies such as minimal attachment (Frazier, 1979), right association (Kimball, 1973), late closure (Frazier & Fodor, 1978), active filler (Clifton & Frazier, 1989; Stowe, 1986), theta attachment (Pritchett, 1992), and so forth, derive from this design.