LINGUIST List 17.1432
Tue May 09 2006
Diss: Psycholing: Schirmeier: 'German Ver-verbs: Int...'
Editor for this issue: Meredith Valant
<meredithlinguistlist.org>
Directory
1. Matthias
Schirmeier,
German Ver-verbs: Internal word structure and lexical processing
Message 1: German Ver-verbs: Internal word structure and lexical processing
Date: 09-May-2006
From: Matthias Schirmeier <mks_dehotmail.com>
Subject: German Ver-verbs: Internal word structure and lexical processing
Institution: University of Alberta
Program: Department of Linguistics
Dissertation Status: Completed
Degree Date: 2004
Author: Matthias K Schirmeier
Dissertation Title: German Ver-verbs: Internal word structure and lexical processing
Linguistic Field(s):
Psycholinguistics
Subject Language(s): German, Standard (deu)
Dissertation Director:
Bruce L Derwing
Gary Libben
Dissertation Abstract:
This dissertation investigates the visual word recognition of German verbscontaining the inseparable prefix ver- (e.g., verbittern 'to embitter') inan experimental setting, using data obtained from adult native speakers ofGerman. More specifically, it investigates the roles of morphology,morpheme salience, stimulus effects, and task effects in the lexicalprocessing of these complex words. Although, on the surface, ver-verbsappear to constitute a homogeneous group, a closer inspection revealssubtle descriptive differences in their internal structure,namely, theexistence of putative adjectival, nominal, verbal, and (synchronically)bound component forms such as those in verbittern 'toembitter'(ver-Adjective), verkleiden 'to disguise' (ver-Noun), verstopfen'to block' (ver-Verb), and vergeuden 'to waste' (ver-Bound), respectively.The template [ver[ROOT](e)n] can serve to show the commonality of theseforms, which, from a descriptive point of view, differ only in their roots.This, in turn,provides a controlled framework in which the effects of rootdifferences could be systematically explored. The results of a series ofpriming tasks, lexical decision tasks, and meta-linguistic judgment taskssuggest that morphology plays a role in the lexical processing of theseverbs. More specifically, differential effects across the four subsetssuggest the importance of morpheme salience. However, these two factors arealso influenced by the type of stimulus and task employed. Overall, thissuggests the existence of two kinds of internal structure for ver-verbs: ahierarchical right-branching structure for items in the Verb and Boundsubsets, and a flat structure for items in the Adjective subset. Items inthe Noun subset are split between those two alternatives as a function ofbase type.
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