title: Co-referential Processing of Pronouns and Repeated Names in Italian.
abstract: In this study, we investigate whether co-referential processing across sentence boundaries is driven by universal properties of the general architecture of memory systems and whether cross-linguistic differences concerning the number of anaphoric forms available in a language's referential inventory can impact the process of inter-sentential co-reference resolution. As a window into these questions, we test whether the repeated-name penalty (RNP) and the overt-pronoun penalty (OPP)-comprehension delays associated with repeated names and overt pronouns, respectively, in comparison to more reduced anaphoric forms in reference to salient antecedents-occur in Italian, examining the extent to which Italian resembles other null-subject languages, with focus on Spanish. Our self-paced reading experiment with factors Antecedent (Subject, Object) and Anaphor (Null Pronoun, Overt Pronoun, Repeated Name) found that Italian exhibits both an OPP and a (weaker) RNP, extending previous research that showed these effects in Spanish and strengthening the claim that co-reference resolution might be subject to universal principles.
authors: Linguistics Program, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC, USA. decarvaj@email.sc.edu.|Institute for Mind and Brain, 1800 Gervais Street, Columbia, SC, 29201, USA. decarvaj@email.sc.edu.
authors: Jefferson
authors: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-8629-2539
authors: J
authors: de Carvalho Maia
authors: Università degli Studi di Milano-Bicocca, Milan, Italy.
authors: Mirta
authors: M
authors: Vernice
authors: Universidad de San Andrés, Buenos Aires, Argentina.
authors: Carlos
authors: C
authors: Gelormini-Lezama
authors: Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Belo Horizonte, Brazil.
authors: Maria Luiza Cunha
authors: ML
authors: Lima
authors: Linguistics Program, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC, USA.|Psychology Department, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC, USA.|Institute for Mind and Brain, 1800 Gervais Street, Columbia, SC, 29201, USA.
authors: Amit
authors: A
authors: Almor
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007558:Italy; D008037:Linguistics; D008297:Male; D011578:Psycholinguistics; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Coreferential processing; Italian; Overt-pronoun penalty; Pronouns; Repeated names; Repeated-name penalty