{"pk":25640,"title":"Individual Differences in Chunking Ability Predict On-line Sentence Processing","subtitle":null,"abstract":"There are considerable differences in language processing\nskill among the normal population. A key question for\ncognitive science is whether these differences can be ascribed\nto variations in domain-general cognitive abilities,\nhypothesized to play a role in language, such as working\nmemory and statistical learning. In this paper, we present\nexperimental evidence pointing to a fundamental memory\nskill—chunking—as an important predictor of crossindividual\nvariation in complex language processing.\nSpecifically, we demonstrate that chunking ability reflects\nexperience with language, as measured by a standard serial\nrecall task involving consonant combinations drawn from\nnaturally occurring text. Our results reveal considerable\nindividual differences in participants’ ability to use chunk\nfrequency information to facilitate sequence recall. Strikingly,\nthese differences predict variations across participants in the\non-line processing of complex sentences involving relative\nclauses. Our study thus presents the first evidence tying the\nfundamental ability for chunking to sentence processing skill,\nproviding empirical support for construction-based\napproaches to language.","language":"eng","license":{"name":"","short_name":"","text":null,"url":""},"keywords":[{"word":"Chunking; Sentence Processing; Language\nLearning; Usage-based Approach; Memory"}],"section":"Papers","is_remote":true,"remote_url":"https://escholarship.org/uc/item/3v46m31n","frozenauthors":[{"first_name":"Stewart","middle_name":"M","last_name":"McCauley","name_suffix":"","institution":"Department of Psychology, Cornell University","department":""},{"first_name":"Morten","middle_name":"H","last_name":"Christiansen","name_suffix":"","institution":"Department of Psychology, Cornell University","department":""}],"date_submitted":null,"date_accepted":null,"date_published":"2015-01-01T18:00:00Z","render_galley":null,"galleys":[{"label":"PDF","type":"pdf","path":"https://journalpub.escholarship.org/cognitivesciencesociety/article/25640/galley/15264/download/"}]}