1 From surface form to mental representation: A processing investigation of Russian numerical phrases1

Russian nouns in numerical expressions appear in three different forms, depending on the numeral: nominative with the numeral 1, genitive singular with the paucal numerals 2-4, and genitive plural with the other numerals. Results from two experiments on the processing of Russian case/number marking suggest that the genitive singular used with the paucals is different from the genitive singular proper found in non-numerical contexts. The processing data presented in this paper provide new support to the idea that linguistic representations can be abstracted away from surface linguistic forms, and that a surface form and its underlying representation could potentially be very different. In real-time processing, speakers are very sensitive to the mismatch between the underlying representation and the surface form. The status of the form occurring with the paucal numerals has long been a challenging issue in Russian linguistics, and the new results add to the growing body of literature that makes use of online processing methodologies in addressing issues of linguistic theory and analysis