(EYE)-TRACKING OBJECT RELATIVE CLAUSES PROCESSING: ANTICIPATION AND INTEGRATION OF CONTEXTUAL INFORMATION ON AMIBIGUITY RESOLUTION

The on-line processing of temporarily ambiguous object relative clauses (relative clause/complement clause) is investigated in contexts that favor the incremental integration of information and the anticipation of the referent of a complex DP. The research questions are: Does contextual information eliminate ambiguity in favor of relative clauses? Does low level information (from the syntax/prosody interface) enable relative and complement clauses to be distinguished? Or does minimal attachment prevail in the presence of structural ambiguity thereby inhibiting the incremental integration of information? An experiment is reported in which a bimodal task (verbal (oral) and visual stimulus presentation) with eye-tracking is carried out, followed by a comprehension task. The participants were adult speakers of Portuguese. The results suggest that structural principles prevail when there is temporary ambiguity. The conditions are discussed in which integrative and anticipatory processes can be conducted by means of two-stage processor