Table 1.
Types of linguistic violations and example sentences.
| Sentence Type | Example |
|---|---|
| 1. Control | |
| The critical animate noun (e.g. guitarist) is semantically related to the general message conveyed by the group of content words in the preceding context (pianist, played, music, bass, strummed), and it conforms to expectations based on real-world knowledge about how likely it is for the Agent to be carrying out this action in this particular context. | The pianist played his music while the bass was strummed by the guitarist during the song. |
| 2. Related Real-World Knowledge Violations | |
| The critical animate noun (e.g. drummer) is semantically related to the general message conveyed by the group of content words in the preceding context (pianist, played, music, bass, strummed), but it violates expectations based on real-world knowledge about how likely it is for the Agent to be carrying out this action in this particular context (a bass is unlikely to be strummed by a drummer in this situation). Note that this event is implausible but not impossible. Note also that the Agent is animate and therefore matches the animacy selection restrictions of the verb. | The pianist played his music while the bass was strummed by the drummer during the song. |
| 3. Unrelated Real-World Knowledge Violations | |
| The critical animate NP (e.g. gravedigger) is not related to the general message conveyed by the group of content words in the preceding context (pianist, played, music, bass, strummed) and it violates expectations based on real-world knowledge about how likely it is for the Agent to be carrying out this action in this particular context (a bass is unlikely to be strummed by a gravedigger in this situation). Note that this event is implausible but not impossible. Note also that the Agent is animate and therefore matches the animacy selection restrictions of the verb. | The pianist played his music while the bass was strummed by the gravedigger during the song. |
| 4. Related Animacy Selection Restriction Violations | |
| The critical inanimate noun (e.g. drum) is semantically related to the general message conveyed by the group of content words in the preceding context (pianist, played, music, bass, strummed), but it violates the animacy-based selection restrictions of the verb for an animate Agent (drums are inanimate and therefore cannot carry out the action of strumming). Note that this event is impossible, rather than simply implausible. | The pianist played his music while the bass was strummed by the drum during the song. |
| 5. Unrelated Animacy Selection Restriction Violations | |
| The critical inanimate noun (e.g. coffin) is not semantically related to the general message conveyed by the group of content words in the preceding context (pianist, played, music, bass, strummed) and it also violates the animacy-based selection restrictions of the verb for an animate Agent (coffins are inanimate and therefore cannot carry out the action of strumming). Note that this event is impossible, rather than simply implausible. | The pianist played his music while the bass was strummed by the coffin during the song. |
Critical Agent nouns are underlined in the examples.