Human Sentence Processing

(4 Credits)

How do we understand and produce sentences in a language we speak? How do we acquire the knowledge that underlies this ability? Psycholinguistics seeks to address these questions using quantitative measurements drawn from sources such as corpora or human experiments, as well as using computational simulations implementing cognitive models. This class is an introduction to the methods and questions studied in experimental linguistics, with a focus on the mechanisms that underlie language comprehension by adult speakers, at the word level and above (syntax, semantics and pragmatics). Formerly titled Experimental Syntax and Semantics.