The Effects of Case Marking Information on Korean Sentence Processing

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Abstract
Two experiments were conducted to determine whether a parser's on-line processes are affected by manipulation of case markings in Korean sentence processing, and to evaluate the usefulness of a Ranked Flagged Serial Parser (RFSP) model in predicting Korean ambiguity resolution processes. By using a self-paced word-by-word reading task, in Experiment 1, relative and coordinate sentences of the form NP-ka (nominative), NP-lul (accusative), and Verb were compared to those sentences of the form NP-nun (topic marker), NP-lul, and Verb. In Experiment 2, relative sentences that have NP-ka, NP-ka, and Verb sequence were compared to those sentences of NP-nun, NP-ka, and Verb sequence. In addition, reversed relative clause sentences were compared after changing case markings of the last NP. The topic marker -nun changed overall patterns of word-by-word reading times of the sentences in both experiments. The results clearly showed that local grammatical cues, such as case markings, are used in generating syntactic hypotheses. We also found that the RFSP model successfully predicted local processing loads and reparsing difficulties in Korean sentence comprehension. Suggestions for further studies were made.