Cognitive and Information Sciences' Mind, Technology, and Society (MTS) Speaker Series presents Fernanda Ferreira, Professor of Psychology at the University of California, Davis.

Dr. Ferreira will present on "Rethinking the Prosody-Syntax Relationship".

Description:

Traditional theories of language processing, syntax, and prosody often stem from written language conventions, but spontaneous speech differs substantially in its frequent corrections, simpler syntactic structures, and shorter utterances. Recent advances in data analysis enable large-scale examination of unrehearsed speech, revealing that syntactic and prosodic boundaries only moderately align—indeed, nearly half of the words analyzed show mismatches between prosody and syntax in boundary strength. Furthermore, prosodic boundaries exhibit a continuous range of strengths, with strong boundaries being rare, indicating that constraints such as working memory and the need to plan shape how speakers naturally organize their utterances. These findings challenge categorical, competence-based theories of prosody and instead support an ecologically valid, resource-based perspective, wherein prosodic features fluctuate dynamically as speech unfolds.
 

Students, faculty, and staff are welcome to attend!