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Psycholinguistic Approaches To A Theory of Punctuation: The University of Tulsa
Psycholinguistic Approaches To A Theory of Punctuation: The University of Tulsa
OF PUNCTUATION
R. Scott Baldwina
The University of Tulsa
James M. Coady
Ohio University
363
364 Journal of Reading Behavior X,4
points out that the medieval grammarians developed three punctuation marks
"designed primarily to meet the demands of oral reading" (p. 350). They were, in
effect, breath marks. These gradually evolved into the comma, colon, and period
which Brightland described in the early seventeen hundreds as follows:
The Use of these points, Pauses, or Stops, is not only to give a proper
Time for Breathing: but to avoid Obscurity, and Confusion of the Sense
in joining Words together in a sentence, (p. 149)
There is a clear movement here towards a recognition of the sense of manning as
a determinant of punctuation. In short, one can see the beginnings of an
awareness of syntax and the role of punctuation in signaling it.
By 1844, John Wilson could argue that the sense and the grammatical form of
the construction of a passage, and not the rhetorical mode of the delivery, is the
fundamental law by which the art of punctuation should be regulated. A syntac-
tic base for punctuation had completely emerged and, in theory at least, replaced
the earner elocutionary philosophy. Remnants of this earlier conflict, however,
still exist today and can perhaps best be seen in the current teaching dictum that
"commas equal pauses." In this paper, punctuation is assumed to be basically an
orthographic device which signals syntactic patterns to the reader.
The theory behind the present research is that punctuation cues exist on a
continuum which ranges from critical to redundant and that the position which
any given punctuation mark holds on the continuum is determined by 1) the
availablility of alternative syntactic cues to mark surface structure boundaries,
and 2) the availability of semantic cues to confirm or reject syntactic
interpretations. Furthermore, it is hypothesized that readers generate
grammatical expectations which affect the segmentation of written syntax by
influencing the reader's attention to or perception of syntactic boundaries.
The "canonical-clause" concept is one way of relating grammatical
expectations to punctuation. The term "canonical" (Baldwin, 1976, 1977) is
adapted from the speech perception theory of Fodor, Bever, and Garrett (1974).
It refers to the hypothesis that the reader initially assumes that a noun phrase
followed by a verb phrase, followed by a second noun phrase are, respectively,
the subject, main verb, and object of a common clause in statement form. A
clause or sentence which falsely confirms the reader's expectation for a
particular grammatical pattern is termed "noncanonical," and one which
correctly confirms or refutes the expectation is termed "canonical." In sentence
(a) below, readers would tend to expect an object noun phrase to follow the
subject-verb pattern "we eat," and a following noun would tend to confirm this
canonical expectation for an object.
EXPERIMENT I
Method
Subjects
The sample consisted of 20 fifth graders selected from a rural, middle class,
and predominantly white elementary school in southeast Ohio. All subjects were
identified by their teachers as being above average readers.
Materials
B. (1. +P+C) "He won't help us dig the pit," said Bill.
(2. +P-C) Bill said, "He won't help us dig the pit."
(3. -P+C) He won't help us dig the pit said Bill
(4. -P-C) Bill said He won't help us dig the pit
Procedure
Test forms were randomly assigned to the 20 subjects so that each test form
Baldwin, Coady 367
was used five times. In this fashion, each subject read sentences under the four
conditions involving punctuation and word order, and each subject read each of
the twelve basic sentences once.
All sentences were typed on 5x8 note cards and were presented to subjects
in random order to control for presentation effects. Subjects were presented
with the individual sentences and were requested to read them. Multiple choice
questions designed to test sentence comprehension were administered after
each sentence was read. Questions were identical for each of the four
conditions.
The dependent measure in the experiment was comprehension, as measured
by the multiple choice questions. Subjects' scores were based on the number of
correct responses.
Comprehension scores were analyzed in a treatments X treatments X
subjects repeated measures design (Bruning and Kintz, 1968). Main effects in the
two by two ANOVA design were punctuation and canonical word order.
Table 1
Means and Standard Deviations for the Sentence Comprehension Test
Word Order
Canonical Noncanonicali Overall Mean
Cell I n
Punctuated Mean 2.40 .80 1.60
SD .75 .62
Cell in IV
Unpunctuated Mean 2.25 .65 1.45
SD 1.07 .75
Overall Mean 2.32 .72
368 Journal of Reading Behavior X,4
Table 2
Summary Table for the 2X2 ANOVA
Source SS df MS F P
Total 101.95 79
Subjects 14.95 19
iCanonical 51.2 1 51.2 124.88 .001
iPunctuation .45 1 .45 .74 NS
Interaction .00 1 .00 .00 NS
Error -t Canonical 7.8 19 .41
Error jtPunctuation 11.55 19 .61
Error Interaction 16.00 19 .84
EXPERIMENT H
The second experiment was identical to the first with the single exception
that 20 linguistics graduate students in a large midwest university served as
subjects.
Results
Table 3
Means and Standard Deviations for the
Sentence Comprehension Test
Word Order Overall
Canonical Noncanonical Mean
Cell I II
Punctuated Mean 2.6 2.25 • 2.42
SD .6 .92
Cell in IV
Unpunctuated Mean 2.55 .9 1.72
SD .51 .63
Overall Mean 2.58 1.58
Table 4
Summary Table for the 2X2 ANOVA
Source SS df MS
Total 77.55 79
Subjects 9.05 19
±Canonical 20 1 20 40 .001
± Punctuation 9.8 1 9.8 32.67 .001
Interaction 8.45 1 8.45 10.74 .005
Error -fc Canonical 9.5 19 .5
Error ±Punctuation 5.7 19 .3
Error Interaction 14.95 19 .79
cell means were carried out (Bernstein, 1964). The comparisons indicated that,
sentence comprehension was significantly lower under the -P-C condition than
under each of the other three condition, p < .01. Among the +P+C, +P-C, and
-P+C conditions, there were no significant differences. Apparently, the main
effects in Experiment II were the consequence of a powerful ordinal interaction.
DISCUSSION
3.00
2.75 ..
2.50 -
2.25 ..
2.00 ..
1.75 .
1.50 ..
1.25 ..
1.00 ..
.75 -.
.50 .
.25 _.
Punctuated
Unpunctuated
• Adults
• Fifth Graders
Canonical Noncanonical
FIGURE 1. Mean comprehension as a function of word order end punctuation.
The results of the present research support the notion that individual marks
Baldwin, Coady 371
noun of direct address and the main clause of both (a) and (b), i.e., there were 92
errors associated with the comma in these two sentences. Following the
generation of deviant pitch + pause patterns, subjects engaged in one of
four behaviors:
Punctuation Theory
under which punctuation marks are critical or near critical in resolving the
syntax of pertinent grammatical structures.
Rule 2: If X is 0, and
# is a mark of punctuation which contradicts E1, then
W#X-»WX
Examples:
(a) Ralph is a beachcomber?
(b) Are you a clown!
Examples:
(a) If you can, help Ozymandias understand statistics.
(b) This is my favorite breakfast, cereal, toast, and coffee.
(c) John, is that you?
(d) The monkeys are fighting. The zookeeper doesn't look happy
about that.
predict nor explain reading behaviors involving punctuation. For example, both
(a) and (b) contain nouns of direct address; and as such, they are punctuated
identically.
(a) Jim, I think that on the count of three we should all burp.
(b) I think that on the count of three we should all burp, Jim.
The canonical-noncanonical construct predicts that the comma is critical only in
(b), because of (b}'s noncanonical word order. At present, this phenomenon can
only be explained with reference to grammatical expectations. Neither
traditional nor transformational grammars offer a suitable explanation for the
variable importance of individual marks of punctuation.
REFERENCES
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