Showing papers on "Phrase published in 1999"

On the Relation between Syntactic Phrases and Phonological Phrases

Abstract: This article argues that the relation between syntactic XPs and phonological phrases is subject to a constraint, WRAP-XP, that demands that each XP be contained in a phonological phrase. WRAP-XP is argued to interact with the constraints on edge alignment proposed by Selkirk (1986, 1995), with a constraint against recursive structure, and with a constraint aligning an edge of a focus with a phonological phrase. WRAP-XP is intended to replace, and improve on, an earlier proposal by Hale and Selkirk (1987) to the effect that lexical government plays a role in the syntax-prosody mapping. The languages discussed in more detail are Tohono O'odham, Kimatuumbi, and Chicheŵa.

Interactive user interface using speech recognition and natural language processing

Abstract: A system and method for interacting with a computer using utterances, speech processing and natural language processing. The system comprises a speech processor for searching a first grammar file for a matching phrase for the utterance, and for searching a second grammar file for the matching phrase if the matching phrase is not found in the first grammar file. The system also includes a natural language processor for searching a database for a matching entry for the matching phrase; and an application interface for performing an action associated with the matching entry if the matching entry is found in the database. The system utilizes context-specific grammars, thereby enhancing speech recognition and natural language processing efficiency. Additionally, the system adaptively and interactively 'learns' words and phrases, and their associated meanings.

Brain potentials indicate immediate use of prosodic cues in natural speech processing

Abstract: Spoken language, in contrast to written text, provides prosodic information such as rhythm, pauses, accents, amplitude and pitch variations. However, little is known about when and how these features are used by the listener to interpret the speech signal. Here we use event-related brain potentials (ERP) to demonstrate that intonational phrasing guides the initial analysis of sentence structure. Our finding of a positive shift in the ERP at intonational phrase boundaries suggests a specific on-line brain response to prosodic processing. Additional ERP components indicate that a false prosodic boundary is sufficient to mislead the listener’s sentence processor. Thus, the application of ERP measures is a promising approach for revealing the time course and neural basis of prosodic information processing.

Codes table framework design in an E-commerce architecture

Abstract: A system, method and article of manufacture are provided for maintaining application consistency. First, a table of codes and associated text phrases are provided. Such table of codes is stored on a local storage medium within an e-commerce computer architecture. Next, the table of codes is accessed on the local storage medium within the e-commerce computer architecture. One of the text phrases is subsequently retrieved by selecting a corresponding one of the codes of the table. During operation, modification of the text phrases associated with each of the codes of the table is permitted. A plurality of services are executed, including retrieving a single one of the text phrases, retrieving all of the text phrases in response to a single command, updating a single code and text phrase combination, updating all of the code and text phrase combinations, naming the table, adding a new code and text phrase combination, removing one of the code and text phrase combination, and adding another table.

Indexical understanding of instructions.

Abstract: Background knowledge is essential for understanding. Our question concerns the nature of that knowledge: Is background knowledge solely descriptive and abstract, that is, consisting of propositions, schemas, and rules, or is there room for experiential and perceptual components? The indexical hypothesis suggests that experiential components are crucial for language comprehension. On this hypothesis, indexing, that is, referring words and phrases to objects (or analogical representations of objects), is required for comprehension. Once a phrase is indexed to an object, then affordances derived from the object are used to guide the interpretation of the language. We demonstrate support for the indexical hypothesis by manipulating the opportunity to index words to objects while acquiring background information about how to use a compass and map to identify landmarks. The participants acquired similar levels of abstract knowledge as assessed by a verbal test. Nonetheless, participants given the opportunity to...

Phrase Structures in Competition: Variation and Change in Old English Word Order

Abstract: Preface List of Tables List of Figures 1. Introduction 2. Previous Analyses 3. The Position of the Verb in Old English 4. Cliticization 5. Variation and Change in the Underlying Position of INFL 6. Middle English Changes Appendices Bibliography Index

Dual-coding, context-availability, and concreteness effects in sentence comprehension: an electrophysiological investigation.

Abstract: Event-related potentials were recorded in 2 experiments while participants read sentences in a word-by-word congruency judgment task. Sentence final words were either congruent, semantically anomalous (Experiments 1 and 2), or neutral (Experiment 2) with respect to sentence context. Half of all final words referred to concrete and half to abstract concepts. A different scalp distribution of the N400 to concrete and abstract final words was found for anomalous and neutral, but not congruent sentences. Although the interaction of context and concreteness is consistent with the context-availability model, the differential scalp distribution of effects for concrete and abstract words, as well as larger context effects for concrete words, was interpreted as being more consistent with an extended dual-code account of semantic processing.

Method and apparatus for natural language parsing using multiple passes and tags

Abstract: A computer-implemented speech parsing method and apparatus for processing an input phrase. The method and apparatus include providing a plurality of grammars that are indicative of predetermined topics. A plurality of parse forests are generated using the grammars. Tags are associated with words preferably according to a scoring scheme utilizing the generated parse forests while parsing the input phrase. The tags that are associated with the words are used as a parsed representation of the input phrase.

Apparatus and method for processing natural language

Abstract: A user interface is described which allows a user to enter input data representing a phrase, sentence, or passage of a natural language in order to cause the initiation of an action by a computer The input data is parsed in order to generate meaning data in the form of lexical meaning representations and link data which defines the modification relationship between the lexical meaning representations The meaning data of the input data is compared with similar meaning data for reference data by identifying a head lexical meaning representation which does not modify any other lexical meaning representations An equivalent lexical meaning representation is identified in the reference data and then equivalent chain linked pairs of lexical meaning representations are identified in the input meaning data and the reference meaning data The computer responds in dependence upon the degree of equivalence determined

An electrophysiological analysis of animacy effects in the processing of object relative sentences.

Abstract: Event-related brain potentials (ERPs) were used to investigate how and when a semantic factor (animacy) affects the early analysis of a difficult syntactic structure, namely, object relative sentences. We contrasted electrophysiological and behavioral responses to two object relative types that were syntactically and lexically identical and varied only in the order of the component animate and inanimate nouns [Inanimate (Animate) vs. Animate (Inanimate)]. ERPs were recorded from 40 subjects to each word of 30 I(A) and 30 A(I) sentences that occurred randomly among a set of various other sentence types read for comprehension. ERP effects to the early noun animacy manipulation were observed beginning with the initial noun and extending past the main clause verbs. We interpret the timing and multitude of electrophysiological effects, including the N400, P600, and left-anterior negativity, as evidence that both semantic and syntactic, and perhaps other types of information, are used early during structural analysis and message-level computations as needed for comprehension.

Automatic Identification of Non-compositional Phrases

Abstract: Non-compositional expressions present a special challenge to NLP applications. We present a method for automatic identification of non-compositional expressions using their statistical properties in a text corpus. Our method is based on the hypothesis that when a phrase is non-composition, its mutual information differs significantly from the mutual informations of phrases obtained by substituting one of the word in the phrase with a similar word.

Prosody in Israeli Sign language.

Abstract: This is a study of the interaction of phonology with syntax, and, to some extent, with meaning, in a natural sign language. It adopts the theory of prosodic phonology (Nespor & Vogel, 1986), testing both its assumptions, which had been based on data from spoken language, and its predictions, on the language of the deaf community in Israel. Evidence is provided to show that Israeli Sign Language (ISL) divides its sentences into the prosodic constituents, phonological phrase and intonational phrase.It is argued that prominence falls at the end of phonological phrases, as the theory predicts for languages like ISL, whose basic word order is head first, then complement. It is suggested that this correspondence between prominence pattern and word order may have important implications for language acquisition. An assimilation rule whose domain is the phonological phrase provides further evidence for the phono logical phrase constituent. The rule involves a phonetic element that has no equivalentin spoken langua...

Document summarizer for word processors

Abstract: An author-oriented document summarizer for a word processor is described. The document summarizer performs a statistical analysis to generate a list of ranked sentences for consideration in the summary. The summarizer counts how frequently content words appear in a document and produces a table correlating the content words with their corresponding frequency counts. Phrase compression techniques are used to produce more accurate counts of repeatedly used phrases. A sentence score for each sentence is derived by summing the frequency counts of the content words in a sentence and dividing that tally by the number of the content words in the sentence. The sentences are then ranked in order of their sentence scores. Concurrent with the statistical analysis, during the same pass through the document the summarizer performs a cue-phrase analysis to weed out sentences with words or phrases that have been pre-identified as potential problem phrases. The cue-phrase analysis compares sentence phrases with a pre-compiled list of words and phrases and sets conditions on whether the sentences containing them can be used in the summary. Following the cue-phrase analysis, the summarizer creates a summary containing the higher ranked sentences. The summary may also include a conditioned sentence if the conditions established for inclusion of the sentence have been satisfied. The summarizer then inserts the sentence at the beginning of the document before the start of the text.

Utterance length, syntactic complexity, and childhood stuttering.

Abstract: This study examined relationships among utterance length, syntactic complexity, and stuttering in children's conversational speech. Analyses extended prior research by examining several different aspects of syntactic complexity, including sentence structure, clause structure, and phrase structure. Subjects were 12 boys who stutter, age 40 to 66 months, who produced 75-utterance conversational speech samples during free-play interactions with their mothers. Group analyses revealed significant differences between fluent and stuttered utterances in terms of all measures of utterance length and several measures of syntactic complexity. Analysis of the relationships between utterance length and syntactic complexity identified several measures of syntactic complexity that influenced stuttering and were independent of utterance length. Logistic regression analyses revealed that utterance length was better than syntactic complexity at predicting whether stuttering would occur, though neither utterance length nor syntactic complexity was a particularly strong predictor for individual subjects' data. Thus, findings suggest that utterance length and syntactic complexity cannot, by themselves, adequately account for the occurrence of stuttering in children's conversational utterances.

Captioning for tele-conferences

Abstract: A teleconferencing system, including apparatus and methods, for providing transcription and/or translation services during a teleconference is disclosed The disclosed teleconferencing system establishes a voice connection and a data connection with participants to the teleconference desiring transcription services The speech of each participant to the teleconference is transcribed using voice recognition technology in real or near-real time Additionally, the transcribed text may be translated into a participant's desired language The translation may be generated in real or near-real time on a word by word basis or alternatively, on a phrase by phrase or sentence by sentence basis The translated and transcribed text is displayed for a participant using the established data connection The transcribed (and possibly translated) text may be displayed in real or near-real time during a participant's speech Audio translation services are also provided to a participant using text to speech software to generate an audio signal from the translated and transcribed text

Clustering web documents: a phrase-based method for grouping search engine results

Abstract: Clustering Web Documents: A Phrase-Based Method for Grouping Search Engine Results

Method, apparatus, and computer readable medium for performing semantic analysis and generating a semantic structure having linked frames

Abstract: A method for performing a semantic analysis process on a computer system including a storage unit and an interface includes the steps of: receiving a syntactic tree generated from a natural language sentence text; determining whether an analysis object, which is one of nodes of the syntactic tree, is a verb phrase class which has a verb as a head or a non-verb phrase class which has mainly a noun as the head on the basis of subdivided type information of a phrase of the node with reference to first data stored in the storage unit; analyzing a relation between a verb in the analysis object and a deep case of the verb when the analysis object is the verb phrase class; analyzing a modificative relation in the analysis object when the analysis object is the non-verb phrase class; generating a semantic structure of the natural language sentence text wherein the semantic structure comprises semantic frames corresponding to nodes of the syntactic tree, at least two semantic frames of the semantic frames being linked by a head relation or a deep case relation or a modificative relation, and storing the semantic structure in the storage unit or displaying the semantic structure on a display which is connectable to the computer system via the interface.

Treatment and Generalization of Complex Sentence Production in Agrammatism

Abstract: The present study applies single-subject experimental design to examine (a) the acquisition and generalization of complex sentence production in agrammatism using Linguistic Specific Treatment (LST) and (b) the utility of syntactic theory in guiding hypotheses of treatment effects. LST trains construction and production of complex sentence structures. Four sentence types were selected for study: object clefts and object-extracted matrix and embedded questions (which are noncanonical with wh-movement), and embedded actives (which are canonical with no overt movement). All sentences contain overt material in the complementizer phrase (CP) of the syntactic tree. Three of five participants (1, 2, and 3) demonstrated generalization from object cleft treatment to production of matrix questions. Thus, LST was effective in improving their ability to generate less complex sentences with wh-movement. Once production of object clefts and matrix questions was acquired, all 5 participants demonstrated generalization from treatment to improved production of embedded questions and/or embedded actives. This generalization involved improved ability to generate embedded clausal structure to form complex sentences but continuing inability to express overt material in CP. Finally, direct treatment for embedded questions did not result in accurate production of embedded actives or vice versa. There were no trends across participants toward improved production of morphosyntactic behaviors in narrative. Persons 1, 2, and 3 showed generalization to increased informativeness and efficiency of expression and were judged by independent listeners to improve in content, coherence, and fluency of spontaneous production. The remaining two participants showed no change or a decline in performance in narrative language production (4 and 5, respectively). These participants demonstrated more severe Broca's aphasia at pretesting compared to Persons 1, 2, and 3, with greater impairments in auditory comprehension, naming, and reading. Etiology and size of lesion did not appear to account for the different behavioral patterns. This study supports the use of LST, which applies syntactic theory to predict patterns of generalization, as an effective treatment approach.

Connectivity in specificational sentences

Abstract: This paper is concerned with the relationship between the semantics of specificational and predicational sentences and the Connectivity effects they display. It discusses the advantages and disadvantages of semantic and syntactic approaches to Connectivity (the ‘unconstrained-be theory’, the ‘question-in-disguise theory’, and the ‘unclefting theory’), concluding that a semantic theory of Connectivity is not only preferable, but necessary. The paper also discusses the implications of such a move regarding Binding phenomena (i.e., Principle A, B, and C effects): adopting a semantic theory of Connectivity requires a theory of Binding which is different from the standard GB Binding Theory.

Word phrase translation using a phrase index

Abstract: A system and method are provided for translating an input text from a natural source language to a natural target language. The system stores a database that contains a plurality of pairs of text fragments with each pair including a text fragment in the source language and a corresponding text fragment in the target language. Each text fragment contains at least one word phrase and represents a primary grammatical unit such as a sentence or a clause. For translating a word phrase, the database is queried using a phrase index of the database, where the phrase index indexes text fragments by word phrases. Word phrases are noun phrases or word phrases. Alternatively, word phrases are predicates involving at least one verb and one noun or adjective used as a noun. The system further comprises a phrase extractor for extracting a word phrase from a text fragment of an input text.

Explaining Article-Possessor Complementarity: Economic Motivation in Noun Phrase Syntax.

Abstract: In many languages the definite article cannot occur when a possessive phrase is present in the NP (e.g. English *the my book, *John's the book). I argue that these patterns can be understood in terms of economic motivation because possessed NPs are very likely to be definite. A structural explanation in terms of a unique determiner position is insufficient to account for the full range of attested crosslinguistic patterns, and the universal generalizations that do seem to be valid can be derived from the economy-based explanation. Finally I show how the performance motivation of economy creates the competence pattern in diachronic change

Stress in ASL: empirical evidence and linguistic issues.

Abstract: The study of signed languages provides an opportunity to identify those characteristics of language that are universal and to investigate the effect of production modality (signed vs. spoken) on the grammar. Over time, American Sign Language (ASL) has accommodated itself to the production and perception requirements of the manual/visual modality, resulting in a prosodic system that is comparable in function to spoken languages but different in means of expression. The present focus is on phrasal prominence in ASL. I review the marking of stress and phrase boundaries in ASL, and discuss prominence assignment at the phrasal level, with brief mention of lexical stress. At the kinematic level, there is a modality effect in marking of linguistic prominence but no modality effect with respect to marking phrase position. Of significance is the fact that ASL lacks phrasal prominence plasticity, that is the ability to move prominence to mark focus in a sentence location other than phrase final. I review the typolo...

Combinatorial computational technique for transformation phrase text-phrase meaning

Abstract: A combinatorial system for extracting major meaning components of a phrase or sentence text in natural language and vice versa. This system allows more intelligent processing and retrieval of textual information in computers. More specifically, the system is divided into three parts. The first is based on a specially defined set of universal primary or atomic abstract concepts, Semantic Factors and rules and methods for assembling and modifying the Semantic Factors. The second is based on a specially defined set of morpheme-type linguistic elements of a specific language, referred to herein as S-Morphs, that are formed into a dictionary. The third part relies upon algorithms and rules for using the two parts described above to translate text into its conceptual description or meanings and/or point from a meaning to relevant objects.