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Volume 30, Issue 1/2
  • ISSN: 1384-5845
  • E-ISSN: 2352-1171

Abstract

Abstract

This study investigates the processing of middle constructions (middles) in Dutch, German and English. Middles combine a non-agentive subject with an action verb in the active form, fitting into the loose vs. tight fit typology established by Hawkins (1986) to capture the main contrasts between German and English. In English, they lead to greater ambiguity and vagueness in forms (loose fit), as in middles, while in German they result in more one-to-one mappings of form and meaning (tight fit). Middles, as instances of flexible argument structure, contribute to a loose fit as they add to the semantic diversity of grammatical relations (cf. Hawkins 1986; Müller-Gotama 1994; Levshina 2020).

a. easily.

b. gemakkelijk.

c. *(sich) leicht.

Building on a fruitful research line that positions Dutch linguistically between English and German (Van Haeringen 1956), our study investigated native speakers of Dutch, German and English by means of a self-paced reading task, in order to demonstrate processing differences in non-agentive subject-verb combinations in various types of middles, and determine the position of Dutch in the loose vs. tight fit-typology.

Our results reveal that German speakers experience greater difficulty processing middles, as evidenced by slower reading times compared to English speakers. Reading times for Dutch speakers fall between those of English and German speakers but exhibit greater similarity to English, suggesting that Dutch aligns more closely with the loose fit languages.

The experiment indicates that both documented and undocumented (extended) middles are read faster in Dutch and English than in German. These findings suggest fundamental differences in processing strategies for semantically diverse subject-verb combinations. Our results enable us to discuss hypotheses based on psycholinguistically informed comparisons of German and English (most notably by Hawkins 1995; 2012; 2014) and address the question of diachronic-causal relations in language change from a language processing perspective, in line with the view that grammars are deeply shaped by processing (Christiansen & Chater 2008; Sinnemäki 2014).

© Anne Renzel, Gunther De Vogelaer & Jens Bölte
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2025-08-12
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Keyword(s): contrastive linguistics; Germanic Sandwich; language processing; look ahead vs. look back parsing; middle construction; self-paced reading; word order

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