This is because the perceptual strategies adopted by the listener are to
assume that the first noun will go with the first verb in an NP-VP (actor-action)
sequence as part of the main clause ... So he understandably makes the wrong
guess when he hears the words the pig pushed . ... especially as his knowledge of
the world tells him that pigs arc not usually pushed they generally do the
pushing. (Aitchison. 1976. p. 203).
Thus. the relation between internal grammars and comprehension is
indirect. especially since comprehension in natural settings (as opposed to
the experimental settings from which much of the psycholinguistic work
discussed by Aitchison derives) is often assisted by such factors as the
following:
I. Natural language contains a great deal of redundancy (see Lyons.
1977. p. 44 for a discussion of this).
JI. .. Context"' and "shared background knowledge" assist interlocutors