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Chapter 2. Experimental research

Problems and opportunities in the big-data era
  • Henk Cremers
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Crossroads Semantics
This chapter is in the book Crossroads Semantics

Abstract

Experimental research in psychology, psycholinguistics or medicine provides quantitative and therefore seemingly conclusive and trustworthy evidence. However, it has been convincingly shown that most research findings are actually false. This has hardly influenced the dominant scientific evaluation system which reflects a continued trust in the unbiasedness of data by a strong reliance on simple quantifications of scientific quality and productivity, such as number of publications and number of citations. This state of affairs is remarkable in the light of a long history of strong criticism of commonly used inference methods and scientific evaluation systems, which is now backed by large-scale research projects directly questioning the reproducibility of scientific findings. This way, the large amounts of data – “big-data” – have helped to uncover some of these problematic issues, but also provided a more open attitude towards data and code sharing. In addition, novel analytic frameworks may help to better integrate empirical data with computational models.

Abstract

Experimental research in psychology, psycholinguistics or medicine provides quantitative and therefore seemingly conclusive and trustworthy evidence. However, it has been convincingly shown that most research findings are actually false. This has hardly influenced the dominant scientific evaluation system which reflects a continued trust in the unbiasedness of data by a strong reliance on simple quantifications of scientific quality and productivity, such as number of publications and number of citations. This state of affairs is remarkable in the light of a long history of strong criticism of commonly used inference methods and scientific evaluation systems, which is now backed by large-scale research projects directly questioning the reproducibility of scientific findings. This way, the large amounts of data – “big-data” – have helped to uncover some of these problematic issues, but also provided a more open attitude towards data and code sharing. In addition, novel analytic frameworks may help to better integrate empirical data with computational models.

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Dedication v
  3. Table of contents vii
  4. Introduction 1
  5. Chapter 1. Bridging theoretical and experimental linguistic research 9
  6. Data and its use
  7. Chapter 2. Experimental research 23
  8. Chapter 3. Finding long-distance dependencies in the Lassy Corpus 39
  9. Chapter 4. How to compare speed and accuracy of syntactic parsers 57
  10. Chapter 5. Adposition clusters in Dutch 77
  11. Chapter 6. Polarity licensing and intervention by conjunction 93
  12. Chapter 7. Frequential test of (S)OV as unmarked word order in Dutch and German clauses 107
  13. Chapter 8. Kratzer’s effect in the nominal domain 125
  14. Chapter 9. Is bilingual speech production language-specific or non-specific? 139
  15. Chapter 10. Prosody of restrictive and appositive relative clauses in Dutch and German 155
  16. Chapter 11. Licensing distributivity 177
  17. Implementation and theory building
  18. Chapter 12. Extending categorial grammar to phonology 193
  19. Chapter 13. Stacking up for the long way down 207
  20. Chapter 14. Meaning between algebra and culture 227
  21. Chapter 15. Whether you like it or not, this is a paper about or not 249
  22. Chapter 16. Between desire and necessity 263
  23. Chapter 17. Inner aspect and the comparative quantifiers 281
  24. Chapter 18. The expressive en maar -construction 305
  25. Index 327
https://doi.org/10.1075/z.210.02cre

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Dedication v
  3. Table of contents vii
  4. Introduction 1
  5. Chapter 1. Bridging theoretical and experimental linguistic research 9
  6. Data and its use
  7. Chapter 2. Experimental research 23
  8. Chapter 3. Finding long-distance dependencies in the Lassy Corpus 39
  9. Chapter 4. How to compare speed and accuracy of syntactic parsers 57
  10. Chapter 5. Adposition clusters in Dutch 77
  11. Chapter 6. Polarity licensing and intervention by conjunction 93
  12. Chapter 7. Frequential test of (S)OV as unmarked word order in Dutch and German clauses 107
  13. Chapter 8. Kratzer’s effect in the nominal domain 125
  14. Chapter 9. Is bilingual speech production language-specific or non-specific? 139
  15. Chapter 10. Prosody of restrictive and appositive relative clauses in Dutch and German 155
  16. Chapter 11. Licensing distributivity 177
  17. Implementation and theory building
  18. Chapter 12. Extending categorial grammar to phonology 193
  19. Chapter 13. Stacking up for the long way down 207
  20. Chapter 14. Meaning between algebra and culture 227
  21. Chapter 15. Whether you like it or not, this is a paper about or not 249
  22. Chapter 16. Between desire and necessity 263
  23. Chapter 17. Inner aspect and the comparative quantifiers 281
  24. Chapter 18. The expressive en maar -construction 305
  25. Index 327
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