About

Robert Kluender is a Professor, Director of Graduate Studies, and Department Chair in the Department of Linguistics at UC San Diego. His research focuses on sentence processing using neurolinguistic methods, specifically event-related brain potentials (ERP). He investigates the grammatical status and processing profile of sentences with 'long-distance' dependencies, such as relative clauses and wh-questions. His work contributes to understanding the neural mechanisms underlying language comprehension and the structural aspects of syntax.

Research topics

• Computer Science
• Natural Language Processing
• Artificial Intelligence
• Philosophy
• Linguistics
• Cognitive psychology
• Neuroscience
• Psychology

Selected publications

• Cognitive and linguistic factors affecting subject/object asymmetry: An eye-tracking study of prenominal relative clauses in Korean

  UNC Libraries · 2021-07-02

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  : Object relatives (ORs) have been reported to cause heavier processing loads than subject relatives (SRs) in both pre- and postnominal position (prenominal relatives: Miyamoto & Nakamura 2003, Kwon 2008, Ueno & Garnsey 2008; postnominal relatives: King & Just 1991, King & Kutas 1995, Traxler et al. 2002). In this article, we report the results of two eye-tracking studies of Korean prenominal relative clauses that confirm a processing advantage for subject relatives both with and without supporting context. These results are shown to be compatible with accounts involving the accessibility hierarchy (Keenan & Comrie 1977), phrase-structural complexity (O’Grady 1997), and probabilistic structural disambiguation (Mitchell et al. 1995, Hale 2006), partially compatible with similarity-based interference (Gordon et al. 2001), but incompatible with linear/temporal analyses of filler-gap dependencies (Gibson 1998, 2000, Lewis & Vasishth 2005, Lewis et al. 2006).

  PublisherDOI

• Nothing Entirely New under the Sun: ERP Responses to Manipulations of Syntax

  Cambridge University Press eBooks · 2021 · 4 citations

  1st authorCorresponding
  • Computer Science
  • Natural Language Processing
  • Linguistics

  Purportedly (morpho)syntactic-event-related brain wave components – P600, LAN, and e[arly]LAN – have over the years proved more likely to be domain-general responses. Studies comparing late positive responses to anomalies across cognitive domains, and manipulating their probability of occurrence, suggest that the P600 is a member of the P300 family. Other studies report individual variation in response to (morpho)syntactic anomalies, smudging the distinction between N400 and P600 responses, and suggesting that LAN responses to morphosyntactic anomaly may be an artifact of N400+P600 overlap. The eLAN has similarly been shown to be a methodological artifact. We argue that studies of long-distance dependencies have produced the most consistent and reliable results, partly because they largely avoid violation paradigms, although current insights may be profitably applied to ERP studies of syntactic islands. We also suggest that what are taken to be specialized effects of referential processing are in fact another manifestation of such long-distance (anaphoric) effects.

  PublisherDOI

• Processing Anaphoric Relations

  2019-02-13

  reference-entrySenior author

  This chapter discusses electrophysiological studies of anaphora, attempting to situate findings within the context of literature on language processing as a whole. First, it reviews what is known about electrophysiological indices of processing long-distance anaphoric dependencies, linking these brain responses to cognitive operations required to form anaphoric relations. Then the focus turns to the brain’s response to referentially ambiguous anaphors and it is argued that these responses, rather than being specific to ambiguity, reflect general cognitive processes. Finally, the chapter focuses on an array of recent studies, including research on parallels between processing of referential and syntactic dependencies, the role of referential specificity in reference resolution, and cataphoric dependencies. In doing so, it summarizes where the field currently stands, in terms of what we know and the outstanding issues that remain. In all cases, from the brain’s perspective, the ultimate question is: is there anything special about processing referential anaphora?

  PublisherDOI

• Rethinking the critical period for language: New insights into an old question from American Sign Language

  Bilingualism Language and Cognition · 2018-06-13 · 59 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  We thank the commentators for their thoughtful critiques, which we found both insightful and stimulating to our own thinking. Our first response is that, while debates about the CPL in theoretical contexts are important, the vigor and intensity of these debates should not overshadow the fact that the main goal of our article was to highlight a finding of vital importance: Sufficient language input in early childhood matters deeply because it has long-term consequences (Lillo-Martin, 2018). Woll sums up this point both succinctly and poignantly in her report of a similar case of very late L1 exposure in adulthood who had decades of experience: “For a [deaf] child who, even in the context of early intervention, does not acquire a spoken language, the danger is that they will never have native-like mastery of any L1.” This is what truly matters. Our hope is that our keynote article and the accompanying commentaries might have a positive effect on clinical practice, educational policy, and even parental choice in this regard. In what follows, we discuss the main issues arising from the commentaries. First we note the points of agreement followed by a clarification of what we did not claim in our article. Researchers continue to debate what the shape of the AoA function looks like and its theoretical implications, which we address third. We then address the issues raised as to whether late L1 acquisition and late L2 learning differ in degree or kind, and last we discuss what we mean when we say that language acquisition during post-natal brain growth creates the capacity to learn language.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Rethinking the critical period for language: New insights into an old question from American Sign Language

  Bilingualism Language and Cognition · 2017-12-26 · 199 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  The hypothesis that children surpass adults in long-term second-language proficiency is accepted as evidence for a critical period for language. However, the scope and nature of a critical period for language has been the subject of considerable debate. The controversy centers on whether the age-related decline in ultimate second-language proficiency is evidence for a critical period or something else. Here we argue that age-onset effects for first vs. second language outcome are largely different. We show this by examining psycholinguistic studies of ultimate attainment in L2 vs. L1 learners, longitudinal studies of adolescent L1 acquisition, and neurolinguistic studies of late L2 and L1 learners. This research indicates that L1 acquisition arises from post-natal brain development interacting with environmental linguistic experience. By contrast, L2 learning after early childhood is scaffolded by prior childhood L1 acquisition, both linguistically and neurally, making it a less clear test of the critical period for language.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Language

  Cambridge University Press eBooks · 2016-12-21 · 1 citations

  book-chapter

  A summary is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. Please use the Get access link above for information on how to access this content.

  PublisherDOI

• Referential processing in the human brain: An Event-Related Potential (ERP) study

  Brain Research · 2015-10-14 · 25 citations

  article
  PublisherDOI

• Subject/object processing asymmetries in Korean relative clauses: Evidence from ERP data: Color versions of Figures 2–4, 6–8

  Language · 2013-09-01 · 1 citations

  article
  PublisherDOI

• Subject/Object Processing Asymmetries in Korean Relative Clauses: Evidence from ERP Data

  Language · 2013-09-01 · 109 citations

  articleOpen access

  Subject relative (SR) clauses have a reliable processing advantage in VO languages like English in which relative clauses (RCs) follow the head noun. The question is whether this is also routinely true of OV languages like Japanese and Korean, in which RCs precede the head noun. We conducted an event-related brain potential (ERP) study of Korean RCs to test whether the SR advantage manifests in brain responses as well, and to tease apart the typological factors that might contribute to them. Our results suggest that brain responses to RCs are remarkably similar in VO and OV languages, but that ordering of the RC and its head noun localizes the response to different sentence positions. Our results also suggest that marking the right edge of the RC in Chinese (Yang et al. 2010) and Korean and the absence of it in Japanese (Ueno & Garnsey 2008) affect the response to the following head noun. The consistent SR advantage found in ERP studies lends further support to a universal subject preference in the processing of relative clauses.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Experimental Syntax and Island Effects

  Cambridge University Press eBooks · 2013-10-05 · 247 citations

  book

  This volume brings together cutting-edge experimental research from leaders in the fields of linguistics and psycholinguistics to explore the nature of a phenomenon that has long been central to syntactic theory - 'island effects'. The chapters in this volume draw upon recent methodological advances in experimental methods in syntax, also known as 'experimental syntax', to investigate the underlying cognitive mechanisms that give rise to island effects. This volume presents a comprehensive empirical review of a contemporary debate in the field by including contributions from researchers representing a variety of points of view on the nature of island effects. This book is ideal for students and researchers interested in cutting-edge experimental techniques in linguistics, psycholinguistics and psychology.

  PublisherDOI

Recent grants

• NIH Grant R29DC002503

  NIH · $477k · 2002

Frequent coauthors

• Marta Kutas

  University of California, San Diego

  14 shared

• Maria Polinsky

  12 shared

• Nayoung Kwon

  8 shared

• Jon Sprouse

  New York University Abu Dhabi

  6 shared

• Robin L. Thompson

  University of Birmingham

  4 shared

• Mieko Ueno

  University of California, San Diego

  3 shared

• Karen Emmorey

  San Diego State University

  3 shared

• Kara D. Federmeier

  University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

  2 shared

Labs

• Heritage Language ProgramPI