What does memory retrieval leave on the table? Modelling the Cost of Semi-Compositionality with MINERVA2 and sBERT

Sydelle de Souza, Ivan Vegner, Francis Mollica, Leonidas A. A. Doumas

Keywords: compositionality, language processing, memory, analogy, collocations

TL;DR: Semi-compositional linguistic units incur a unique reaction time cost compared to compositional units and idioms, which can be modelled by a pattern of memory retrieval failures in MINERVA2.

Abstract: Despite being ubiquitous in natural language, collocations (e.g., kick+habit) incur a unique processing cost, compared to compositional phrases (kick+door) and idioms (kick+bucket). We confirm this cost with behavioural data as well as MINERVA2, a memory model, suggesting that collocations constitute a distinct linguistic category. While the model fails to fully capture the observed human processing patterns, we find that below a specific item frequency threshold, the model’s retrieval failures align with human reaction times across conditions. This suggests an alternative processing mechanism that activates when memory retrieval fails.

Submission Number: 139