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In the course of language evolution, changing the order of words in a sentence in favor of “subject – predicate – object” reduces the load on the brain, which allows the freed up resources to be used for more effective communication and complex grammatical structures.
There are SVO languages that place the verb between the subject and the object (SVO – Subject (Subject) – Verb (Verb) – Object (Addition)), and there are SOV languages uXNUMXbuXNUMXbwhere the verb is at the end (SOV). The order of these elements is not a random whim of evolution or fortune, it greatly affects the effectiveness of communication. A group of scientists from SISSA (Scuola Internazionale Superiore di Studi Avanzati – International School of Advanced Studies) from the Laboratory for the Study of Language and Consciousness, together with Iranian scientists, studied the mechanism of the transition of the language from the SOV type, which is considered primary, to the SVO type. Scientists have shown that the tendency of a language to use more efficient modes of communication and more complex grammatical structures requires a reduction in the computational load on the brain, which, in turn, forces us to abandon the more “cumbersome” SOV order in favor of the more “economical” SVO.
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Subject, object, verb. In writing, as in oral speech, this triple can be arranged in different ways (theoretically, in six ways), but the vast majority of languages (86%) choose only from two schemes: SVO (“Vasya eats soup”) and SOV (“Vasya eats soup”) and SOV (“Vasya soup eats). The latter is much more common than the former, and this scheme – SOV – is considered to be basic; the scientific community believes that it is she who appears first at the birth of a new language. Supporting this hypothesis is the fact that many languages have moved from the SOV type to SVO over time, but there are no examples of the reverse transition.
So what determines the language’s preference for SVO over SOV? This is exactly the question Hanna Marno of SISSA asked.1. Marnot explains: “We started with the assumption that languages strive for the greatest efficiency of communication over time, and in this striving tend to increase the complexity of their grammar. In other words, more and more complex structures occur in sentences. However, there is a natural limit that our brain imposes on this growth: the computational limit. The computational limit is the maximum number of language operations that our brain can perform per unit of time. It is the clash of these two tendencies that leads to the fact that when the grammar becomes more complicated, SOV-type languages uXNUMXbuXNUMXbare less attractive. Why? The point is that in SOV languages we are forced to use “markers” – little particles that are attached to nouns to clarify their function in a sentence. These particles increase the computational load, which pushes us to move to the SVO type, where markers are not needed.
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Previously, in experiments in 2010, two groups of subjects (Italian SVO and Turkish SOV) had to communicate through sign language, which they had to first invent. Both groups, both Turkish and Italian, created sign SOV languages. “Then we assumed that if we make life easier for the subjects – reduce the computational load of the task, we will see the emergence of the SVO language,” adds Hanna Marno. To achieve their goal, before starting the main series of experiments, Marno and colleagues taught two new groups of subjects (native speakers of Italian and Farsi) a ready-made system of gestures. “Breaked from the need to invent a sign vocabulary, both groups were able to concentrate on expressing their thoughts, which, as we expected, led to the emergence of SVO languages. This is a significant result,” Marno concluded. “We managed to explain an important mechanism of language evolution.”
See more at journal Frontiers of Psychology.