Effects of collocational restrictions in the interpretation of adjective-noun combinations

An experiment is reported in which the interpretation of adjective-noun combinations was investigated. Semantic characteristics of adjectives and nouns were varied. Central adjectives were members of pairs of frequent antonyms (e.g., big-small, wet-dry). Peripheral adjectives were near-synonyms of such antonyms (e.g., sturdy, swampy). Compared to central adjectives, peripheral adjectives have additional collocational restrictions that account for their more restricted usages. Combinations contained nouns in which dimensions that matched the collocational restrictions of the peripheral adjectives were of high or low salience. A speeded classification task for meaningfulness was used. Combinations consisting of peripheral adjectives and low salient nouns resulted in particularly low percentages of meaningful responses. The results confirm important predictions of schema-based theory, but they also point to required elaborations of this theory.