Doctoral Dissertation Research: Learning and processing mechanisms for singular they/them pronouns

Vanderbilt University, Nashville TN

Investigators

Abstract

The use of the pronoun “they” instead of singular “he” or “she” to refer to a lone individual has met with mixed acceptance for a variety of purposes and can be challenging for some listeners and speakers despite the fact that, historically, singular-they is well entrenched in the language. For example, many people who don't intend to misgender others still make errors in their actual language production. Errors are particularly common with singular they, which is becoming more common and more accepted (46% of younger Americans in 2021 know someone who uses they/them pronouns, up from 32% in 2018), but is still new to many speakers. This project asks why errors like these occur, and tests learning strategies and speech production outcomes. This project draws on sentence processing, speech production, perspective-taking, and error-based learning approaches to ask novel questions about mechanisms of language learning and production. Building on promising preliminary data, the proposed experiments investigate how difficulties with singular they arise during language processing, how choices between alternative pronouns are affected by context, and what strategies support learning to remember people’s stated pronouns and fluently produce singular they. De-identified data and code will be made publicly available, along with study pre-registrations. In addition to informing evidence-based best practices for reducing misgendering, the findings of the proposed studies will advance understanding of language learning and speech production. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.