Nino Grillo
Senior Lecturer

Research

Overview

I am primarily interested in the relation between the grammar and the parser. This means I often work in parallel on the syntax-semantics (and more recently prosody) of a phenomenon and on its processing. I have a secondary interest in sentence processing in language acquisition and impairment.

My main domains of research include locality restrictions on syntactic dependencies (in particular movement and attachment), the interaction of event structure and passivisation, argument/adjunct asymmetries and perceptual reports. 

Projects

• The syntax and semantics of Pseudo Relatives
• Processing of syntactic dependencies
• Prosodic correlates of attachment
• Processing of passivization

Research group(s)

• Syntax and Semantics research group

Collaborators

• Andrea Santi (UCL)
• Artemis Alexiadou (Humboldt Universität zu Berlin)
• Barbara Hemforth (CNRS Paris Diderot)
• Berit Gehrke (CNRS Paris Diderot)
• Bruno Fernandes (Universidade Nova de Lisboa)
• Caterina Paolazzi (UCL)
• Céline Pozniak (CNRS Paris Diderot)
• Giorgos Spathas (Humboldt Universität zu Berlin)
• Giuseppina Turco (CNRS/Sorbonne Nouvelle)
• Keir Moulton (Simon Fraser University)
• João Costa (Universidade Nova de Lisboa)
• Leah Roberts (University of York)
• Miriam Aguilar (Universidade Nova de Lisboa)
• Nils Hirsch (Humboldt Universität zu Berlin)
• Oana Lungu (Universit\’e de Nantes)

Available PhD research projects

• I would be able to supervise research projects on sentence processing and syntax.

Teaching

Undergraduate

• Psycholinguistics (L27H)
• Advanced Topics in Psycholinguistics (L67H)
• Directed Reading in Psycholinguistics (L48M)

Postgraduate

• Psycholinguistics (L31M)
• Advanced Topics in Psycholinguistics (L76M)
• Directed Reading in Psycholinguistics (L48M)

External activities

Invited talks and conferences

Invited talks

• 2017 There and back again: Pseudo Relative contribution to Parsing and Grammar. PRIN Workshop, Università di Siena.
• 2017 Passive processing and event structure. Workshop on Acquisition of Passives, Université de Genève.
• 2016 Duration and complexity. Department of Linguistics, Simon Fraser University.
• 2016 Kind of Perfect: semantics of Pseudo Relatives. Utrecht University.
• 2015 Hand in hand: the close correspondence of syntactic and processing complexity. Invited talk at: Hard sentences: how to measure clausal complexity? Annual conference of the SLI (Società di Linguistica Italiana), V. Bianchi, C. Chesi and A. Moro (org.).
• 2015 Recent findings in the processing of (Pseudo)Relatives. Lectures de linguistique expérimentale – Syntaxe et sémantique. Université Diderot/Paris VII.
• 2015 Novel insights on the representation and processing of Pseudo Relatives. Exploring Complexity, Universität Stuttgart.
• 2014 Pseudo Relatives and Internally Headed Relatives. Department of Linguistics, McGill University, invited lecture with Keir Moulton.
• 2014 Effects of Small Clause availability across Attachment and Movement. Department of Linguistics, Queen Mary, University of London.
• 2013 Attraction phenomena and online attachment. Séminaire de Recherche en Psycholinguistique, Faculté de Psychologie, Université de Geneve.
• 2012 Local and Universal. Séminaire de Recherche en Linguistique, Département de linguistique, Université de Genève.
• 2012 Variable Syntax, Uniform Parsing. Department of Linguistics, Queen Mary, University of London.
• 2012 Local and Universal. Department of Linguistics, University College London.
• 2009 Passivization in language acquisition & breakdown. McGill Linguistics Department.
• 2009 Events, Locality and Passivization. Universidade Nova de Lisboa. (job talk)
• 2008 How to become passive. Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona, with Berit Gehrke.
• 2008 Event structure and the structure of passives, with a note on acquisition and breakdown. Concordia LSA Colloquium Series.
• 2007 Canonicity and Minimality. McGill Linguistics Colloquium Series.
• 2006 [A]grammatic Comprehension. Experimental Linguistics Talks in Utrecht (ELiTU).
• 2005 Some remarks on locality in natural language and aphasia: a view from passives. The 2nd LPIA (Left periphery in aphasia) meeting, Wien, Austria.
• 2005 ECP, entropy and omission in language development and impairment. CISCL Università di Siena.
• 2004 Agrammatic aphasia and minimality effects. The first LPIA (Left Periphery in Aphasia) meeting, Greifswald, Germany.

Conferences

• 1. Grillo, N., A. Alexiadou, B. Gehrke, N. Hirsh, C. Paolazzi and A. Santi. (2016). Processing unambiguous verbal passives in German. AMLaP 2016, Basque Center on Cognition, Brain and Language, Bilbao.
• 2. Aguilar, M. and N. Grillo. (2016). Matrix Verb-Type effects on Relative Clause Attachment in Spanish. AMLaP 2016, Basque Center on Cognition, Brain and Language, Bilbao.
• 3. Grillo, N. and G. Turco. (2016). The Prosody of (Pseudo)Relatives. Alternate Talk/Poster at Speech Prosody, Boston University.
• 4. Grillo, N. and G. Turco. (2016). The prosody of (Pseudo)Relatives and Produc- tion Planning. Poster at 29th CUNY, University of Florida.
• 5. Grillo, N. and K. Moulton (2016). Exceptional Agreement in Italian Pseudo Rela- tives. Talk at Canadian Linguistic Association 2016, University of Calgary.
• 6. Paolazzi, C., N. Grillo, A. Alexiadou and A. Santi. Passivizing states. (2016). Poster at 29th CUNY, University of Florida.
• 7. Grillo, N. and K. Moulton (2016). Clausal Determiners and Long Distance AGREE in Italian. Poster at GLOW 2016, University of Göttingen.
• 8. Grillo, N., B. Gehrke, N. Hirsch, C. Paolazzi and A. Santi. (2016). Passives are not inherently harder than actives. Talk at 37th DGfS, Universität Konstanz.
• 9. Grillo, N. and K. Moulton. Kind of Perfect. (2016). Talk at IGG42, Lecce, Italy.
• 10. Grillo, N. and K. Moulton. (2016). Clausal Determiners and Long Distance AGREE in Italian. Poster at IGG42, Lecce, Italy.
• 11. Grillo, N. and K. Moulton. (2015). Event Kinds and the Pseudo-Relative. Poster at NELS 46, Concordia University, Montréal.
• 12. Grillo, N., A. Santi, C. Pozniak and B. Hemforth. (2015). Pseudo Relatives are easier than Relative Clauses: Eye-tracking evidence from Tense. Talk at AMLaP 2015, University of Malta.
• 13. Paolazzi, C., N. Grillo, A. Alexiadou and A. Santi. (2015). Evidence against heuristic processing of English passive sentences. Poster at AMLaP 2015. Uni- versity of Malta.
• 14. Grillo, N. and K. Moulton. (2015). Mismatching Pseudo Relatives describe Event Kinds. Talk at GLOW 2015’s satellite workshop on States and Events, Paris.
• 15. Grillo, N., A. Santi, C. Pozniak and B. Hemforth. (2015). Pseudo Relatives are easier than Relative Clauses: Evidence from Tense. Talk at 28th CUNY, University of Southern California, Los Angeles.
• 16. Grillo, N., S. Habboub and O. Lungu. (2015). Canonicity effects are modulated by matrix verb type. Poster at 28th CUNY, USC, Los Angeles.
• 17. Paolazzi, C., N. Grillo, A. Alexiadou and A. Santi. (2015). Evidence against heuristic processing of English passives. Talk at Psycho & Neurolinguistic Ap- proaches to the Grammar-Lexicon Distinction. University of Copenhagen.
• 18. Grillo, N., A. Alexiadou, C. Paolazzi and A. Santi. (2015). No evidence of higher complexity or agent-first strategy in German passives. Talk at Linguistic Com- plexity in the Individual and Society. NTNU, Trondheim.
• 19. K. Moulton and Grillo, N. (2014). Pseudo Relatives: Big but Transparent. Poster at NELS 45, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA.
• 20. Grillo, N. and O. Lungu. (2014). Investigating Locality: Lessons from PR avail- ability. Talk atLes 3èmes Rencontres d’Automne de Linguistique Formelle: Lan- gage, Langues et Cognition (RALFe). Université Paris 8 / CNRS.
• 21. Grillo, N., B. Fernandes, J. Costa and A. Santi. (2014). Pseudo Relatives vs. Relative Clauses: Greater preference, lower costs. Poster at AMLaP 2014, Edin- burgh.
• 22. Grillo, N. and G. Spathas. (2014). Tense and Aspect modulate RC Attachment: Testing the PR Hypothesis in Greek. Talk at Experimental and theoretical ap- proaches to relative clauses reconciled, 36th DGfS, Oldenburg.
• 23. Grillo, N., M. Tomaz, M.d.C. Lourenço Gomes and A. Santi. (2013). Pseudo Relatives vs. Relative Clauses: Greater Preference, Lower Costs. Poster at AMLaP 2013, Marseille.
• 24. Grillo, N., A. Santi, B. Fernandes and J. Costa. (2013). The Highs and Lows in English Attachment. Poster at the 26th CUNY, Columbia.
• 25. M. Tomaz, M.d.C. Lourenço Gomes, A. Santi and Grillo, N.. (2013). A con- cordância de número em construções relativas e pseudorelativas em Português europeu. Talk at XXIX Encontro nacional da APL, Coimbra, Portugal.
• 26. J. Costa, N. Grillo, B. Fernandes and S. Vaz. (2013). Pseudo-Relatives and PIC in the Parsing and Acquisition of European Portuguese. Talk at Workshop on Portuguese Syntax, Venezia.
• 27. Grillo, N. and J. Costa. (2012). A novel argument for the universality of parsing principles. Talk at the 25th CUNY, New York.
• 28. Grillo, N., B. Fernandes and J. Costa. (2012). Universally local attachment: New evidence from PIC. Talk at Experimental Psycholinguistics Conference, Madrid.
• 29. Grillo, N., B. Fernandes and J. Costa. (2012). Attachment Preferences in Prepo- sitional Infinitive Constructions in European Portuguese. Poster at AMLaP 2012, Riva del Garda.
• 30. Grillo, N. and J. Costa. (2012). Pseudo Relatives: a novel argument for the universality of parsing principles. Talk at IGG 38, Verona.
• 31. Grillo N., A. Santi, Y. Grodzinsky and M. Wagner. (2011). Planned Production and self-paced reading of relative clause attachment. Poster at 10th International Symposium in Psycholinguistics, San Sebastian / Donostia.
• 32. Santi, A., N. Grillo, Y. Grodzinsky and M. Wagner. (2011). Poster at Planned Production and self-paced reading of relative clause attachment. Poster at the 24th CUNY, Stanford University.
• 33. Grillo, N. and J. Costa. (2011). Variable Syntax, Uniform Parsing. Poster at Experimental and Theoretical Advances in Prosody 2, Montréal.
• 34. Santi, A., N. Grillo, Y. Grodzinsky and M. Wagner. (2011). Planned Production and self-paced reading of relative clause attachment. Talk at Experimental and Theoretical Advances in Prosody 2, Montréal.
• 35. Grillo, N., J. Costa and M. Lobo. (2011). Reading clarifies acquisition: A study on subject-object asymmetry. Talk at Reading: Processing of written language, Lisbon.
• 36. Grillo, N. and J. Costa. (2011). Availability of pseudo-relatives and crosslinguis- tic variation in attachment preferences. Talk at XXVII Encontro da Associação Portuguesa de Linguística, Lisbon.
• 37. Gehrke, B. and N. Grillo. (2010). An event structure approach to passives and its implications for acquisition. Talk at Morphological Voice and its Grammatical Interfaces: Theoretic Modelling and Psycholinguistic Validation, Vienna.
• 38. Grillo, N. (2009). Grammaticality and Complexity. Poster atNeurobiology of Lan- guage 09, Chicago.
• 39. Gehrke, B. and N. Grillo. (2009). Event structure and the acquisition of passives. Talk at Glow in Asia VII. Hyderabad.
• 40. Grillo, N.. (2007). Locality effects as evidence for minimal structure. (2007) Experimental evidence for minimal structure, Talk at 29th DGfS, Siegen.
• 41. Grillo, N.. (2006) Syntactic constraints on agrammatic comprehension. Poster at theWestern Conference on Linguistics 2006. Fresno.
• 42. Gehrke, B. and N. Grillo. (2006). Changing the perspective on passives. Talk at the Western Conference on Linguistics 2006. Fresno.
• 43. Garraffa, M. and N. Grillo. (2006). Intervenienza sintattica e canonicità: studio di un caso di afasia non fluente. Talk at Congresso annuale Associazione Italiana di Psicologia, Sezione di psicologia sperimentale, Rovereto.
• 44. Gehrke, B. and N. Grillo. (2006). An event-structure-based account of passiviza- tion. Talk at Interface legibility at the edge, Bucharest.
• 45. Garraffa, M. and N. Grillo. (2006). Agreement and Intervention in a nonflu- ent agrammatic speaker. Poster at The architecture of language, from cognitive modeling to brain mapping and back, Pisa.
• 46. Gehrke, B. and N. Grillo. (2006). Results at the edge. Poster at Interphases, Nicosia.
• 47. Gehrke, B. and N. Grillo. (2005). Aspects on passives. Talk at XIV ConSOLE conference Vitoria / Gasteiz.
• 48. Grillo, N. (2005). Syntactic underspecification and minimality effects. Under- specification in Morphology and Syntax, Talk at the 27th DGfS, Köln.
• 49. Grillo, N. (2004). Minimality effects in agrammatic comprehension. Talk at XIII ConSOLE conference, Trømso.
• 50. Garraffa, M. and N. Grillo (2004). Relativized Minimality and agrammatism. Poster at The V Science of Aphasia Conference. Potsdam.