No abstract

Working memory (WM) capacity has been shown to influence how read- ers make decisions about syntactic ambiguity. In the present study, the authors conducted a conceptual replication of Swets et al. (2007) across three differ- ent language samples (L1 English monolinguals, L1-L2 Spanish-English bilin- guals, and L1-L2 Mandarin-English bilinguals) to assess the effects of working memory and language proficiency on L1 relative clause attachment decisions. Consistent with the 2007 results, structural equation modeling (SEM) analyses demonstrated that low WM span is associated with a preference to attach am- biguous RCs higher in the syntactic structure, contrary to a recency strategy. Analyses also demonstrate that proficiency in L1 and L2 have no effect, suggest- ing that relative clause attachment preferences primarily reflect the properties of the language and the working memory capacity of the comprehender.