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German, English, Spanish, and French versions of short (ia) and long (ib) relative clauses were tested in written questionnaire studies. The noun phrases containing the clauses appeared in either object position (as in i) or in subject/topic position, and the relative clauses ambiguously modified the first or the second noun of the noun phrase.

In the first experiment, German, English and Spanish were tested. In all three languages, more high attachment (first noun modification) interpretations were observed for long relative clauses than for short ones, perhaps reflecting differences in implicit prosodic phrasing provided by participants when they read the questionnaire. Across languages, more high attachment was observed in object position than in subject/topic position, but this effect was larger for …