Exam question 4 · Pronouns: I, me, you, they and who

In respect of the sentence "Max told Leo that he had won", select the response consistent with sound reasoning.

Mova's choice: option 1 · The right answer: option 2 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: Max · What happens: tell, win, select, respect · To what, where: Leo, respect, response, sentence · Speech: someone speaks here

This is exam question 4 of lesson 5 «Pronouns: I, me, you, they and who» of the language course of Mova's primary school, asked in stiff, formal language. The page gives the question's syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause, then the 4 options as the student saw them, each with its tree and pragmatics. Every text is parsed by Mova itself. How the student answered it, with the score of every option and why: the test at school.

The question

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	In	in	ADP	_	2 respect	case
2	respect	respect	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 told	obl
3	of	of	ADP	_	5 sentence	case
4	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	5 sentence	det
5	sentence	sentence	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 respect	nmod
6	"	"	PUNCT	_	8 told	punct
7	Max	Max	PROPN	Number=Sing	8 told	nsubj
8	told	tell	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
9	Leo	Leo	PROPN	Number=Sing	8 told	iobj
10	that	that	SCONJ	_	13 won	mark
11	he	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	13 won	nsubj
12	had	have	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	13 won	aux
13	won	win	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part	16 select	advcl
14	"	"	PUNCT	_	13 won	punct
15	,	,	PUNCT	_	16 select	punct
16	select	select	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	8 told	ccomp
17	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	18 response	det
18	response	response	NOUN	Number=Sing	16 select	obj
19	consistent	consistent	ADJ	Degree=Pos	18 response	amod
20	with	with	ADP	_	22 reasoning	case
21	sound	sound	NOUN	Number=Sing	22 reasoning	compound
22	reasoning	reasoning	NOUN	Number=Sing	19 consistent	obl
23	.	.	PUNCT	_	8 told	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	roles by
1	tell speech: assert in a quote	past	Max		Leo	respect of the sentence	vn transfer_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP S_INF»: agent=Agent leo=Recipient clause=Topic
2	win in a quote	past · perfect	Max				vn succeed-74-2 «NP V»: agent=Agent
3	select	infinitive		the response			vn obtain-13.5.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent response=Theme
4	respect			the sentence			nom respect «cognition transitive»: of=patient

One row per clause the reader finds. «not said here»: a role filled from the clause above. «roles by»: a VerbNet class and frame when one fits the verb, else the reader's rules on the tree.

The options

Option 1 · ← Mova's choice

The pronoun necessarily refers to Max

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 pronoun	det
2	pronoun	pronoun	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 refers	nsubj
3	necessarily	necessarily	ADV	_	4 refers	advmod
4	refers	refer	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
5	to	to	ADP	_	6 Max	case
6	Max	Max	PROPN	Number=Sing	4 refers	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	refer	present	the pronoun		Max			necessarily property	vn relate-86.2-2 «NP V PP.co-theme»: agent=Theme to max=Co-Theme

Option 2 · ✓ the right answer

The pronoun is ambiguous, as it may refer to either person

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 pronoun	det
2	pronoun	pronoun	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 ambiguous	nsubj
3	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	4 ambiguous	cop
4	ambiguous	ambiguous	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root
5	,	,	PUNCT	_	9 refer	punct
6	as	as	SCONJ	_	9 refer	mark
7	it	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	9 refer	nsubj
8	may	may	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	9 refer	aux
9	refer	refer	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	4 ambiguous	conj
10	to	to	ADP	_	12 person	case
11	either	either	DET	PronType=Ind	12 person	det
12	person	person	NOUN	Number=Sing	9 refer	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	present	the pronoun					ambiguous property	tree rules
2	refer	may	pronoun					to either person	vn relate-86.2-2 «NP V PP.co-theme»: agent=Theme to person=Co-Theme

Option 3

The pronoun necessarily refers to Leo

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 pronoun	det
2	pronoun	pronoun	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 refers	nsubj
3	necessarily	necessarily	ADV	_	4 refers	advmod
4	refers	refer	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
5	to	to	ADP	_	6 Leo	case
6	Leo	Leo	PROPN	Number=Sing	4 refers	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	refer	present	the pronoun		Leo			necessarily property	vn relate-86.2-2 «NP V PP.co-theme»: agent=Theme to leo=Co-Theme

Option 4

The pronoun refers to neither person

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 pronoun	det
2	pronoun	pronoun	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 refers	nsubj
3	refers	refer	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
4	to	to	ADP	_	6 person	case
5	neither	neither	DET	PronType=Neg	6 person	det
6	person	person	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 refers	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	refer	present	the pronoun					to neither person	vn relate-86.2-2 «NP V PP.co-theme»: agent=Theme to person=Co-Theme

Text: the tests of Mova's primary school, written for Mova (world/data/school/), as the course runner gave them to the student. Trees: Mova's own parse — the en model on the CPU, when the site is built — not checked by a teacher; they may be wrong. Frames: Mova's frames reader (prag), each text read on its own. Elamur Cosmic License.

This page in Markdown → https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/questions/language/5-pronouns-i-me-you-they-and-who/e4/