Editing Linguistic typology (section)

===== Theoretical issues =====
Several [[Language processing in the brain|processing]] explanations were proposed in the 1980s and 1990s for the above correlations. They suggest that the brain finds it easier to [[Parsing|parse]] [[Syntactic tree diagram|syntactic patterns]] that are either right or left [[Branching (linguistics)|branching]], but not mixed. The most widely held such explanation is [[John A. Hawkins (linguist)|John A. Hawkins]]' parsing efficiency theory, which argues that language is a non-innate [[Adaptive system|adaptation]] to innate [[Cognition|cognitive]] mechanisms. Typological tendencies are considered as being based on language users' preference for grammars that are organized efficiently, and on their avoidance of word orderings that cause processing difficulty. Hawkins's processing theory predicts the above table but also makes predictions for non-correlation pairs including the order of adjective, [[demonstrative]] and numeral in respect with the noun. This theory was based on [[Corpus linguistics|corpus]] research and lacks support in [[Psycholinguistics|psycholinguistic]] studies.<ref name="Song Order" />

Some languages exhibit regular "inefficient" patterning. These include the VO languages [[Chinese language|Chinese]], with the [[adpositional phrase]] before the verb, and [[Finnish grammar|Finnish]], which has postpositions. But there are few other profoundly exceptional languages. It is suggested more recently that the left-right orientation is limited to role-marking connectives ([[adpositions]] and [[Subordinator (grammar)|subordinators]]), stemming directly from the semantic mapping of the sentence. Since the true correlation pairs in the above table either involve such a connective or, arguably, follow from the canonical order, orientation predicts them without making problematic claims.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Austin |first=Patrik |year=2021 |title=A semantic and pragmatic explanation of harmony |journal=Acta Linguistica Hafniensia |volume=54 |issue=1 |pages=1–23 |doi=10.1080/03740463.2021.1987685 |s2cid=244941417 |doi-access=free }}</ref>