Tree Structures
Left- and right-branching structures are illustrated with the trees that follow. Each example appears twice, once according to a constituency-based analysis associated with a phrase structure grammar and once according to a dependency-based analysis associated with a dependency grammar. The first group of trees illustrate left-branching:
The upper row shows the constituency-based structures, and the lower row the dependency-based structures. In the constituency-based structures, left-branching is present (but not really visible) insofar as the non-head daughter is to the left of the head. In the corresponding dependency-based structures in the lower row, the left-branching is clear; the dependent appears to the left of its head, the branch extending down to the left. The following structures demonstrate right-branching:
The upper row again shows the constituency-based structures, and the lower row the dependency-based structures. The constituency-based structures are right-branching insofar as the non-head daughter is to the right of the head. This right-branching is completely visible in the lower row of dependency-based structures, where the branch extends down to the right. The (c)-examples contain one instance of right-branching (the upper branch) and one instance of left-branching (the lower branch). The following trees illustrate phrases that combine both types of branching:
The combination of left- and right-branching is now completely visible in both the constituency- and dependency-based trees. The head appears in a medial position, which means that the phrase combines both types of branching. Note that the (b)-trees also contain a PP phrase that is an instance of pure right-branching.
Read more about this topic: Branching (linguistics)
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