Event heads and the Distribution of Psych-roots

Most syntactic accounts of psychological predicates rely on the notion that the arguments within a verb phrase are “equidistant” for purposes of syntactic movement. Such a view was straightforward under the original “flat structure” approach to VP, in which, for example, the direct and indirect objects are both treated as sisters of V. Following extensive work on object asymmetries (Baker 1988, Barss & Lasnik 1986, Bresnan & Moshi 1993, Larson 1988, Marantz 1984, 1993, among others), it is now generally agreed that the verb phrase has an internal hierarchical structure. Nevertheless, unlike raising from one subject position to another, movement of internal arguments to subject position has often been treated as though it cannot be held to a strict locality (“shortest move”) condition. Accounts involving nonlocal movement of internal arguments have been especially prevalent in the literature on causative psych-verbs (PsyCaus verbs). My ulterior motive here is to establish that the syntax of psych-predicates actually supports locality in A-movement. The approach sketched below points the way towards overcoming a potential stumbling block for theories of A-movement, making it possible to maintain the strong hypothesis that all syntactic movement respects locality.