Jackendoff坚持Chomsky生成语法的心智主义、组合性和语言习得理论,但同时指出主流生成语法的若干问题,如语法的深层结构决定意义、句法中心主义、词库和语法的区分等,认为这些问题使得主流生成语法孤立于其他认知科学。相对于句法中心建构理论,Jackendoff提出了平行建构理论。该理论整合了语言学和认知神经科学,修正并发展了主流生成语法,代表了生成语法研究的新发展。但Jackendoff的平行建构理论也存在问题,如更简句法可操作性不强,基于空间概念的概念结构也有待商榷,且预测力不强等。

Jackendoff insists on mentalism, combinationality and acquisition of mainstream generative grammar and at the same time he points out the problems of generative grammar of Chomsky, that is, deep structure determining meaning, syntactocentrism and distinction between lexicon and grammar. All these problems make mainstream generative grammar isolated from other cognitive science. By contrasting with syntactocentric architecture, Jackendoff puts forward parallel architecture, which integrates linguistics and cognitive neuroscience. Parallel architecture modifies and develops generative grammar, which represents the new development of generative grammar. However, parallel architecture has some problems: simpler syntax is not very operative, conceptual structure is questionable, and simpler syntax is not very predictable.