doi: 10.3765/sp.2.4 Embedded implicatures?!? ∗

Cognition, 2006

Recent research in semantics and pragmatics has revived the debate about whether there are two cognitively distinct categories of conversational implicatures: generalised and particularised. Generalised conversational implicatures are so-called because they seem ...

Semantics and pragmatics, 2010

Conventionalist theories of scalar implicature differ from other accounts in that they predict strengthening of embedded scalar terms. argue that experimental support for this prediction is largely based on sentence comprehension tasks that inflate the frequency with which terms like some are strengthened. Using a picture verification task, they observed no strengthening of embedded scalars. We present data from a multiple-choice picture verification task that is more sensitive to interpretation preferences, and find that readers do show a preference for strengthened interpretations even in embedded phrases. These data cast doubt on Geurts and Pouscoulous's empirical arguments against the existence of embedded implicatures.

Synthese, 2008

In this paper I discuss some of the criteria that are widely used in the linguistic and philosophical literature to classify an aspect of meaning as either semantic or pragmatic. With regards to the case of scalar implicature (e.g. some Fs are G implying that not all Fs are G), these criteria are not ultimately conclusive, either in the results of their application, or in the interpretation of the results with regards to the semantics/pragmatics distinction (or in both). I propose a psychologically relevant criterion, that of the primary or secondary role of context. This criterion applies to sub-personal processes that derive the interpretation of a scalar term rather than to the eventual interpretation of the term, and there exist well-established experimental paradigms that can generate quantitative data. I present recent studies on scalar implicature which employ such off-line and real-time paradigms, aiming to demonstrate how research on the semantics/pragmatics distinction can benefit from experimental investigation.

We compare two aspects of meaning, namely the presupposition of stop in the scope of negation (John didn't stop going to the movies on Wednesday., → John used to go to the movies before Wednesday.) and scalar implicatures associated with strong scalar items under negation (John didn't always go to the movie last week. → John sometimes went to the movies last week.) ('Indirect Scalar Implicatures' (ISIs) Chierchia, 2004). Our results replicate the finding by Chemla and Bott (2013) that global presupposition interpretations are faster with a different methodology that avoids a potential confound of response bias. More surprisingly, ISIs are found to pattern with presuppositions in that responses reflecting an interpretation without an inference (corresponding to a 'literal' interpretation) are slower than ones based on the relevant inference, contrary to what has been found for direct scalar implicatures. These results are puzzling from the traditional perspective that ISIs are generated in the same way as direct implicatures. We explore two possible interpretations: first, strong scalar terms could receive a presuppositional analysis as well and presuppose that their domain is non-empty. Alternatively, we could group stop and ISIs together from another angle and see them as obligatory scalar implicatures, in contrast to the non-obligatory direct ones.

Lingua, 2012

One of the characteristic marks of Gricean implicatures in general, and scalar implicatures in particular, examples of which are given in (1), is that they are the result of a defeasible inference. (1a) John had some of the cookies (1b) John had some of the cookies. In fact he had them all. (1a) invites the inference that John didn't have all the cookies, an inference that can be defeated by additional information, as in (1b). Scalar inferences like that in (1a) thus depend upon some sort of nonmonotonic reasoning over semantic contents. They share this characteristic of defeasiblility with inferences that result in the presence of discourse relations that link discourse segments together into a discourse structure for a coherent text or dialogue-call these inferences discourse or D inferences. I have studied these inferences about discourse structure, their effects on content and how they are computed in the theory known as Segmented Discourse Representation Theory or SDRT. In this paper I investigate how the tools used to infer discourse relations apply to what Griceans and others call scalar or quantity implicatures. The benefits of this investigation are three fold: at the theoretical level, we have a unified and relatively simple framework for computing defeasible inferences both of the quantity and discourse structure varieties; further, we can capture what's right about the intuitions of so called ''localist'' views about scalar implicatures; finally, this framework permits us to investigate how D-inferences and scalar inferences might interact, in particular how discourse structure might trigger scalar inferences, thus explaining the variability (Chemla, 2008) or even non-existence of embedded implicatures noted recently (e.g., Geurts and Pouscoulous, 2009), and their occasional noncancellability. The view of scalar inferences that emerges from this study is also rather different from the way both localists and Neo-Griceans conceive of them. Both localists and Neo-Griceans view implicatures as emerging from pragmatic reasoning processes that are strictly separated from the calculation of semantic values; where they differ is at what level the pragmatic implicatures are calculated. Localists take them to be calculated in parallel with semantic composition, whereas Neo-Griceans take them to have as input the complete semantic content of the assertion. My view is that scalar inferences depend on discourse structure and large view of semantic content in which semantics and pragmatics interact in a complex way to produce an interpretation of an utterance or a discourse.

Semantics and Pragmatics, 2010

Conventionalist theories of scalar implicature differ from other accounts in that they predict strengthening of embedded scalar terms. argue that experimental support for this prediction is largely based on sentence comprehension tasks that inflate the frequency with which terms like some are strengthened. Using a picture verification task, they observed no strengthening of embedded scalars. We present data from a multiple-choice picture verification task that is more sensitive to interpretation preferences, and find that readers do show a preference for strengthened interpretations even in embedded phrases. These data cast doubt on Geurts and Pouscoulous's empirical arguments against the existence of embedded implicatures.

This paper reports an experimental investigation of presuppositions and scalar implicatures in language acquisition. Recent proposals (Chemla 2009; Romoli 2012, 2014) posit the same mechanisms for generating both types of inferences, in contrast to the traditional view. We used a Covered Box picture selection task to compare the interpretations assigned by two groups of children (4/5 and 7 year olds) and by adults, in response to sentences with presuppositions and ones with either ‘direct’ or ‘indirect’ scalar implicatures. The main finding was that the behavior of children and adults differed across inference types. This asymmetry is consistent with the traditional perspective, but poses a challenge for the more recent uniform accounts. We discuss how the latter could be amended to account for these findings, and also relate the findings to previous results on presupposition processing. Finally, we discuss an unexpected difference found between direct and indirect scalar implicatures.

In this article we present two sets of experiments designed to investigate the acquisition of scalar implicatures. Scalar implicatures arise in examples like Some professors are famous where the speaker's use of some typically indicates that s/he had reasons not to use a more informative term, e.g. all. Some professors are famous therefore gives rise to the implicature that not all professors are famous. Recent studies on the development of pragmatics suggest that preschool children are often insensitive to such implicatures when they interpret scalar terms (Cognition 78 raises two important questions: (a) are all scalar terms treated in the same way by young children?, and (b) does the child's difficulty reflect a genuine inability to derive scalar implicatures or is it due to demands imposed by the experimental task on an otherwise pragmatically savvy child? Experiment 1 addresses the first question by testing a group of 30 5-year-olds and 30 adults (all native speakers of Greek) on three different scales, koli, merikil (kall, somel), ktris, diol (kthree, twol) and kteliono, arxizol (kfinish, startl). In each case, subjects were presented with contexts which satisfied the semantic content of the stronger (i.e. more informative) terms on each scale (i.e. all, three and finish) but were described using the weaker terms of the scales (i.e. some, two, start). We found that, while adults overwhelmingly rejected these infelicitous descriptions, children almost never did so. Children also differed from adults in that their rejection rate on the numerical scale was reliably higher than on the two other scales. In order to address question (b), we trained a group of 30 5-yearolds to detect infelicitous statements. We then presented them with modified versions of the stories A. Papafragou, J. Musolino / Cognition 86 (2003) 253-282 253 Cognition 86 (2003) 253-282 www.elsevier.com/locate/cognit 0010-0277/02/$ -see front matter q (A. Papafragou).

This paper reports an experimental investigation of presuppositions and scalar implicatures in language acquisition. Recent proposals (Chemla 2009; Romoli 2012, 2014) posit the same mechanisms for generating both types of inferences, in contrast to the traditional view. We used a Covered Box picture selection task to compare the interpretations assigned by two groups of children (4/5 and 7 year olds) and by adults, in response to sentences with presuppositions and ones with either ‘direct’ or ‘indirect’ scalar implicatures. The main finding was that the behavior of children and adults differed across inference types. This asymmetry is consistent with the traditional perspective, but poses a challenge for the more recent uniform accounts. We discuss how the latter could be amended to account for these findings, and also relate the findings to previous results on presupposition processing. Finally, we discuss an unexpected difference found between direct and indirect scalar implicatures.

Axiomathes, 2019

In a recent paper Mandy Simons has argued that in a Gricean framework there is room for embedded pragmatic effects. One of her goals has been to demonstrate that an argument put forward by François Recanati to the effect that it is not possible to apply Gricean reasoning to generation of local pragmatic effects is mistaken. In his commentary Recanati maintains that the view suggested by Simons can be called Gricean only in a very broad sense and insists that the process responsible for local effects is essentially different from the one which generates conversational implicatures. In my view their exchange highlights important issues concerning the way in which local pragmatic effects are generated and is worthy of a careful analysis. In what follows I critically examine Simons's and Recanati's views and then suggest the view that in the light of this analysis seems to me the most adequate. In particular, I argue-against Recanati-that during the interpretation process interpreters construct literal propositional nuclei, which usually fell short of being truth-evaluable but which play an important role in the interpretation. I claim that the view that assumes that such literal propositions are constructed in the process of interpretation is more universal and may be used to analyse a wider range of examples than the view that does not postulate such constructions. Nevertheless, I maintain-against Simons-that the global and local pragmatic inferences are importantly different.