Marty, Paul;
Sudo, Yasutada;
Romoli, Jacopo;
Breheny, Richard;
(2025)
Probing the Probe: Why Inference Tasks May Inflate Response Rates for Scalar Implicature.
In: Gotzner, N and Harris, JA and Breheny, R and Sharvit, Y, (eds.)
Alternatives in Grammar and Cognition.
(pp. 121-152).
Palgrave MacMillan
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Abstract
Scalar implicature is widely understood to result from a process of strengthening by exclusion of an alternative. As much previous research demonstrates, this process appears to be optional for language users. In this paper, we focus on the fact that, in standard inference tasks, participants are more likely to make a response based on the strengthened interpretation than in other tasks, like verification tasks. We consider two, potentially independent, contributing factors to account for this effect: that inference task probes suggest that an alternative is relevant, and that they make the alternative linguistic expression salient. We report a study designed to test the strength of these factors and find that alternative salience has no discernible effect on inference task rates, over and above suggesting relevance. Our results are convergent with other recent research on scalar implicature which suggests that salience of linguistic alternative per se is not a strong factor in determining whether interpretations are strengthened via scalar implicature.
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