On The Analysis of Scope Ambiguities in Comparative Constructions: Converging Evidence from Real-Time Sentence Processing and Offline Data
This paper compares two accounts of an ambiguity that arises when a comparative phrase containing an exactly differential is embedded under an intensional operator (Heim 2000). Under one account, the comparative phrase is responsible for the ambiguity (the er-scope theory), and, under the other, the...
| Main Authors: | , , , |
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| Other Authors: | |
| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Linguistic Society of America
2020
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| Online Access: | https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/125246 |
| _version_ | 1826216282171637760 |
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| author | Breakstone, Micha Y. Fox, Daniel Cremers, Alexandre Hackl, Martin |
| author2 | Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Linguistics and Philosophy |
| author_facet | Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Linguistics and Philosophy Breakstone, Micha Y. Fox, Daniel Cremers, Alexandre Hackl, Martin |
| author_sort | Breakstone, Micha Y. |
| collection | MIT |
| description | This paper compares two accounts of an ambiguity that arises when a comparative phrase containing an exactly differential is embedded under an intensional operator (Heim 2000). Under one account, the comparative phrase is responsible for the ambiguity (the er-scope theory), and, under the other, the ambiguity is attributed to the exactly phrase (the exactly-scope theory). We present converging evidence from the distribution of de re and de dicto readings and real time sentence processing that supports the er-scope theory. Since the er-scope theory presupposes a quantificational analysis of the comparative, such an analysis is ipso facto supported by our results. Keywords: Comparatives; Scope; Sentence Processing |
| first_indexed | 2024-09-23T16:45:13Z |
| format | Article |
| id | mit-1721.1/125246 |
| institution | Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-09-23T16:45:13Z |
| publishDate | 2020 |
| publisher | Linguistic Society of America |
| record_format | dspace |
| spelling | mit-1721.1/1252462022-10-03T08:03:21Z On The Analysis of Scope Ambiguities in Comparative Constructions: Converging Evidence from Real-Time Sentence Processing and Offline Data Breakstone, Micha Y. Fox, Daniel Cremers, Alexandre Hackl, Martin Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Linguistics and Philosophy This paper compares two accounts of an ambiguity that arises when a comparative phrase containing an exactly differential is embedded under an intensional operator (Heim 2000). Under one account, the comparative phrase is responsible for the ambiguity (the er-scope theory), and, under the other, the ambiguity is attributed to the exactly phrase (the exactly-scope theory). We present converging evidence from the distribution of de re and de dicto readings and real time sentence processing that supports the er-scope theory. Since the er-scope theory presupposes a quantificational analysis of the comparative, such an analysis is ipso facto supported by our results. Keywords: Comparatives; Scope; Sentence Processing 2020-05-14T19:32:03Z 2020-05-14T19:32:03Z 2015-04 2011 2019-09-25T18:25:29Z Article http://purl.org/eprint/type/ConferencePaper 2163-5943 2163-5951 https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/125246 Breakstone, Micha Yochanan, et al. “On The Analysis of Scope Ambiguities in Comparative Constructions: Converging Evidence from Real-Time Sentence Processing and Offline Data.” Proceedings of SALT, 20-22 May, 2011, New Brunswick, New Jersey, edited by Neil Ashton, Anca Chereches, and David Lutz, Linguistic Society of America, 2011. © 2011 Breakstone, Cremers, Fox & Hackl en http://dx.doi.org/10.3765/SALT.V0I0.2609 Proceedings of SALT Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 unported license https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/ application/pdf Linguistic Society of America Linguistic Society of America |
| spellingShingle | Breakstone, Micha Y. Fox, Daniel Cremers, Alexandre Hackl, Martin On The Analysis of Scope Ambiguities in Comparative Constructions: Converging Evidence from Real-Time Sentence Processing and Offline Data |
| title | On The Analysis of Scope Ambiguities in Comparative Constructions: Converging Evidence from Real-Time Sentence Processing and Offline Data |
| title_full | On The Analysis of Scope Ambiguities in Comparative Constructions: Converging Evidence from Real-Time Sentence Processing and Offline Data |
| title_fullStr | On The Analysis of Scope Ambiguities in Comparative Constructions: Converging Evidence from Real-Time Sentence Processing and Offline Data |
| title_full_unstemmed | On The Analysis of Scope Ambiguities in Comparative Constructions: Converging Evidence from Real-Time Sentence Processing and Offline Data |
| title_short | On The Analysis of Scope Ambiguities in Comparative Constructions: Converging Evidence from Real-Time Sentence Processing and Offline Data |
| title_sort | on the analysis of scope ambiguities in comparative constructions converging evidence from real time sentence processing and offline data |
| url | https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/125246 |
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