Context in Generalized Conversational Implicatures: The Case of Some

Area of Science:

• Linguistics
• Cognitive Science
• Psycholinguistics

Background:

• Scalar implicatures are optional pragmatic inferences.
• Context determines whether pragmatic interpretations are accessed.
• Neo-Gricean and Post-Gricean theories offer different predictions about contextual factors.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate factors that make a context upper-bounding for scalar implicatures.
• To compare the predictive power of Neo-Gricean and Post-Gricean accounts.
• To examine the roles of factual information (cardinality) and psychological attributions in triggering pragmatic interpretations.

Main Methods:

• Three experiments were conducted using the quantifier scale .
• Experiment 1: Assessed the role of cardinality information (factual context).
• Experiment 2 & 3: Assessed the role of highlighting the relevance of semantic vs. pragmatic interpretations (psychological attribution).

Main Results:

• Cardinality information was necessary for computing pragmatic interpretations but played a minor role in triggering them.
• Highlighting the contrast between semantic and pragmatic interpretations strongly mandated pragmatic interpretation.
• Results provided a small advantage for the Post-Gricean account over the Neo-Gricean account.

Conclusions:

• Highlighting the relevance of pragmatic vs. semantic interpretations makes a context upper-bounding.
• Contextual relevance, particularly psychological attributions, is a stronger driver of scalar implicature than factual information.
• Findings support Sperber and Wilson's Post-Gricean framework for understanding scalar implicatures.