Scalar and ad-hoc pragmatic inferences in children: guess which one is easier.

Journal of Child Language
Francesca FoppoloLuca Surian

Abstract

Several studies investigated preschoolers' ability to compute scalar and ad-hoc implicatures, but only one compared children's performance with both kinds of implicature with the same task, a picture selection task. In Experiment 1 (N = 58, age: 4;2-6;0), we first show that the truth value judgment task, traditionally employed to investigate children's pragmatic ability, prompts a rate of pragmatic responses comparable to the picture selection task. In Experiment 2 (N = 141, age: 3;8-9;2) we used the picture selection task to compare scalar and ad-hoc implicatures and linked the ability to derive these implicatures to some cognitive and linguistic measures. We found that four- and five-year-olds children performed better on ad-hoc than on scalar implicatures. Furthermore, we found that morphosyntactic competence was associated with success in both kinds of implicatures, while performance on mental state reasoning was positively associated with success on scalar but not ad-hoc implicatures.

References

Feb 1, 1982·Journal of Child Language·S Jackson, S Jacobs
Apr 2, 2004·Child Development·Henry M Wellman, David Liu
Jul 7, 2007·Psychological Science·Luca SurianDan Sperber
Jan 29, 2010·Trends in Cognitive Sciences·Renée BaillargeonZijing He
Mar 25, 2011·Cognition·Napoleon Katsos, Dorothy V M Bishop
Jul 25, 2013·Frontiers in Psychology·Paul P Marty, Emmanuel Chemla
Apr 25, 2016·Cognition·Dimitrios Skordos, Anna Papafragou
Sep 11, 2017·Schizophrenia Research·Martien WampersWalter Schaeken
Aug 29, 2018·Frontiers in Psychology·Francesca M BoscoIlaria Gabbatore

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Citations

Feb 24, 2021·Journal of Communication Disorders·Greta MazzaggioLuca Surian
Mar 23, 2021·Frontiers in Psychology·Francesca Panzeri, Francesca Foppolo

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