RT list: Relevant experimental evidence from Yi Ting Huang & Jesse Snedeker

Another nail in the coffin of the neo-Gricean view of 'scalar implicatures':

Language and Cognitive Processes

Volume 26, Issue 8, 2011

Logic and conversation revisited: Evidence for a division between
semantic and pragmatic content in real-time language comprehension

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DOI:10.1080/01690965.2010.508641
Yi Ting Huang & Jesse Snedeker
pages 1161-1172

Available online: 17 Oct 2011
Abstract
The distinction between semantics (linguistically encoded meaning) and
pragmatics (inferences about communicative intentions) can often be
unclear and counterintuitive. For example, linguistic theories argue
that the meaning of some encompasses the meaning of all while the
intuition that some implies not all results from an inference. We
explored how online interpretation of some evolves using an
eye-tracking while listening paradigm. Early eye-movements indicated
that while some was initially interpreted as compatible with all,
participants began excluding referents compatible with all
approximately 800 ms later. These results contrast with recent
evidence of immediate inferencing and highlight the presence of
bottom-up semantic–pragmatic interactions which necessarily rely on
initial access to lexical meanings to trigger inferences.

 (also - and freely available at:
http://www.wjh.harvard.edu/~lds/pdfs/Huang%20%20Snedeker%20logic%20and%20con.pdf
)
Received on Tue Oct 18 11:15:42 2011