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a b st r a c tThe semantics of focus particles like only requires a set of alternatives (Rooth, 1992 ). In two experiments, we investigated the impact of such particles on the retrieval of alternatives that are mentioned in the prior context or unmentioned. The fi rst experiment used a probe recognition task and showed that focus particles interfere with the recognition of mentioned alternatives and the rejection of unmentioned alternatives relative to a condition without a particle. A second lexical decision experiment demonstrated priming eff ects for mentioned and unmentioned alternatives (compared with an unrelated condition) while focus particles caused additional interference eff ects. Overall, our results indicate that focus particles trigger an active search for alternatives and lead to a competition between mentioned alternatives, unmentioned alternatives, and the focused element.k e y w o r d s : focus particles , alternative-set semantics , probe recognition task , lexical decision task , competitive inhibition .[ * ] We are grateful to

Previous research has demonstrated great variability in the rates of scalar inferences across different triggers (Doran et al., 2009; van Tiel et al., 2016). In the current study, we show that variation is more systematic than previously thought. In particular, we present experimental evidence suggesting that endorsements of scalar implicatures (i) are anti-correlated with the degree of negative strengthening of the stronger scale-mate (e.g., whether John is not stunning is interpreted as conveying that John is rather ugly) and (ii) are affected by the scale structure and the underlying scalar semantics of gradable adjectives (in particular boundedness, polarity, and adjectival extremeness). Overall, our research suggests that scale structure should be taken into account in theories of implicature.

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