Comprehension of relevance implicatures by pre-schoolers: The case of adjectives

Tribushinina, Elena

doi:10.1016/j.pragma.2012.09.018

Cited by 39 publications

(19 citation statements)

References 23 publications

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“…The children had no trouble interpreting filler sentences with evaluative adjectives (e.g. That one I find very ugly), which is not surprising in view of earlier findings that even 2-year-old toddlers are able to understand sentences with evaluative adjectives as indirect requests (for positive items) or refusals (for negative items) (Tribushinina 2012).…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 63%

“…The paradigm of a shopping game was chosen, since it provides a felicitous argumentative context for interpreting indirect utterances as acceptance or refusal to buy a product. In this context, even 2-year-old toddlers were shown to be able to understand indirect utterances with evaluative adjectives (Tribushinina 2012).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

“…The children were tested in Experiment 2 using a procedure developed by Schulze, Grassmann & Tomasello (2013) and Tribushinina (2012). Schulze, Grassmann & Tomasello (2013) demonstrated that pre-schoolers are able to make relevance inferences when inference-drawing is naturally embedded in an ongoing interaction (e.g.…”

Section: This Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Combinations of evaluative adjectives with the intensifier heel 'very' will be used as fillers. Since even 2-year-olds were shown to be able to grasp the Brought to you by | University Library Utrecht Authenticated Download Date | 1/15/15 10:49 AM argumentative orientation of evaluative adjectives (Tribushinina 2012), the addition of the intensifier heel 'very' is not likely to make the task more difficult for 5-year-olds.…”

Section: This Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The procedure developed by Tribushinina (2012) for testing the comprehension of evaluative adjectives used for indirect requests/refusals was taken as a basis and adjusted for the purposes of this study. The children were playing a shopping game in which they had to decide whether a customer wanted to buy a product, based on a description by that customer indirectly conveying his/her argument to buy it or not (e.g.…”

Section: Materials and Proceduresmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Comprehension of degree modifiers by pre-school children: What does it mean to be ‘a bit cold’?

Tribushinina¹

2014

Folia Linguistica

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Although even young infants were shown to have some understanding of (adjectival) scalarity, studies of children's spontaneous speech suggest that the acquisition of scalar semantics may not yet be completed by the time children enter primary school. In the present study, this hypothesis is tested by investigating the comprehension of diminishers ('a bit') and consequential degree modifiers ('too') modifying relative adjectives (long, warm) in a group of 5-year-old Dutch-speaking children. Based on earlier production studies, it is hypothesized that by age 6 children are adult-like in their comprehension of 'too' and not yet target-like in the comprehension of 'a bit' modifying relative adjectives. The results of the comprehension experiment demonstrate that some children have already acquired the semantics of both 'too' and 'a bit', whereas others still have trouble understanding combinations of relative adjectives with each of these degree adverbs. Furthermore, poor comprehenders need more time to process sentences with 'a bit' compared to the same sentences with 'too', presumably revealing a greater conceptual complexity of diminishers. These findings are consistent with the idea that the acquisition of scalarity has a protracted time course.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 63%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%