@article{ChenSzendroiCrainetal.2018, author = {Chen, Hui-Ching and Szendroi, Krizsta and Crain, Stephen and H{\"o}hle, Barbara}, title = {Understanding Prosodic Focus Marking in Mandarin Chinese}, series = {Journal of Psycholinguistic Research}, volume = {48}, journal = {Journal of Psycholinguistic Research}, number = {1}, publisher = {Springer}, address = {New York}, issn = {0090-6905}, doi = {10.1007/s10936-018-9580-9}, pages = {19 -- 32}, year = {2018}, abstract = {This study investigated whether Mandarin speakers interpret prosodic information as focus markers in a sentence-picture verification task. Previous production studies have shown that both Mandarin-speaking adults and Mandarin-speaking children mark focus by prosodic information (Ouyang and Kaiser in Lang Cogn Neurosc 30(1-2):57-72, 2014; Yang and Chen in Prosodic focus marking in Chinese four-and eight-year-olds, 2014). However, while prosodic focus marking did not seem to affect sentence comprehension in adults Mandarin-speaking children showed enhanced sentence comprehension when the sentence focus was marked by prosodic information in a previous study (Chen in Appl Psycholinguist 19(4):553-582, 1998). The present study revisited this difference between Mandarin speaking adults and children by applying a newly designed task that tested the use of prosodic information to identify the sentence focus. No evidence was obtained that Mandarin-speaking children (as young as 3years of age) adhered more strongly to prosodic information than adults but that word order was the strongest cue for their focus interpretation. Our findings support the view that children attune to the specific means of information structure marking in their ambient language at an early age.}, language = {en} } @misc{FanselowLenertova2010, author = {Fanselow, Gisbert and Lenertov{\´a}, Denisa}, title = {Left peripheral focus}, series = {Humanwissenschaftliche Reihe}, journal = {Humanwissenschaftliche Reihe}, number = {596}, issn = {1866-8364}, doi = {10.25932/publishup-42819}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-428198}, pages = {43}, year = {2010}, abstract = {In Czech, German, and many other languages, part of the semantic focus of the utterance can be moved to the left periphery of the clause. The main generalization is that only the leftmost accented part of the semantic focus can be moved. We propose that movement to the left periphery is generally triggered by an unspecific edge feature of C (Chomsky 2008) and its restrictions can be attributed to requirements of cyclic linearization, modifying the theory of cyclic linearization developed by Fox and Pesetsky (2005). The crucial assumption is that structural accent is a direct consequence of being linearized at merge, thus it is indirectly relevant for (locality restrictions on) movement. The absence of structural accent correlates with given-ness. Given elements may later receive (topic or contrastive) accents, which accounts for fronting in multiple focus/contrastive topic constructions. Without any additional assumptions, the model can account for movement of pragmatically unmarked elements to the left periphery ('formal fronting', Frey 2005). Crucially, the analysis makes no reference at all to concepts of information structure in the syntax, in line with the claim of Chomsky (2008) that UG specifies no direct link between syntax and information structure.}, language = {en} } @article{VerhoevenKuegler2015, author = {Verhoeven, Elisabeth and K{\"u}gler, Frank}, title = {Accentual preferences and predictability: An acceptability study on split intransitivity in German}, series = {Lingua : international review of general linguistics}, volume = {165}, journal = {Lingua : international review of general linguistics}, publisher = {Elsevier}, address = {Amsterdam}, issn = {0024-3841}, doi = {10.1016/j.lingua.2014.09.013}, pages = {298 -- 315}, year = {2015}, abstract = {The difference in the default prosodic realization of simple sentences with unergative vs. unaccusative/passive verbs (assigning early nuclear accent with unaccusative/passive verbs but late nuclear accent with unergative verbs) is often related to the syntactic distinction of their nominative arguments as starting off in different hierarchical positions. Alternative accounts try to trace this prosodic variation back to asymmetries in the semantic or pragmatic contribution of the verb to an utterance. The present article investigates the interaction of the assignment of default nuclear accent with the predictability of the verb. In an experimental study testing the acceptability of nuclear accent assignment, we confirmed that the predictability of the verb influences accentual preferences (such that highly predictable verbs are preferably not accented). However, the experiment also reveals that the unaccusativity distinction cannot be accounted for by means of pragmatic phenomena of this type: the two verb classes are associated with distinct accentual patterns in the baseline condition, that is, without the predictability manipulation. (C) 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.}, language = {en} } @article{SpalekGotznerWartenburger2014, author = {Spalek, Katharina and Gotzner, Nicole and Wartenburger, Isabell}, title = {Not only the apples}, series = {Journal of memory and language : JML}, volume = {70}, journal = {Journal of memory and language : JML}, publisher = {Elsevier}, address = {San Diego}, issn = {0749-596X}, doi = {10.1016/j.jml.2013.09.001}, pages = {68 -- 84}, year = {2014}, abstract = {Focus sensitive particles highlight the relevance of contextual alternatives for the interpretation of a sentence. Two experiments tested whether this leads to better encoding and therefore, ultimately, better recall of focus alternatives. Participants were presented with auditory stimuli that introduced a set of elements ("context sentence") and continued in three different versions: the critical sentences either contained the exclusive particle nur ("only"), the inclusive particle sogar ("even"), or no particle (control condition). After being exposed to blocks of ten trials, participants were asked to recall the elements in the context sentence. The results show that both particles enhanced memory performance for the alternatives to the focused element, relative to the control condition. The results support the assumption that information-structural alternatives are better encoded in memory in the presence of a focus sensitive particle.}, language = {en} } @article{BurmesterSpalekWartenburger2014, author = {Burmester, Juliane and Spalek, Katharina and Wartenburger, Isabell}, title = {Context updating during sentence comprehension: The effect of aboutness topic}, series = {Brain \& language : a journal of the neurobiology of language}, volume = {137}, journal = {Brain \& language : a journal of the neurobiology of language}, publisher = {Elsevier}, address = {San Diego}, issn = {0093-934X}, doi = {10.1016/j.bandl.2014.08.001}, pages = {62 -- 76}, year = {2014}, language = {en} } @article{FanselowLenertova2011, author = {Fanselow, Gisbert and Lenertova, Denisa}, title = {Left peripheral focus mismatches between syntax and information structure}, series = {Natural language \& linguistic theory}, volume = {29}, journal = {Natural language \& linguistic theory}, number = {1}, publisher = {Springer}, address = {Dordrecht}, issn = {0167-806X}, doi = {10.1007/s11049-010-9109-x}, pages = {169 -- 209}, year = {2011}, abstract = {In Czech, German, and many other languages, part of the semantic focus of the utterance can be moved to the left periphery of the clause. The main generalization is that only the leftmost accented part of the semantic focus can be moved. We propose that movement to the left periphery is generally triggered by an unspecific edge feature of C (Chomsky 2008) and its restrictions can be attributed to requirements of cyclic linearization, modifying the theory of cyclic linearization developed by Fox and Pesetsky (2005). The crucial assumption is that structural accent is a direct consequence of being linearized at merge, thus it is indirectly relevant for (locality restrictions on) movement. The absence of structural accent correlates with givenness. Given elements may later receive (topic or contrastive) accents, which accounts for fronting in multiple focus/contrastive topic constructions. Without any additional assumptions, the model can account for movement of pragmatically unmarked elements to the left periphery ('formal fronting', Frey 2005). Crucially, the analysis makes no reference at all to concepts of information structure in the syntax, in line with the claim of Chomsky (2008) that UG specifies no direct link between syntax and information structure.}, language = {en} } @article{DrenhausZimmermannVasishth2011, author = {Drenhaus, Heiner and Zimmermann, Malte and Vasishth, Shravan}, title = {Exhaustiveness effects in clefts are not truth-functional}, series = {Journal of neurolinguistics : an international journal for the study of brain function in language behavior and experience}, volume = {24}, journal = {Journal of neurolinguistics : an international journal for the study of brain function in language behavior and experience}, number = {3}, publisher = {Elsevier}, address = {Oxford}, issn = {0911-6044}, doi = {10.1016/j.jneuroling.2010.10.004}, pages = {320 -- 337}, year = {2011}, abstract = {While it is widely acknowledged in the formal semantic literature that both the truth-functional focus particle only and it-clefts convey exhaustiveness, the nature and source of exhaustiveness effects with it-clefts remain contested. We describe a questionnaire study (n = 80) and an event-related brain potentials (ERP) study (n = 16) that investigated the violation of exhaustiveness in German only-foci versus it-clefts. The offline study showed that a violation of exhaustivity with only is less acceptable than the violation with it-clefts, suggesting a difference in the nature of exhaustivity interpretation in the two environments. The ERP-results confirm that this difference can be seen in online processing as well: a violation of exhaustiveness in only-foci elicited a centro-posterior positivity (600-800ms), whereas a violation in it-clefts induced a globally distributed N400 pattern (400-600ms). The positivity can be interpreted as a reanalysis process and more generally as a process of context updating. The N400 effect in it-clefts is interpreted as indexing a cancelation process that is functionally distinct from the only case. The ERP study is, to our knowledge, the first evidence from an online experimental paradigm which shows that the violation of exhaustiveness involves different underlying processes in the two structural environments.}, language = {en} } @article{ZimmermannOnea2011, author = {Zimmermann, Malte and Onea, Edgar}, title = {Focus marking and focus interpretation}, series = {LINGUA}, volume = {121}, journal = {LINGUA}, number = {11}, publisher = {ELSEVIER SCIENCE BV}, address = {AMSTERDAM}, issn = {0024-3841}, doi = {10.1016/j.lingua.2011.06.002}, pages = {1651 -- 1670}, year = {2011}, abstract = {The languages of the world exhibit a range of formal phenomena (e.g. accenting, syntactic reordering and morphological marking) that are commonly linked to the information-structural notion of focus. Crucially, there does not seem to be a one-to-one mapping between particular formal features (focus marking devices) and focus, neither from a cross-linguistic perspective, nor within individual languages. This raises the question of what is actually being expressed if we say that a constituent is focused in a particular language, and whether, or to what extent, the same semantic or pragmatic content is formally expressed by focus-marking across languages. This special issue addresses the question of focus and its grammatical realization from a number of theoretical and empirical perspectives. In this introductory article we elaborate on this question by making an explicit proposal about what we take to be the correct way of thinking about the information-structural category of focus and its formal realization. In the first part, we introduce a unified semantico-pragmatic perspective on focus in terms of alternatives and possible worlds. In the second part, we present a cursory cross-linguistic overview of focus marking strategies as found in the languages of the world. Finally, in the third part, we discuss the connection between the notion of focus, different pragmatic uses of focus and different focus marking strategies employed in the grammars of natural languages. (C) 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.}, language = {en} } @article{FeryHerbst2004, author = {F{\´e}ry, Caroline and Herbst, Laura}, title = {German sentence accent revisited}, series = {Interdisciplinary studies on information structure : ISIS ; working papers of the SFB 632}, journal = {Interdisciplinary studies on information structure : ISIS ; working papers of the SFB 632}, number = {1}, editor = {Ishihara, Shinichiro and Schmitz, Michaela and Schwarz, Anne}, issn = {1614-4708}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus-8273}, pages = {43 -- 75}, year = {2004}, abstract = {Results of a production experiment on the placement of sentence accent in German are reported. The hypothesis that German fulfills some of the most widely accepted rules of accent assignment— predicting focus domain integration—was only partly confirmed. Adjacency between argument and verb induces a single accent on the argument, as recognized in the literature, but interruption of this sequence by a modifier often induces remodeling of the accent pattern with a single accent on the modifier. The verb is rarely stressed. All models based on linear alignment or adjacency between elements belonging to a single accent domain fail to account for this result. A cyclic analysis of prosodic domain formation is proposed in an optimality-theoretic framework that can explain the accent pattern. Japanese wh-questions always exhibit focus intonation (FI). Furthermore, the domain of FI exhibits a correspondence to the wh-scope. I propose that this phonology-semantics correspondence is a result of the cyclic computation of FI, which is explained under the notion of Multiple Spell-Out in the recent Minimalist framework. The proposed analysis makes two predictions: (1) embedding of an FI into another is possible; (2) (overt) movement of a wh-phrase to a phase edge position causes a mismatch between FI and wh-scope. Both predictions are tested experimentally, and shown to be borne out.}, language = {en} }