@article{PattersonEsaulovaFelser2017,
  author    = {Patterson, Clare and Esaulova, Yulia and Felser, Claudia},
  title     = {The impact of focus on pronoun resolution in native and non-native sentence comprehension},
  series = {Second language research},
  volume    = {33},
  journal   = {Second language research},
  publisher = {Sage Publ.},
  address   = {London},
  issn      = {0267-6583},
  doi       = {10.1177/0267658317697786},
  pages     = {403 -- 429},
  year      = {2017},
  language  = {en}
}
@article{ChenHoehle2018,
  author    = {Chen, Aoju and H{\"o}hle, Barbara},
  title     = {Four- to five-year-old' use of word order and prosody in focus marking in Dutch},
  series = {Linguistics Vanguard},
  volume    = {4},
  journal   = {Linguistics Vanguard},
  publisher = {De Gruyter},
  address   = {Berlin},
  issn      = {2199-174X},
  doi       = {10.1515/lingvan-2016-0101},
  pages     = {9},
  year      = {2018},
  abstract  = {This study investigated Dutch-speaking four- to five-year-olds' use of word order and prosody in distinguishing focus types (broad focus, narrow focus, and contrastive narrow focus) via an interactive answer-reconstruction game. We have found an overall preference for the unmarked word order SVO and no evidence for the use of OVS to distinguish focus types. But the children used pitch and duration in the subject-nouns to distinguish focus types in SVO sentences. These findings show that Dutch-speaking four- to five-year-olds differ from their German- and Finnish-speaking peers, who show evidence of varying choice of word order to mark specific focus types, and use prosody to distinguish focus types in subject and object nouns in both SVO and OVS sentences. These comparisons suggest that typological differences in the relative importance between word order and prosody can lead to differences in children's use of word order and prosody in unmarked and marked word orders. A more equal role of word order and prosody in the ambient language can stimulate more extensive use of prosody in the marked word order, whereas a more limited role of word order can restrict the use of prosody in the unmarked word order.},
  language  = {en}
}
@article{Kitagawa2007,
  author    = {Kitagawa, Yoshihisa},
  title     = {When we fail to question in Japanese},
  series = {Interdisciplinary studies on information structure : ISIS ; working papers of the SFB 632},
  volume    = {9},
  journal   = {Interdisciplinary studies on information structure : ISIS ; working papers of the SFB 632},
  editor    = {Ishihara, Shinichiro and Petrova, Svetlana and Schwarz, Anne},
  publisher = {Universit{\"a}tsverlag Potsdam},
  address   = {Potsdam},
  issn      = {1866-4725},
  url       = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus-24481},
  pages     = {29 -- 64},
  year      = {2007},
  abstract  = {When we pay close attention to the prosody of Wh-questions in Japanese, we discover many novel and interesting empirical puzzles that would require us to devise a much finer syntactic component of grammar. This paper addresses the issues that pose some problems to such an elaborated grammar, and offers solutions, making an appeal to the information structure and sentence processing involved in the interpretation of interrogative and focus constructions.},
  language  = {en}
}
@incollection{Kiss2007,
  author    = {Kiss, Katalin {\´E}.},
  title     = {Topic and focus},
  url       = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus-19639},
  publisher      = {Universit{\"a}t Potsdam},
  year      = {2007},
  abstract  = {The paper explicates the notions of topic, contrastive topic, and focus as used in the analysis of Hungarian. Based on distributional criteria, topic and focus are claimed to represent distinct structural positions in the left periphery of the Hungarian sentence, associated with logical rather than discourse functions. The topic is interpreted as the logical subject of predication. The focus is analyzed as a derived main predicate, specifying the referential content of the set denoted by the backgrounded post-focus section of the sentence. The exhaustivity associated with the focus and the existential presupposition associated with the background are shown to be properties following from their specificational predication relation.},
  language  = {en}
}
@article{Abusch2007,
  author    = {Abusch, Dorit},
  title     = {Focus presuppositions},
  url       = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus-19663},
  year      = {2007},
  abstract  = {This paper reviews notions related to focus and presupposition and addresses the hypothesis that focus triggers an existential presupposition. Presupposition projection behavior in certain examples appears to favor a presuppositional analysis of focus. It is argued that these examples are open to a different analysis using givenness theory. Overall, the analysis favors a weak semantics for focus not including an existential presupposition.},
  language  = {en}
}
@phdthesis{SennemaSkowronek2009,
  author    = {Sennema-Skowronek, Anke},
  title     = {The use of focus markers in second language word processing},
  url       = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus-37237},
  school      = {Universit{\"a}t Potsdam},
  year      = {2009},
  abstract  = {There are many factors which make speaking and understanding a second language (L2) a highly complex challenge. Skills and competencies in in both linguistic and metalinguistic areas emerge as parts of a multi-faceted, flexible concept underlying bilingual/multilingual communication. On the linguistic level, a combination of an extended knowledge of idiomatic expressions, a broad lexical familiarity, a large vocabulary size, and the ability to deal with phonetic distinctions and fine phonetic detail has been argued necessary for effective nonnative comprehension of spoken language. The scientific interest in these factors has also led to more interest in the L2's information structure, the way in which information is organised and packaged into informational units, both within and between clauses. On a practical level, the information structure of a language can offer the means to assign focus to a certain element considered important. Speakers can draw from a rich pool of linguistic means to express this focus, and listeners can in turn interpret these to guide them to the highlighted information which in turn facilitates comprehension, resulting in an appropriate understanding of what has been said. If a speaker doesn't follow the principles of information structure, and the main accent in a sentence is placed on an unimportant word, then there may be inappropriate information transfer within the discourse, and misunderstandings. The concept of focus as part of the information structure of a language, the linguistic means used to express it, and the differential use of focus in native and nonnative language processing are central to this dissertation. Languages exhibit a wide range of ways of directing focus, including by prosodic means, by syntactic constructions, and by lexical means. The general principles underlying information structure seem to contrast structurally across different languages, and they can also differ in the way they express focus. In the context of L2 acquisition, characteristics of the L1 linguistic system are argued to influence the acquisition of the L2. Similarly, the conceptual patterns of information structure of the L1 may influence the organization of information in the L2. However, strategies and patterns used to exploit information structure for succesful language comprehension in the native L1, may not apply at all, or work in different ways or todifferent degrees in the L2. This means that L2 learners ideally have to understand the way that information structure is expressed in the L2 to fully use the information structural benefit in the L2. The knowledge of information structural requirements in the L2 could also imply that the learner would have to make adjustments regarding the use of information structural devices in the L2. The general question is whether the various means to mark focus in the learners' native language are also accessible in the nonnative language, and whether a L1-L2 transfer of their usage should be considered desirable. The current work explores how information structure helps the listener to discover and structure the forms and meanings of the L2. The central hypothesis is that the ability to access information structure has an impact on the level of the learners' appropriateness and linguistic competence in the L2. Ultimately, the ability to make use of information structure in the L2 is believed to underpin the L2 learners' ability to effectively communicate in the L2. The present study investigated how use of focus markers affects processing speed and word recall recall in a native-nonnative language comparison. The predominant research question was whether the type of focus marking leads to more efficient and accurate word processing in marked structures than in unmarked structures, and whether differences in processing patterns can be observed between the two language conditions. Three perception studies were conducted, each concentrating on one of the following linguistic parameters: 1. Prosodic prominence: Does prosodic focus conveyed by sentence accent and by word position facilitate word recognition? 2. Syntactical means: Do cleft constructions result in faster and more accurate word processing? 3. Lexical means: Does focus conveyed by the particles even/only (German: sogar/nur) facilitate word processing and word recall? Experiments 2 and 3 additionally investigated the contribution of context in the form of preceding questions. Furthermore, they considered accent and its facilitative effect on the processing of words which are in the scope of syntactic or lexical focus marking. All three experiments tested German learners of English in a native German language condition and in English as their L2. Native English speakers were included as a control for the English language condition. Test materials consisted of single sentences, all dealing with bird life. Experiment 1 tested word recognition in three focus conditions (broad focus, narrow focus on the target, and narrow focus on a constituent than the target) in one condition using natural unmanipulated sentences, and in the other two conditions using spliced sentences. Experiment 2 (effect of syntactic focus marking) and Experiment 3 (effect of lexical focus marking) used phoneme monitoring as a measure for the speed of word processing. Additionally, a word recall test (4AFC) was conducted to assess the effective entry of target-bearing words in the listeners' memory. Experiment 1: Focus marking by prosodic means Prosodic focus marking by pitch accent was found to highlight important information (Bolinger, 1972), making the accented word perceptually more prominent (Klatt, 1976; van Santen \& Olive, 1990; Eefting, 1991; Koopmans-van Beinum \& van Bergem, 1989). However, accent structure seems to be processed faster in native than in nonnative listening (Akker\& Cutler, 2003, Expt. 3). Therefore, it is expected that prosodically marked words are better recognised than unmarked words, and that listeners can exploit accent structure better for accurate word recognition in their L1 than they do in the L2 (L1 > L2). Altogether, a difference in word recognition performance in L1 listening is expected between different focus conditions (narrow focus > broad focus). Results of Experiments 1 show that words were better recognized in native listening than in nonnative listening. Focal accent, however, doesn't seem to help the German subjects recognize accented words more accurately, in both the L1 and the L2. This could be due to the focus conditions not being acoustically distinctive enough. Results of experiments with spliced materials suggest that the surrounding prosodic sentence contour made listeners remember a target word and not the local, prosodic realization of the word. Prosody seems to indeed direct listeners' attention to the focus of the sentence (see Cutler, 1976). Regarding the salience of word position, VanPatten (2002; 2004) postulated a sentence location principle for L2 processing, stating a ranking of initial > final > medial word position. Other evidence mentions a processing adantage of items occurring late in the sentence (Akker \& Cutler, 2003), and Rast (2003) observed in an English L2 production study a trend of an advantage of items occurring at the outer ends of the sentence. The current Experiment 1 aimed to keep the length of the sentences to an acceptable length, mainly to keep the task in the nonnative lnaguage condition feasable. Word length showed an effect only in combination with word position (Rast, 2003; Rast \& Dommergues, 2003). Therefore, word length was included in the current experiment as a secondary factor and without hypotheses. Results of Experiment 1 revealed that the length of a word doesn't seem to be important for its accurate recognition. Word position, specifically the final position, clearly seems to facilitate accurate word recognition in German. A similar trend emerges in condition English L2, confirming Klein (1984) and Slobin (1985). Results don't support the sentence location principle of VanPatten (2002; 2004). The salience of the final position is interpreted as recency effect (Murdock, 1962). In addition, the advantage of the final position may benefit from the discourse convention that relevant background information is referred to first, and then what is novel later (Haviland \& Clark, 1974). This structure is assumed to cue the listener as to what the speaker considers to be important information, and listeners might have reacted according to this convention. Experiment 2: Focus marking by syntactic means Atypical syntactic structures often draw listeners' attention to certain information in an utterance, and the cleft structure as a focus marking device appears to be a common surface feature in many languages (Lambrecht, 2001). Surface structure influences sentence processing (Foss \& Lynch, 1969; Langford \& Holmes, 1979), which leads to competing hypotheses in Experiment 2: on the one hand, the focusing effect of the cleft construction might reduce processing times. On the other, cleft constructions in German were found to be used less to mark fo than in English (Ahlemeyer \& Kohlhof, 1999; Doherty, 1999; E. Klein, 1988). The complexity of the constructions, and the experience from the native language might work against an advantage of the focus effect in the L2. Results of Experiment 2 show that the cleft structure is an effective device to mark focus in German L1. The processing advantage is explained by the low degree of structural markedness of cleft structures: listeners use the focus function of sentence types headed by the dummy subject es (English: it) due to reliance on 'safe' subject-prominent SVO-structures. The benefit of cleft is enhanced when the sentences are presented with context, suggesting a substantial benefit when focus effects of syntactic surface structure and coherence relation between sentences are integrated. Clefts facilitate word processing for English native speakers. Contrary to German L1, the marked cleft construction doesn't reduce processing times in English L2. The L1-L2 difference was interpreted as a learner problem of applying specific linguistic structures according to the principles of information structure in the target language. Focus marking by cleft did not help German learners in native or in nonnative word recall. This could be attributed to the phonological similarity of the multiple choice options (Conrad \& Hull, 1964), and to a long time span between listening and recall (Birch \& Garnsey, 1995; McKoon et al., 1993). Experiment 3: Focus marking by lexical means Focus particles are elements of structure that can indicate focus (K{\"o}nig, 1991), and their function is to emphasize a certain part of the sentence (Paterson et al., 1999). I argue that the focus particles even/only (German: sogar/nur) evoke contrast sets of alternatives resp. complements to the element in focus (Ni et al., 1996), which causes interpretations of context. Therefore, lexical focus marking isn't expected to lead to faster word processing. However, since different mechanisms of encoding seem to underlie word memory, a benefit of the focusing function of particles is expected to show in the recall task: due to focus particles being a preferred and well-used feature for native speakers of German, a transfer of this habitualness is expected, resulting in a better recall of focused words. Results indicated that focus particles seem to be the weakest option to mark focus: Focus marking by lexical particle don't seem to reduce word processing times in either German L1, English L2, or in English L1. The presence of focus particles is likely to instantiate a complex discourse model which lets the listener await further modifying information (Liversedge et al., 2002). This semantic complexity might slow down processing. There are no indications that focus particles facilitate native language word recall in German L1 and English L1. This could be because focus particles open sets of conditions and contexts that enlarge the set of representations in listeners rather than narrowing it down to the element in the scope of the focus particle. In word recall, the facilitative effect of focus particles emerges only in the nonnative language condition. It is suggested that L2 learners, when faced with more demanding tasks in an L2, use a broad variety of means that identify focus for a better representation of novel words in the memory. In Experiments 2 and 3, evidence suggests that accent is an important factor for efficient word processing and accurate recall in German L1 and English L1, but less so in English L2. This underlines the function of accent as core speech parameter and consistent cue to the perception of prominence native language use (see Cutler \& Fodor, 1979; Pitt \& Samuel, 1990a; Eriksson et al., 2002; Akker \& Cutler, 2003); the L1-L2 difference is attributed to patterns of expectation that are employed in the L1 but not (yet?) in the L2. There seems to exist a fine-tuned sensitivity to how accents are distributed in the native language, listeners expect an appropriate distribution and interpret it accordingly (Eefting, 1991). This pleads for accent placement as extremely important to L2 proficiency; the current results also suggest that accent and its relationship with other speech parameters has to be newly established in the L2 to fully reveal its benefits for efficient processing of speech. There is evidence that additional context facilitates processing of complex syntactic structures but that a surplus of information has no effect if the sentence construction is less challenging for the listener. The increased amount of information to be processed seems to impede better word recall, particularly in the L2. Altogether, it seems that focus marking devices and context can combine to form an advantageous alliance: a substantial benefit in processing efficiency is found when parameters of focus marking and sentence coherence are integrated. L2 research advocates the beneficial aspects of providing context for efficient L2 word learning (Lawson \& Hogben, 1996). The current thesis promotes the view that a context which offers more semantic, prosodic, or lexical connections might compensate for the additional processing load that context constitutes for the listeners. A methodological consideration concerns the order in which language conditions are presented to listeners, i.e., L1-L2 or L2-L1. Findings suggest that presentation order could enforce a learning bias, with the performance in the second experiment being influenced by knowledge acquired in the first (see Akker \& Cutler, 2003). To conclude this work: The results of the present study suggest that information structure is more accessible in the native language than it is in the nonnative language. There is, however, some evidence that L2 learners have an understanding of the significance of some information-structural parameters of focus marking. This has a beneficial effect on processing efficiency and recall accuracy; on the cognitive side it illustrates the benefits and also the need of a dynamic exchange of information-structural organization between L1 and L2. The findings of the current thesis encourage the view that an understanding of information structure can help the learner to discover and categorise forms and meanings of the L2. Information structure thus emerges as a valuable resource to advance proficiency in a second language.},
  language  = {en}
}
@article{GrubicRenansDuah2018,
  author    = {Grubic, Mira and Renans, Agata and Duah, Reginald Akuoko},
  title     = {Focus, exhaustivity and existence in Akan, Ga and Ngamo},
  series = {Linguistics : an interdisciplinary journal of the language sciences},
  volume    = {57},
  journal   = {Linguistics : an interdisciplinary journal of the language sciences},
  number    = {1},
  publisher = {De Gruyter Mouton},
  address   = {Berlin},
  issn      = {0024-3949},
  doi       = {10.1515/ling-2018-0035},
  pages     = {221 -- 268},
  year      = {2018},
  abstract  = {This paper discusses the relation between focus marking and focus interpretation in Akan (Kwa), Ga (Kwa), and Ngamo (West Chadic). In all three languages, there is a special morphosyntactically marked focus/background construction, as well as morphosyntactically unmarked focus. We present data stemming from original fieldwork investigatingwhether marked focus/background constructions in these three languages also have additional interpretative effects apart from standard focus interpretation. Crosslinguistically, different additional inferences have been found for marked focus constructions, e.g. contrast (e.g. Vallduvi, Enric \& Maria Vilkuna. 1997. On rheme and kontrast. In Peter Culicover \& Louise McNally (eds.), The limits of syntax (Syntax and semantics 29), 79-108. New York: Academic Press; Hartmann, Katharina \& Malte Zimmermann. 2007b. In place -Out of place: Focus in Hausa. In Kerstin Schwabe \& Susanne Winkler (eds.), On information structure, meaning and form, 365-403. Amsterdam \& Philadelphia: John Benjamins.; Destruel, Emilie \& Leah Velleman. 2014. Refining contrast: Empirical evidence from the English it-cleft. In Christopher Pinon (ed.), Empirical issues in syntax and semantics 10, 197-214. Paris: Colloque de syntaxe et semantique a Paris (CSSP). http://www.cssp.cnrs.fr/eiss10/), exhaustivity (e.g. E. Kiss, Katalin. 1998. Identificational focus versus information focus. Language 74(2). 245-273.; Hartmann, Katharina \& Malte Zimmermann. 2007a. Exhaustivity marking in Hausa: A re-evaluation of the particle nee/cee. In Enoch O. Aboh, Katharina Hartmann \& Malte Zimmermann (eds.), Focus strategies in African languages: The interaction of focus and grammar in Niger-Congo and AfroAsiatic (Trends in Linguistics 191), 241-263. Berlin \& New York: Mouton de Gruyter.), and existence (e.g. Rooth, Mats. 1999. Association with focus or association with presupposition? In Peter Bosch \& Rob van der Sandt (eds.), Focus: Linguistic, cognitive, and computational perspectives, 232-244. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.; von Fintel, Kai \& Lisa Matthewson. 2008. Universals in semantics. The Linguistic Review 25(1-2). 139-201). This paper investigates these three inferences. In Akan and Ga, the marked focus constructions are found to be contrastive, while in Ngamo, no effect of contrast was found. We also show that marked focus constructions in Ga and Akan trigger exhaustivity and existence presuppositions, while the marked construction in Ngamo merely gives rise to an exhaustive conversational implicature and does not trigger an existence presupposition. Instead, the marked construction in Ngamo merely indicates salience of the backgrounded part via a morphological background marker related to the definite determiner (Schuh, Russell G. 2005. Yobe state, Nigeria as a linguistic area. Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society 31(2). 77-94; Guldemann, Tom. 2016. Maximal backgrounding = focus without (necessary) focus encoding. Studies in Language 40(3). 551590). The paper thus contributes to the understanding of the semantics of marked focus constructions across languages and points to the crosslinguistic variation in expressing and interpreting marked focus/background constructions.},
  language  = {en}
}
@article{Zerbian2013,
  author    = {Zerbian, Sabine},
  title     = {Prosodic marking of narrow focus across varieties of South African English},
  series = {English world-wide : a journal of varieties of English},
  volume    = {34},
  journal   = {English world-wide : a journal of varieties of English},
  number    = {1},
  publisher = {Benjamins},
  address   = {Amsterdam},
  issn      = {0172-8865},
  doi       = {10.1075/eww.34.1.02zer},
  pages     = {26 -- 47},
  year      = {2013},
  abstract  = {This paper reports on an elicited production study which investigates prosodic marking of narrow focus in modified noun phrases in varieties of South African English. The acoustic analysis of fundamental frequency, intensity, and duration in narrow focus is presented and discussed. The results suggest that these three acoustic parameters are manipulated differently in narrow focus in the varieties of English as a Second Language as compared to General South African English. The article compares the results to what is known about prosodic marking of information structure in other varieties of English as a Second Language and underlines the necessity of carefully controlled data in the investigation of phonological and phonetic variation in varieties of English.},
  language  = {en}
}
@phdthesis{Grubic2015,
  author    = {Grubic, Mira},
  title     = {Focus and alternative sensitivity in Ngamo (West-Chadic)},
  url       = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-81666},
  school      = {Universit{\"a}t Potsdam},
  year      = {2015},
  abstract  = {The main research question of this thesis concerns the relation between focus interpretation, focus realization, and association with focus in the West Chadic language Ngamo. Concerning the relation between focus realization and interpretation, this thesis contributes to the question, cross-linguistically, what factors influence a marked realization of the focus/background distinction. There is background-marking rather than focus-marking in Ngamo, and the background marker is related to the definite determiner in the language. Using original fieldwork data as a basis, a formal semantic analysis of the background marker as a definite determiner of situations is proposed. Concerning the relation between focus and association with focus, the thesis adds to the growing body of crosslinguistic evidence that not all so-called focus-sensitive operators always associate with focus. The thesis shows that while the exclusive particle yak('i) (= "only") in Ngamo conventionally associates with focus, the particles har('i) (= "even, as far as, until, already"), and ke('e) (= "also, and") do not. The thesis provides an analysis of these phenomena in a situation semantic framework.},
  language  = {en}
}
@article{GueldemannZerbianZimmermann2015,
  author    = {Gueldemann, Tom and Zerbian, Sabine and Zimmermann, Malte},
  title     = {Variation in information structure with special reference to Africa},
  series = {Annual review of linguistics},
  volume    = {1},
  journal   = {Annual review of linguistics},
  editor    = {Liberman, M and Partee, BH},
  publisher = {Annual Reviews},
  address   = {Palo Alto},
  isbn      = {978-0-8243-4201-2},
  issn      = {2333-9691},
  doi       = {10.1146/annurev-linguist-030514-125134},
  pages     = {155 -- 178},
  year      = {2015},
  abstract  = {Information structure has been one of the central topics of recent linguistic research. This review discusses a wide range of current approaches with particular reference to African languages, as these have been playing a crucial role in advancing our knowledge about the diversity of and recurring patterns in both meaning and form of information structural notions. We focus on cross-linguistic functional frameworks, the investigation of prosody, formal syntactic theories, and relevant effects of semantic interpretation. Information structure is a thriving research domain that promises to yield important advances in our general understanding of human language.},
  language  = {en}
}
@article{Kasimir2005,
  author    = {Kasimir, Elke},
  title     = {Question-answer test and givenness},
  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    = {3},
  issn      = {1866-4725},
  url       = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus-8698},
  pages     = {1 -- 52},
  year      = {2005},
  abstract  = {In order to investigate the empirical properties of focus, it is necessary to diagnose focus (or: "what is focused") in particular linguistic examples. It is often taken for granted that the application of one single diagnostic tool, the so-called question-answer test, which roughly says that whatever a question asks for is focused in the answer, is a fool-proof test for focus. This paper investigates one example class where such uncritical belief in the question-answer test has led to the assumption of rather complex focus projection rules: in these examples, pitch accent placement has been claimed to depend on certain parts of the focused constituents being given or not. It is demonstrated that such focus projection rules are unnecessarily complex and in turn require the assumption of unnecessarily complicated meaning rules, not to speak of the difficulties to give a precise semantic/pragmatic definition of the allegedly involved givenness property. For the sake of the argument, an alternative analysis is put forward which relies solely on alternative sets following Mats Rooth's work, and avoids any recourse to givenness. As it turns out, this alternative analysis is not only simpler but also makes in a critical case the better predictions.},
  language  = {en}
}
@article{GotznerSpalek2022,
  author    = {Gotzner, Nicole and Spalek, Katharina},
  title     = {Expectations about upcoming discourse referents},
  series = {International review of pragmatics : IRP},
  volume    = {14},
  journal   = {International review of pragmatics : IRP},
  number    = {1},
  publisher = {Brill},
  address   = {Leiden},
  issn      = {1877-3095},
  doi       = {10.1163/18773109-01401003},
  pages     = {77 -- 94},
  year      = {2022},
  abstract  = {In the current study, we explore how different information-structural devices affect which referents conversational partners expect in the upcoming discourse. Our main research question is how pitch accents (H*, L+H*) and focus particles (German nur `only' and auch 'also') affect speakers' choices to mention focused referents, previously mentioned alternatives or new, inferable alternatives. Participants in our experiment were presented with short discourses involving two referents and were asked to orally produce two sentences that continue the story. An analysis of speakers' continuations showed that participants were most likely to mention a contextual alternative in the condition with only and the L+H* conditions, followed by H* conditions. In the condition with also, in turn, participants mentioned both the focused/accented referent and the contextual alternative. Our findings highlight the importance of information structure for discourse management and suggest that speakers take activated alternatives to be relevant for an unfolding discourse.},
  language  = {en}
}
@phdthesis{Atasoy2022,
  author    = {Atasoy, Atilla},
  title     = {Production, perception, and processing of focus in Turkish},
  doi       = {10.25932/publishup-54815},
  url       = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-548156},
  school      = {Universit{\"a}t Potsdam},
  pages     = {xxiii, 267},
  year      = {2022},
  abstract  = {The main goal of this dissertation is to experimentally investigate how focus is realised, perceived, and processed by native Turkish speakers, independent of preconceived notions of positional restrictions. Crucially, there are various issues and scientific debates surrounding focus in the Turkish language in the existing literature (chapter 1). It is argued in this dissertation that two factors led to the stagnant literature on focus in Turkish: the lack of clearly defined, modern understandings of information structure and its fundamental notion of focus, and the ongoing and ill-defined debate surrounding the question of whether there is an immediately preverbal focus position in Turkish. These issues gave rise to specific research questions addressed across this dissertation. Specifically, we were interested in how the focus dimensions such as focus size (comparing narrow constituent and broad sentence focus), focus target (comparing narrow subject and narrow object focus), and focus type (comparing new-information and contrastive focus) affect Turkish focus realisation and, in turn, focus comprehension when speakers are provided syntactic freedom to position focus as they see fit. To provide data on these core goals, we presented three behavioural experiments based on a systematic framework of information structure and its notions (chapter 2): (i) a production task with trigger wh-questions and contextual animations manipulated to elicit the focus dimensions of interest (chapter 3), (ii) a timed acceptability judgment task in listening to the recorded answers in our production task (chapter 4), and (iii) a self-paced reading task to gather on-line processing data (chapter 5). Based on the results of the conducted experiments, multiple conclusions are made in this dissertation (chapter 6). Firstly, this dissertation demonstrated empirically that there is no focus position in Turkish, neither in the sense of a strict focus position language nor as a focally loaded position facilitating focus perception and/or processing. While focus is, in fact, syntactically variable in the Turkish preverbal area, this is a consequence of movement triggered by other IS aspects like topicalisation and backgrounding, and the observational markedness of narrow subject focus compared to narrow object focus. As for focus type in Turkish, this dimension is not associated with word order in production, perception, or processing. Significant acoustic correlates of focus size (broad sentence focus vs narrow constituent focus) and focus target (narrow subject focus vs narrow object focus) were observed in fundamental frequency and intensity, representing focal boost, (postfocal) deaccentuation, and the presence or absence of a phrase-final rise in the prenucleus, while the perceivability of these effects remains to be investigated. In contrast, no acoustic correlates of focus type in simple, three-word transitive structures were observed, with focus types being interchangeable in mismatched question-answer pairs. Overall, the findings of this dissertation highlight the need for experimental investigations regarding focus in Turkish, as theoretical predictions do not necessarily align with experimental data. As such, the fallacy of implying causation from correlation should be strictly kept in mind, especially when constructions coincide with canonical structures, such as the immediately preverbal position in narrow object foci. Finally, numerous open questions remain to be explored, especially as focus and word order in Turkish are multifaceted. As shown, givenness is a confounding factor when investigating focus types, while thematic role assignment potentially confounds word order preferences. Further research based on established, modern information structure frameworks is needed, with chapter 5 concluding with specific recommendations for such future research.},
  language  = {en}
}
@phdthesis{Wierzba2017,
  author    = {Wierzba, Marta},
  title     = {Revisiting prosodic reconstruction},
  url       = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-403152},
  school      = {Universit{\"a}t Potsdam},
  pages     = {vi, 224},
  year      = {2017},
  abstract  = {In this thesis, I develop a theoretical implementation of prosodic reconstruction and apply it to the empirical domain of German sentences in which part of a focus or contrastive topic is fronted. Prosodic reconstruction refers to the idea that sentences involving syntactic movement show prosodic parallels with corresponding simpler structures without movement. I propose to model this recurrent observation by ordering syntax-prosody mapping before copy deletion. In order to account for the partial fronting data, the idea is extended to the mapping between prosody and information structure. This assumption helps to explain why object-initial sentences containing a broad focus or broad contrastive topic show similar prosodic and interpretative restrictions as sentences with canonical word order. The empirical adequacy of the model is tested against a set of gradient acceptability judgments.},
  language  = {en}
}
@article{Hartmann2007,
  author    = {Hartmann, Katharina},
  title     = {Focus and Tone},
  url       = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus-19729},
  year      = {2007},
  abstract  = {Tone is a distinctive feature of the lexemes in tone languages. The information-structural category focus is usually marked by syntactic and morphological means in these languages, but sometimes also by intonation strategies. In intonation languages, focus is marked by pitch movements, which are also perceived as tone. The present article discusses prosodic focus marking in these two language types.},
  language  = {en}
}
@article{Komen2009,
  author    = {Komen, Erwin R.},
  title     = {Branching constraints},
  series = {Linguistics in Potsdam},
  journal   = {Linguistics in Potsdam},
  number    = {28},
  issn      = {1616-7392},
  url       = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus-32273},
  pages     = {157 -- 186},
  year      = {2009},
  abstract  = {Rejecting approaches with a directionality parameter, mainstream minimalism has adopted the notion of strict (or unidirectional) branching. Within optimality theory however, constraints have recently been proposed that presuppose that the branching direction scheme is language specific. I show that a syntactic analysis of Chechen word order and relative clauses using strict branching and movement triggered by feature checking seems very unlikely, whereas a directionality approach works well. I argue in favor of a mixed directionality approach for Chechen, where the branching direction scheme depends on the phrase type. This observation leads to the introduction of context variants of existing markedness constraints, in order to describe the branching processes in terms of optimality theory. The paper discusses how and where the optimality theory selection of the branching directions can be implemented within a minimalist derivation.},
  language  = {en}
}
@article{GotznerRomoli2022,
  author    = {Gotzner, Nicole and Romoli, Jacopo},
  title     = {Meaning and alternatives},
  series = {Annual review of linguistics},
  volume    = {8},
  journal   = {Annual review of linguistics},
  publisher = {Annual Reviews},
  address   = {Palo Alto},
  issn      = {2333-9691},
  doi       = {10.1146/annurev-linguistics-031220-012013},
  pages     = {213 -- 234},
  year      = {2022},
  abstract  = {Alternatives and competition in language are pervasive at all levels of linguistic analysis. More specifically, alternatives have been argued to play a prominent role in an ever-growing class of phenomena in the investigation of natural language meaning. In this article, we focus on scalar implicatures, as they are arguably the most paradigmatic case of an alternative-based phenomenon. We first review the main challenge for theories of alternatives, the so-called symmetry problem, and we briefly discuss how it has shaped the different approaches to alternatives. We then turn to two more recent challenges concerning scalar diversity and the inferences of sentences with multiple scalars. Finally, we describe several related alternative-based phenomena and recent conceptual approaches to alternatives. As we discuss, while important progress has been made, much more work is needed both on the theoretical side and on understanding the empirical landscape better.},
  language  = {en}
}
@article{Rooth2007,
  author    = {Rooth, Mats},
  title     = {Notions of focus anaphoricity},
  url       = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus-19622},
  year      = {2007},
  abstract  = {This article reviews some of the theoretical notions and empirical phenomena which figure in current formal-semantic theories of focus. It also develops the connection between "alternative semantics" and "givenness" accounts of focus interpretation.},
  language  = {en}
}
@article{SchreiberOneaGaspar2021,
  author    = {Schreiber, Alexander and Onea G{\´a}sp{\´a}r, Edgar},
  title     = {Are narrow focus exhaustivity inferences Bayesian inferences?},
  series = {Frontiers in psychology / Frontiers Research Foundation},
  volume    = {12},
  journal   = {Frontiers in psychology / Frontiers Research Foundation},
  publisher = {Frontiers Research Foundation},
  address   = {Lausanne},
  issn      = {1664-1078},
  doi       = {10.3389/fpsyg.2021.677223},
  pages     = {19},
  year      = {2021},
  abstract  = {In successful communication, the literal meaning of linguistic utterances is often enriched by pragmatic inferences. Part of the pragmatic reasoning underlying such inferences has been successfully modeled as Bayesian goal recognition in the Rational Speech Act (RSA) framework. In this paper, we try to model the interpretation of question-answer sequences with narrow focus in the answer in the RSA framework, thereby exploring the effects of domain size and prior probabilities on interpretation. Should narrow focus exhaustivity inferences be actually based on Bayesian inference involving prior probabilities of states, RSA models should predict a dependency of exhaustivity on these factors. We present experimental data that suggest that interlocutors do not act according to the predictions of the RSA model and that exhaustivity is in fact approximately constant across different domain sizes and priors. The results constitute a conceptual challenge for Bayesian accounts of the underlying pragmatic inferences.},
  language  = {en}
}
@phdthesis{Shipova2024,
  author    = {Shipova, Evgeniya},
  title     = {Formal analysis of {\`e}to-clefts in Russian: syntax and semantics},
  doi       = {10.25932/publishup-63014},
  url       = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-630149},
  school      = {Universit{\"a}t Potsdam},
  pages     = {219},
  year      = {2024},
  abstract  = {{\`E}to-clefts are Russian focus constructions with the demonstrative pronoun {\`e}to 'this' at the beginning: "{\`E}to Mark vyigral gonku" ("It was Mark who won the race"). They are often being compared with English it-clefts, German es-clefts, as well as the corresponding focus-background structures in other languages. In terms of semantics, {\`e}to-clefts have two important properties which are cross-linguistically typical for clefts: existence presupposition ("Someone won the race") and exhaustivity ("Nobody except Mark won the race"). However, the exhaustivity effects are not as strong as exhaustivity effects in structures with the exclusive only and require more research. At the same time, the question if the syntactic structure of {\`e}to-clefts matches the biclausal structure of English and German clefts, remains open. There are arguments in favor of biclausality, as well as monoclausality. Besides, there is no consistency regarding the status of {\`e}to itself. Finally, the information structure of {\`e}to-clefts has remained underexplored in the existing literature. This research investigates the information-structural, syntactic, and semantic properties of Russian clefts, both theoretically (supported by examples from Russian text corpora and judgments from native speakers) and experimentally. It is determined which desired changes in the information structure motivate native speakers to choose an {\`e}to-cleft and not the canonical structure or other focus realization tools. Novel syntactic tests are conducted to find evidence for bi-/monoclausality of {\`e}to-clefts, as well as for base-generation or movement of the cleft pivot. It is hypothesized that {\`e}to has a certain important function in clefts, and its status is investigated. Finally, new experiments on the nature of exhaustivity in {\`e}to-clefts are conducted. They allow for direct cross-linguistic comparison, using an incremental-information paradigm with truth-value judgments. In terms of information structure, this research makes a new proposal that presents {\`e}to-clefts as structures with an inherent focus-background bipartitioning. Even though {\`e}to-clefts are used in typical focus contexts, evidence was found that {\`e}to-clefts (as well as Russian thetic clefts) allow for both new information focus and contrastive focus. {\`E}to-clefts are pragmatically acceptable when a singleton answer to the implied question is expected (e.g. "It was Mark who won the race" but not "It was Mark who came to the party"). Importantly, {\`e}to in Russian clefts is neither dummy, nor redundant, but is a topic expression; conveys familiarity which triggers existence presupposition; refers to an instantiated event, or a known/perceivable situation; finally, {\`e}to plays an important role in the spoken language as a tool for speech coherency and a focus marker. In terms of syntax, this research makes a new monoclausal proposal and shows evidence that the cleft pivot undergoes movement to the left peripheral position. {\`E}to is proposed to be TopP. Finally, in terms of semantics, a novel cross-linguistic evaluation of Russian clefts is made. Experiments show that the exhaustivity inference in {\`e}to-clefts is not robust. Participants used different strategies in resolving exhaustivity, falling into 2 groups: one group considered {\`e}to-clefts exhaustive, while another group considered them non-exhaustive. Hence, there is evidence for the pragmatic nature of exhaustivity in {\`e}to-clefts. The experimental results for {\`e}to-clefts are similar to the experimental results for clefts in German, French and Akan. It is concluded that speakers use different tools available in their languages to produce structures with similar interpretive properties.},
  language  = {en}
}