Authors
Deniz Özyıldız
Ciyang Qing
Floris Roelofsen
Wataru Uegaki
Maribel Romero
Date (dd-mm-yyyy)
2026-03
Title
Operationalizing focus-sensitivity in a cross-linguistic context
Journal
Natural Language Semantics
Volume
34
Publication Year
2026-03
Pages
47–83
Issue number
1
Document type
Article
Abstract

This paper evaluates empirical methods for detecting the focus-sensitivity of clause-embedding predicates, with the objective of making them applicable to predicates within and across languages. Our positive proposal is a test based on a combination of inferential judgments and truth-value judgments. We compare this method with three alternatives: one based on truth-value judgments alone; another based on judgments of coherence or contradiction; and a third one based on inferential judgments alone. We conclude that our combined test is more successful than its alternatives in terms of cross-linguistic uniformity (i.e., it is applicable to different languages with as few language-specific elements involved as possible) and item generalizability (i.e., there is a clear recipe for how to carry out the test for any clause-embedding predicate).

URL
go to publisher's site
Permalink
https://hdl.handle.net/11245.1/089c6c36-41a6-4255-bda4-2e5b9dade305