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Article published In: Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism
Vol. 15:6 (2025) ► pp.843–871

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Scalar diversity in L2 French speakers

Pragmatic inferences in adjective scales

ORCiD logo with link | The University of Iowa
ORCiD logo with link | The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
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Available under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) 4.0 license.

For any use beyond this license, please contact the publisher at rights@benjamins.nl.

Open Access publication of this article was funded through a Transformative Agreement with University of Iowa.

Published online: 16 December 2024
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https://doi.org/10.1075/lab.24020.des
Abstract
While scalar inferences associated with some have featured in most of the past investigations into L2 implicature derivation, this study examines acquisition of pragmatic inferences licensed by adjective pairs (e.g., <intelligent, brilliant>, <dirty, filthy>). Previous work has focused mainly on direct scalar implicatures where an utterance containing a weak scalar term implicates the negation of the stronger. This work extends the investigation to include focus on two additional inference types: indirect scalar implicatures, where not brilliant conveys intelligent, and negative strengthening, a type of manner implicature where not brilliant results in a rather dumb interpretation. Using an inference-judgment paradigm, we test the interplay of these three inference types in adjectival scales for French speakers and L2 French learners and find that response behavior is modulated by the availability of alternative meanings for each participant group. L2 learners demonstrated familiarity with direct and indirect scalar implicature but lack awareness of negative strengthening. We interpret these results by highlighting the role of processing complexity as well as pragmatic competence and proficiency. Overall, this study makes an empirical contribution to the field of L2 acquisition and adds to building a more encompassing understanding of mechanisms that are often assumed to be universal in language acquisition.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Background literature
    • 2.1Adjective scales: Inferences and diversity
    • 2.2Empirical landscape on L2 acquisition of implicatures
  • 3.The present study
    • 3.1Participants
    • 3.2Materials and procedure
    • 3.3Data preparation and analysis
  • 4.Results
    • 4.1Task 1: Direct scalar implicatures
    • 4.2Task 2: Indirect scalar implicatures
    • 4.3Task 3: Negative strengthening
    • 4.4Statistical analysis
  • 5.General discussion
  • 6.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Data availability
  • Notes
  • References
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