Genericity as extenuation for weak NPIs under bare NPs: An experiment on Czech
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| Year of publication | 2025 |
| Type | Appeared in Conference without Proceedings |
| Citation | |
| Description | Current theories of PSI (Polarity-Sensitive Items) licensing (Gajewski (2011), Chierchia (2013)) consider Negative Polarity Items (NPIs) unlicensed when in affirmative episodic statements. However, in generic sentences, NPIs are expected to be grammatical. The effect on potential indefinite licensors for PSIs has not been tested. To this end, we constructed an experiment testing the number of the head NP and the genericity/episodicity of the verb as factors in PSI licensing in Czech. We asked if speakers recognize generic statements as a boost for the acceptability of sentences with a weak PSI in the scope of an indefinite NP We employed a 2×2 factorial design, controlling for number (sg/pl on the subject and predicate) and genericity (generic: the adverb většinou – “mostly” + habitual -av- morpheme in the predicate × episodic: the adverb právě – “just” + perfective predicate). Filler sentences were used as well. The participants rated the acceptability of the stimuli on a 1 (unacceptable) to 5 (acceptable) scale. We predicted that genericity would increase the acceptability as opposed to episodicity and that plural generic items would be rated higher than singular ones. The results showed a significant (p*) interaction between genericity and number, suggesting that genericity helps with NPI licensing only in the scope of a plural subject. However, a subsequent experiment (N = 98) where we controlled for genericity not just on the verb but also on the subject's kind-interpretation (using contexts) showed that only genericity is reliable (BF= 32, gen:PI BF = 3000). To conclude: Czech speakers are inclined to accept genericity as an extenuating condition for *sebemenší* when no NPI licenser is present but it must be kind-denoting genericity, not the habitual morpheme on the predicate whose genericity may or may not be inherited by the NP. |
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