Abstract
Languages vary with respect to whether sentences with two negative elements give rise to double negation or negative concord meanings. We explore an influential hypothesis about what governs this variation: namely, that whether a language exhibits double negation or negative concord is partly determined by the phonological and syntactic nature of its negative marker (Zeijlstra 2004; Jespersen 1917). For example, one version of this hypothesis argues that languages with affixal negation must be negative concord (Zeijlstra 2008). We use an artificial language learning experiment to investigate whether English speakers are sensitive to the status of the negative marker when learning double negation and negative concord languages. Our findings fail to provide evidence supporting this hypothesised connection. Instead, our results suggest that learners find it easier to learn negative concord languages compared to double negation languages independently of whether the negative marker is an adverb or an affix. This is in line with evidence from natural language acquisition (Thornton et al. 2016).
Highlights
Languages exhibit a wide range of variation in how negative words interact with one another across contexts
Recall that, based on Jespersen-Zeijstra’s generalization, we predict that English-speaking learners will find it easier to learn a double negation language when the negative marker is an adverb than when it is an affix; according to this generalization, languages with affixal negation are necessarily negative concord
For learners in the negative concord condition, we did not predict an effect of marker type; negative concord is possible with either type of negative marker
Summary
Languages exhibit a wide range of variation in how negative words interact with one another across contexts. Each negative expression in a sentence (or clause) necessarily contributes an independent semantic negation. As illustrated in (1-a) and (1-b), in Dutch, both the negative marker ‘niet’ and the negative indefinite ‘niemand’ can independently be used to express sentential negation. We thank Hedde Zeijlstra and the audience at the Workshop on the Processing of Negation and Polarity for valuable input.
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