Singular <i>they</i> in context

Abstract

There is a growing experimental and theoretical literature on singular they, much of it focusing on the nature of the antecedents it takes (Foertsch & Gernsbacher 1997; Bjorkman 2017; Doherty & Conklin 2017; Prasad 2017; Ackerman et al. 2018; Ackerman 2018a; Ackerman 2018b; Conrod 2018; Ackerman 2019; Camilliere et al. 2019; Conrod 2019; Konnelly & Cowper 2020). We conducted two experiments which, in contrast to earlier studies, manipulated whether the gender of the referent of singular they is known to the discourse participants and whether there is a linguistic antecedent for singular they. We found that the presence of an antecedent ameliorates the acceptability of singular they—even in a context where the gender of the referent may be known to the hearer. We interpret this novel finding as revealing how a linguistic antecedent can signal the irrelevance of gender in a discourse and thereby licenses singular they. We also find a trend, inversely correlated with age, toward higher acceptability of even deictic singular they in gender known contexts, partially bearing out findings in Bjorkman (2017), Conrod (2019), and Konnelly & Cowper (2020) about innovative users of singular they.