The Role of Context in the Resolution of Quantifier Scope Ambiguities

This paper presents experimental results that elucidate some aspects of semantic processing, i.e. of the system that allows perceivers to associate an interpretation to a sentence on-line. The phenomenon under investigation is the resolution of quantifier scope ambiguities. Sentences containing multiple quantifiers (i.e. everybody, some musician, etc.) are known to give rise to several interpretations. The question addressed in this work is how this kind of ambiguity is resolved in the on-line process of constructing an interpretation for a sentence. The research reported here concentrates exclusively on English and French interrogative sentences, and in particular on the case of ambiguous how many questions that contain a universally quantified subject, every N. The central results of this paper are the following. First, quantifier scope preferences are shown to be problematic for the most straightforward extension of an economy-based model to the processing of meaning, as evidenced by questionnaire studies in English and in French. Second, a model is elaborated in which the attested scope preferences are determined by the interaction with context. The results from a self-paced reading study in English indicate that context plays a crucial role in the processing of scope ambiguity. Third, while incremental context interactive models have been claimed to induce immediate resolution of structural ambiguity (Crain & Steedman 1985; Altmann & Steedman 1988; and others), it is argued here that the interaction with context can also delay such ambiguity resolution, as evidenced by the results of the English self-paced reading study. Finally, comparison of the two languages, English and French, sheds further light onto the phenomenon under investigation.