Affirmative and rejective responses to negative assertions and questions

该项目继续调查对否定断言和带有回答助词(yes、no、ja、nein、doch等)的极端问题的肯定和拒绝回答。从XPrag.de的第一个资助期开始。在第一个供资期间取得的结果在几个方面都相当令人惊讶，需要更广泛和更深入的分析，以及进一步系统的定量实证检验。首先，我们发现了被调查的语言(德语/英语)之间的差异，这些差异对于现有的反应助词的理论描述来说是意想不到的。与第三种语言(荷兰语)的比较显示出更多的跨语言差异。其次，我们发现回答助词的可接受性在个体间有很大的差异，说话者在特定的(取决于语言的)对话类型中表现出相反的偏好。第三，我们意外地发现德语和英语中对否定问题和否定断言的回答之间存在细微的差异。第四，对总体上对更好地理解反应粒子至关重要的因素的探索，如积极命题和消极命题的可用性，尽管仍处于初始阶段，但已产生了更深入研究的有希望的结果。该项目的目的是继续调查粒子反应和命题回指，在第一个资助期取得了部分令人惊讶的发现。在第二个资助期，我们计划进一步审查这些调查结果，填补因意外发现而出现的经验报道的空白，目的是为彻底的理论评估建立一个合适的数据库。将开展的实证工作将包括：(A)扩大被调查语言的范围，(B)扩大偏向先行语的类型，(C)调查韵律因素，(D)调查命题回指的回答，而不是yes和no。我们期望通过这些研究能够更清楚地理解语法(句法、语义和韵律)和个体偏好之间的相互作用，无论是关于回答助词还是关于命题领域中的回指过程。此外，如果以及如果是这样，说话者偏见等因素可能如何影响这些粒子的使用，我们希望对这个问题有更好的见解。说话者偏见通常不会进入对反应粒子的分析。

The project continues the investigation of affirmative and rejective responses to negative assertions and polar questions with response particles (yes, no, ja, nein, doch etc.) from the first funding period of XPrag.de. The results obtained in the first funding period have been quite surprising in several ways and require more extended and more in-depth analysis, as well as further systematic quantitative empirical testing. First, we found differences between the languages under investigation (German/English) that were unexpected for existing theoretical accounts of response particles. A comparison with a third language (Dutch) revealed more cross-linguistic differences. Second, we found great inter-individual variation in the acceptability of response particles to the extent that speakers showed opposite preferences in specific (language-dependent) dialogue types. Third, we unexpectedly found subtle differences between responses to negative questions and negative assertions in German and in English. Fourth, the exploration of factors that overall are crucial in a good understanding of response particles like the availability of positive and negative propositions, although still in its initial stages, has yielded promising results for a more intensive investigation. The project is designed to continue the investigation of the particle responses and propositional anaphors for which the first funding period has delivered partly surprising findings. In the second funding period we plan to further scrutinize these findings and fill gaps in the empirical coverage that have arisen as a consequence of the unexpected findings, with the goal to create a suitable database for a thorough theoretical evaluation. The empirical work to be carried out will consist in (A) an extension of the range of languages under investigation, (B) an extension to more types of biased antecedents, (C) an investigation of prosodic factors, (D) an investigation of responses with propositional anaphors beyond yes and no. We expect from these investigations a clearer understanding of the interplay of grammar (syntax, semantics and prosody) and individual preferences both with respect to response particles and with respect to anaphoric processes in the realm of propositions. Furthermore, we expect to gain better insights into the issue if, and if so, how factors like speaker bias, which do not normally enter the analyses of response particles may contribute to the use of these particles.