Examined the extent to which cross-linguistic differences in sentence interpretation would generalize to complex sentences with an embedded clause. College students who were native speakers of English or Italian completed four experiments. Results indicated that cross-linguistic differences were maintained when students interpreted complex…

Presents a view of the relative roles of logical presupposition and shared knowledge in "it"-cleft constructions. Indicators of shared knowledge relate to a speaker's "assumptions" about the state of the hearer's knowledge, whereas presuppositions indicate a speaker's "requirements" for what should be included within…