Main content
German DPros: perspective-taking and prominence
Date created: | Last Updated:
: DOI | ARK
Creating DOI. Please wait...
Category: Project
Description: German demonstrative pronouns (DPro) avoid maximally prominent discourse referents as antecedents or binders. It has been argued that since individuals functioning as perspectival centers are prominent discourse referents, they are avoided by DPros. We report an eyetracking study in the visual-world paradigm to test this hypothesis. We manipulated the "perspectival center-hood" of the topic of the discourse (R1), which also introduced another referent (R2). Results showed: R2 is generally preferred as the antecedent, the manipulation of speaker-hood did not have an influence, but, being referred to by an epithet enhanced R1's availability as an antecedent of the DPro.