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• Acceptability of copredication sentences can change with the sense order. • Acceptability is driven by context-sensitive expectations in the mind's model. • Copredication and adjective ordering effects driven by similar expectations. • Various expectation types: coherence, information structure, and structural primes. • Ordering effects can be accounted for by the predictive processing framework. Copredication is the phenomenon that two or more predicates can jointly apply to the same argument. In "The book is heavy and informative" the word book seems to refer to both a concrete physical object that can be heavy and an abstract content that can be informative. It has been observed that if the concrete sense of the nominal is triggered first, the copredication statement often sounds better compared to when the abstract sense is triggered first. However, the cognitive underpinnings of this effect are not well understood. In this theoretically oriented paper, we propose a predictive processing model of order effects aimed at advancing our understanding of that phenomenon. We also connect the debate regarding ordering preferences with an existing strand of research on ordering preferences in multi-adjective strings and the information structure of sentences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights • The Semantic Subset Principle operates in the L2 acquisition of the proform one. • L2 learners are initially conservative, allowing the superset reading later. • Japanese L2 learners’ interpretation of one in English is not due to L1 transfer. Abstract Acquisition of the English proform one raises a serious learnability problem in second language (L2). Focusing on the Semantic Subset Principle, which should overcome the learnability problem, this study investigates how Japanese-speaking L2 learners of English interpret one. Two experiments were conducted to examine the interpretations of one in an ambiguous pattern allowing subset/superset readings (e.g., This student with long hair is smarter than that one) and an unambiguous pattern allowing only the subset reading (e.g., This student of philosophy is smarter than that one). The results indicated that the L2 learners are similar to the English control group in that they correctly interpreted one in an unambiguous pattern by allowing the subset reading but not the superset reading. However, in the ambiguous pattern, the L2 learners in the upper-proficiency group allowed both the subset and superset reading as the native speakers of English did, whereas those in the lower-proficiency group interpreted one with the restricted subset reading. These results suggest that L2 learners start with the restricted option and that they start allowing the superset reading only later. The Semantic Subset Principle forces Japanese-speaking learners to be initially conservative, allowing their subsequent development in accordance with input. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Some seemingly robust linguistic generalizations remain controversial for years, often for lack of experimental verification. As a case study, we examine word length preferences in Chinese NN compounds. Since the original observation of Lü (1963) , there has been a broad consensus that 1+2 (monosyllabic + disyllabic) is ill formed, while 2+1, 2+2 and 1+1 are well-formed. In addition, it has been shown that the preferences can be derived from metrical principles. However, a judgment experiment is yet to be offered to verify the preferences, and without it some scholars remain skeptical. We offer such an experimental study, in which 15 native speakers are asked to rate the acceptability of 1,132 randomly generated NN compounds, with 283 each of the four length patterns. It is found that 2+2 is the most acceptable, followed by 2+1, while 1+2 and 1+1 are the least acceptable. The high rating of 2+2 and the low rating of 1+2 support previous predictions. The rating for 2+1 is slightly lower than expected, and that of 1+1 is most unexpected. It is also found that four other factors (the naturalness of the referent, homograph ambiguity, the boundness of a morpheme, and frequency) have significant effects on acceptability judgment, although their sizes are smaller than that of the length effect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Some seemingly robust linguistic generalizations remain controversial for years, often for lack of experimental verification. As a case study, we examine word length preferences in Chinese NN compounds. Since the original observation of Lü (1963) , there has been a broad consensus that 1+2 (monosyllabic + disyllabic) is ill formed, while 2+1, 2+2 and 1+1 are well-formed. In addition, it has been shown that the preferences can be derived from metrical principles. However, a judgment experiment is yet to be offered to verify the preferences, and without it some scholars remain skeptical. We offer such an experimental study, in which 15 native speakers are asked to rate the acceptability of 1,132 randomly generated NN compounds, with 283 each of the four length patterns. It is found that 2+2 is the most acceptable, followed by 2+1, while 1+2 and 1+1 are the least acceptable. The high rating of 2+2 and the low rating of 1+2 support previous predictions. The rating for 2+1 is slightly lower than expected, and that of 1+1 is most unexpected. It is also found that four other factors (the naturalness of the referent, homograph ambiguity, the boundness of a morpheme, and frequency) have significant effects on acceptability judgment, although their sizes are smaller than that of the length effect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present paper describes the Spanish Ambiguous Words (SAW) database, which comprises 210 words (133 polysemous and 77 homographs). Three-hundred and fifteen Spanish university students took part in the study on which SAW is based. First, subjective word meanings and senses were collected by means of a meaning retrieval task. Two judges then assigned participants’ responses to different categories of meaning according to lexicographical and statistical criteria. Results showed that, while there was a relatively high relationship between the number of senses included in the dictionary and those provided by participants ( r = .62), regression analyses on lexical decision and naming times revealed that participants’ number of senses had significant predictive power, whereas those from the dictionary did not. This indicates that normative data from participants seem to better reflect the psychological reality of word senses. Hence, the SAW database constitutes a useful tool for future research into ambiguous word learning and recognition in Spanish. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A large body of psycholinguistic research has revealed that during sentence interpretation adults coordinate multiple sources of information. Particularly, they draw both on linguistic properties of the message and on information from the context to constrain their interpretations. Relatively little however is known about how this integrative processor develops through language acquisition and about how children process language. In this study, two on-line picture verification tasks were used to examine how 1st, 2nd and 4th/5th grade monolingual Greek children resolve pronoun ambiguities during sentence interpretation and how their performance compares to that of adults on the same tasks. Specifically, we manipulated the type of subject pronoun, i.e. null or overt, and examined how this affected participants’ preferences for competing antecedents, i.e. in the subject or object position. The results revealed both similarities and differences in how adults and the various child groups comprehended ambiguous pronominal forms. Particularly, although adults and children alike showed sensitivity to the distribution of overt and null subject pronouns, this did not always lead to convergent interpretation preferences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In ergative constructions, the agent of a transitive verb is in the ergative case and the theme is in the absolutive case. By contrast, in biabsolutive constructions, both the agent and theme of a transitive verb appear in the absolutive case. This paper presents and analyzes the biabsolutive construction in two Nakh-Dagestanian languages, Lak and Tsez. Despite many surface similarities, the biabsolutive constructions in Lak and Tsez call for different syntactic analyses. We argue that the biabsolutive construction in Lak is an instance of restructuring in the presence of an aspectual head bearing a progressive (imperfective) feature. Tsez biabsolutive constructions, on the other hand, are biclausal; we argue that the theme and the lexical verb are contained in a PP complement selected by a light verb. Related languages may be classified as “Lak-type” or “Tsez-type” based on the behavior of their biabsolutives. The existence of two underlying structures for one surface pattern in Nakh-Dagestanian poses a learnability problem for a child acquiring a language with biabsolutive constructions. We outline a set of strategies used by a learner who must compare the available input data with a set of structural hypotheses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights: [•] How do adults solve privative ambiguities and interpret “the only one”? [•] Do adults always minimally commit themselves to the weaker interpretation? [•] We show that context takes precedence over truth conditional considerations. [•] We propose a Principle of Maximal Exploitation: if context is provided, use it. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Highlights: [⿢] We study the ambiguities generated by numerals and regular scalar items like ⿿some⿿. [⿢] We compare the processing costs associated with their weak and strong readings. [⿢] The strong readings attached to ⿿some⿿ come at an extra memory cost. [⿢] For numerals, conversely, this cost is associated with the weak readings. [⿢] Consequences of these findings for the core semantics of numerals are discussed. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Highlights: [•] Perception data on German varieties show no direct link between negation scope and prosodic phrasing. [•] The relevance of the prosodic cues pause, intonation contour and peak alignment varies depending on the task. [•] The resolution of scope ambiguities depends on a general impression of ‘cohesion’ between two clauses. [•] Resolving scope ambiguities is predominantly tune-based in German. [•] Viennese listeners interpret accentual peaks as earlier than listeners from Kiel and Düsseldorf. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Two experiments examined the effect of intonational phrase boundaries (Experiment 1) and interactions between intonational phrase boundaries and contrastive accents (Experiment 2) in parsing, using a sentence continuation judgment task. Across experiments, we found that intonational phrase boundaries were consistently interpreted as signaling syntactic structure as long as there were no alternative reasons for them to be present. Experiment 2 showed that different prosodic cues interact in syntactic processing. The effect of intonational phrase boundaries was modulated by contrastive accents through weaker intermediate phrase boundaries that followed contrastive accents, suggesting that the effects of pitch accents are indirect in syntactic processing. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: The present study examines how Wh-interrogative sentences in Japanese are produced and comprehended when they involve potentially ambiguous Wh-scope interpretations. Two experiments were conducted: one eliciting utterances from native speakers and the other testing the comprehension of resynthesized sound stimuli. The results reveal the existence of a puzzling asymmetry between production and comprehension as well as an asymmetry between matrix and subordinate Wh-scope comprehension. Speakers mainly make use of the pitch of the item immediately following the subordinate complementizer to encode distinct Wh-scope interpretations. Listeners, on the other hand, rely more heavily on the pitch of a subordinate-clause Wh-item to decode its scope interpretation, especially when the matrix Wh-scope interpretation is detected. Potential sources of the speaker–listener discrepancy are identified, and it is argued that this discrepancy contributes to the difficulty of the matrix scope interpretation of an “in-situ” Wh-phrase located within an embedded Wh-clause. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Russian nouns in nominative and accusative numerical expressions appear in three different forms, depending on the numeral: nominative singular with the numeral 1, genitive singular with the paucal numerals 2–4, and genitive plural with all other numerals. Results from an acceptability judgment task and a self-paced reading task on Russian case/number marking provide support for a theory stating that the suffix used with paucal nouns is morphologically ambiguous. The ambiguity resolution process involving this suffix leads to extra processing cost, compared to the unambiguous suffixes in other numeral contexts (the number 1, and the numbers 5+). This would account for the additional processing time observed with the paucal nouns. The status of the form occurring with the paucal numerals has long been a challenging issue in Russian linguistics, and the new results add to the growing body of literature which makes use of experimental methods to address issues of linguistic theory and analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This study investigates the degree to which referential context information influences structural ambiguity resolution preferences in non-native sentence comprehension, using both an off-line questionnaire and an on-line self-paced reading task. The critical target sentences contained prepositional phrases (PPs) modifying either the verb phrase (VP) or the preceding noun phrase (NP), as in Bill glanced at the customer with strong suspicion (with ripped jeans). These were embedded within short context paragraphs providing either one or two potential referents for the postverbal NP. The results showed that native Chinese-speaking learners of English and native English speakers were affected differently by referential information in the on-line task. The learners’ reading times of the critical PP were influenced significantly by the referential context, with VP-modifying items being read faster than NP-modifying ones in a VP-supporting context, and the reverse pattern seen in NP-supporting contexts. The native speakers’ ambiguity resolution preferences, on the other hand, were modulated by the referential context in the off-line task only. Our results indicate that non-native comprehenders are highly sensitive to extra-sentential discourse-level information during processing even at intermediate levels of proficiency, a finding that provides a challenge for ‘processing capacity limitation’ accounts for non-targetlike L2 performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The paper offers an analysis of Bulgarian relative clauses introduced by the invariant complementizer deto ‘that’, whose distribution also extends to factive contexts. Using reconstruction as primary evidence for movement, I review the basic facts for its presence (amount readings, idiom interpretation, binding and scope) and absence (Principle C) and argue that both a raising and a matching analysis must be available for the derivation of deto-relatives. I also discuss the distribution and structural properties of resumptive clitics which are shown to block reconstruction in all types of contexts and hence to be compatible with a matching derivation only. Given the structural ambiguity in the derivation of Bulgarian complementizer relatives and in search of a unified treatment of their potentially ambivalent behavior, the paper applies Cinque''s (2003, 2008) analysis of relative clauses, which postulates two identical copies of the relativized Head (internal and external) and exploits different movement options to account for the raising and the matching derivations. It is then argued that such a proposal, which also exploits distinct CP positions, can successfully accommodate all of the observed reconstruction effects (or lack thereof), including the option of resumption. The paper also offers a discussion of factive clauses introduced by the same complementizer and proposes that they are best treated as hidden relatives embedded under a more complex structure involving a PP projection and a silent D head. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: The internal processing of simple determiner phrases has received little attention in the processing literature so far. German determiners can occur with and without nominal complements. Therefore, a sequence of determiner and noun can be ambiguous: determiner and noun can either form a single phrase ([Det N]) or two phrases ([Det] [N]). Three self-paced-reading experiments reveal a preference for the single-phrase analysis. Locally ambiguous two-phrase sentences cause a garden-path effect. We argue that this preference is best explained in terms of semantic and prosodic minimality. The two-phrase analysis is semantically more complex because it involves two referents. It is prosodically more complex because it requires sentence stress on the determiner which is unstressed by default. Additional evidence for prosodic minimality comes from extraposed subject-modifying relative clauses. In two-phrase sentences, the relative clause was locally ambiguous between subject and object construal. By default, the relative clause is associated with the most recent NP, the object. Subject construal requires stress on the determiner. A focus adverbial preceding the subject facilitates subject construal by directing accentuation to the determiner. We present corpus data suggesting that lexical frequencies have an effect on the ambiguity under consideration, but that reference to minimality is still needed. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Event-related potentials (ERPs) were used to examine the interplay of structure building and the integration of morphosyntactic information during incremental parsing. The critical sentence conditions examined the processing of verbs that were ambiguous between a clause-initial finite main verb analysis and an analysis as an (homophonous) infinitival verb in a fronted verb phrase. The task interacts with particle stripping, since particles are stranded if the finite verb is fronted. Conversely, if the particle is present, the potentially finite verb cannot be the fronted finite verb. This is a top-down (grammar-driven) prediction of the parser with immediate impact on the ongoing structure building process of the parser. The ERP results provide first of all straightforward indications for a minimality-driven parsing process (motto: assign immediately the minimal convergent structure to the available input string, and disregard ambiguities that would result in more complex assignments). Second, they show that the parser cross-checks (validates) the minimality-driven outcome for its compatibility with the locally available morpho-syntactic information (finiteness, agreement, particle stripping). Furthermore, we suggest a simple metric which resolves apparent contradictions with respect to previous ERP findings for reanalysis in structural ambiguities and which solely depends on the complexity of structural reanalyzes (that is, whether the required structural modification proceeds within a single clause, or takes place across a sentence boundary). [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: This paper investigates prepositional phrase attachment preferences in Greek V-NP-PP structures. Native Greek speakers’ attachment preferences were investigated through an off-line acceptability task and an on-line self-paced grammaticality judgment task. The experimental sentences include Greek V-NP-PP sentences in which four Greek prepositions were inserted (me [with], se [in, into], ja [for], apo [from, by]) so as to examine possible lexical effects that may stem from the lexicosemantic properties of each preposition. In addition, the influence of Definiteness Agreement, a language-specific grammatical phenomenon in Modern Greek, was investigated in the experimental data by varying the definiteness of the NP complement of P. The results indicate an initial VP-attachment preference consistent with principles of syntax-based models of sentence processing (Minimal Attachment, Minimal Everything). In addition, the influence of Definiteness Agreement in the NP domain was evident both in the on-line and in the off-line data suggesting that attachment preferences may also be influenced by language-specific grammatical properties. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: The paper presents an in-depth study of focus marking in Gùrùntùm, a West Chadic language spoken in Bauchi State in Nigeria. Focus in Gùrùntùm is marked morphologically by means of a focus marker a, which typically precedes the focused constituent. Even though the morphological focus-marking system of Gùrùntùm allows for a lot of fine-grained distinctions in information structure (IS), the language is not entirely free of focus ambiguities that are the result of conflicting IS- and syntactic requirements governing the placement of focus markers. We show that morphological focus marking with a applies across different types of focus, such as new-information, contrastive, selective and corrective focus, and that a does not have a second function as a perfective marker, as is assumed in the literature. In contrast, we argue that sentence-final occurrences of a in perfective sentences are markers of sentential focus and have additional functions at the level of discourse structure. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Prosody has a large impact on language processing. We contrast two views of how prosody and intonation might exert their effects. On a ‘prosodic packaging’ approach, prosodic boundaries structure the linguistic input into perceptual and memory units, with the consequence that material in earlier packages is less accessible for linguistic processing than material in the current package. This approach claims that such lessened accessibility holds true for the comprehension of all constructions, regardless of the particular kind of linguistic dependency that needs to be established using the earlier constituent. A ‘specialized role’ approach, in contrast, attributes to prosodic boundaries a role in making grouping decisions when building hierarchical structure, but attributes to pitch accents the major role in determining the accessibility of a constituent. The results of four listening studies with replacive sentences (Diane thought Patrick was entertaining, not Louise) support the predictions of the specialized role hypothesis over the prosodic packaging approach. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Buli is an Oti-Volta tone language spoken in Northern Ghana. This paper outlines the basic features of its tonal system and explores whether and in which way pitch respectively phonemic tone is approached as a means to indicate the pragmatic category of focus. Pursued are cases with focus-related surface tone changes as well as cases where pitch could help to disambiguate between broad and narrow foci. It is argued that focus is not consistently encoded by pitch or tone. Parallel findings for the closely related languages Kɔnni and Dagbani suggest that the apparent lack of significant prosodic focus signals in Buli might pertain to a larger group of tonal languages of the Gur family. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This paper provides a critical review of recent work on children's interpretation of scopally ambiguous sentences. Our question is whether current generalizations about scope resolution in child language adequately explain all the data that they should explain. In particular, we consider a generalization that has seen many incarnations, the so-called Observation of Isomorphism. We argue that the Observation of Isomorphism has no place in our theory of child language. In particular, we highlight the theoretical and empirical shortcomings of current theories which attribute a privileged role to surface scope in children's parsing (e.g., ). Furthermore, we show that the Observation of Isomorphism cannot even be invoked to describe children's non-adult behavior, by reviewing existing experimental findings showing that children may in fact select inverse scope interpretations for sentences that adults consistently interpret on surface scope (see ). [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Yongren Lolo (as well as a portion of related Tibeto-Burman languages) exhibits a type of DOM in a wide range of clause types strictly based on ambiguity. Devices such as morphological case-marking and word order fixations are taken out of the toolbox only if the assignment of semantic roles is not implied by the semantics of the predicate and its arguments. ADDOM-languages (Ambiguity-Driven Differential Object Marking languages) such as Yongren Lolo resist any rigid alignment pattern of semantic roles. Earlier attempts by linguists to sketch Lolo-style syntax in terms of the grammatical relations of primary object and ‘anti-ergative’ marking are shown to fail for various reasons. The characteristic feature of ADDOM-languages seems to be their ability to strike a special deal between two conflicting constraints that operate at a deeper level of syntactic organization: Economy and Markedness. Based on the interplay of these constraints, I define a wide range of theoretic ADDOM-structures and position Yongren Lolo within this typology. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The Japanese existential construction can be used either to assert the presence of some entity in a certain location or to indicate that something is an integral part of another. It has been noted, however, that the part–whole reading seems to disappear when the nominative NP precedes the locative PP. Contrary to the existing analyses which make appeal to some constraint on movement to derive this disambiguation effect, this paper presents an information structural account. The analysis is empirically supported by the lack of disambiguation in embedded contexts and the significant role of contextual information that encourages the ‘missing’ part–whole interpretation to re-emerge. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The status of words like either, both and neither, here referred to as ‘correlative adverbs’ or ‘correlatives’, is controversial. Using relevant data from Germanic languages. I shall show that the analyses of Schwarz (1999) and Larson (1985) are inadequate. Instead, I will suggest an analysis based on the assumptions in Hendriks (2001a,b, 2002): that correlatives are focus particles. Their syntactic position is discussed with the hypothesis that focus particles are adverbs, and I suggest. inspired by the adverb hierarchies of Cinque (1997), that there is a designated Correlative Phrase position. My analysis includes overt and covert movement, which explains some correlations between different interpretations of scope and syntactic positions, as discussed also by Larson (1985) and Bayer (1996). My analysis not only gives an account of this kind of scope ambiguity, but also accounts for the fact that each correlative is associated with only one conjunction; that with phrasal coordination, the correlative can be displaced from the conjunction phrase; and that with sentential coordination, the correlative can be part of the first conjunct. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper outlines and discusses three kinds of OT-approach to the partially iconic form/meaning map exhibited by Icelandic (indefinite) object-shift. One bidirectional and two OT-syntactic approaches are contrasted. The conclusion is that bidirectionality fares best in providing a “deeper” understanding of why iconic rather than non-iconic patterns should occur. OT-syntax is more successful in empirical coverage, being able to model partial iconicity in areas where purely syntactic constraints overrule interpretive preferences. Finally, I suggest that OT-syntactic approaches should be further distinguished in terms of the kind of input/output constraints they advocate. This concerns the degree of universality and independent motivation for classical scoping principles as opposed to “harmonic alignment” of the definiteness and the grammatical function scale. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores a theory of the meaning-form relation based on ranked and violable constraints [A. Prince, P. Smolensky, 1993. Optimality Theory: Constraint Interaction in Generative Grammar, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, and University of Colorado, Boulder], using the English genitive construction as a testing ground. Our main thesis is that partially ordered optimality-theoretic grammars allow us to relate four apparently independent empirical phenomena: (i) categorical grammaticality contrasts; (ii) variation and preferences in expression; (iii) ambiguity and preferences in interpretation; (iv) lexical organization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this introductory article is to provide a background to the articles contained in this special issue of Lingua that centers around variation in form, variation in meaning, and markedness. Theoretical and empirical considerations are brought together in this special issue in which the linguistic disciplines that are covered diverge. The different contributions deal with language processing, first language acquisition, language contact, functional-typology and generative morphology and syntax. Several papers in this special issue argue in favour of an Optimality Theoretic analysis of the data under discussion. This is not a coincidence, given that Optimality Theory is claimed to be a formal theory of markedness (cf. Gilbers and De Hoop, 1998, Lingua, 104, 1 for an introduction to OT). In Section 1, we present two hypotheses dealing with the relation between variation in form and variation in meaning. We discuss several dimensions along which markedness of forms and meanings can be measured in Section 2. In the final section we discuss the possibility that the concept of bidirectional optimization accounts for markedness as well as variation in form versus variation in meaning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Under the view of syntactic movement as driven by the need to attract and check formal features (Chomsky, 1995), what appears to be “movement” reduces to Generalized Pied-Piping (GPP), an operation that carries along the features of the category that contains the attracted feature. This study addresses the question of whether GPP is constrained by minimality just as the core feature-checking operation Attract is constrained by the Minimal Link Condition. Phenomena where A-movement and A′-movement interact are shown to suggest that GPP is immune to such a constraint. Thus, the asymmetry with respect to feature-minimality in movement relations in general (i.e., a certain feature cannot cross over another feature of the same type while others can) is captured by the operational asymmetry between Attract and GPP, which is naturally understood if we think of CHL as a derivational system. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This paper highlights and accounts for some interesting properties of the superlative construction in Modern Standard Arabic that have not been addressed by previous research on Arabic. One property that is focused on in this paper is the interaction between number and definiteness in this construction. It is shown that superlative adjectives have properties that are different from those of the abstract adjectives, and similar to those of quantifiers and nouns. Superlatives are similar to nouns and quantifiers in that they can host clitics, modify or quantify over noun phrases, and that these noun phrases should always be assigned the genitive case. Given these similarities, it is argued that the superlative construction behaves like a Construct State (CS), which is a nominal construction in Arabic that roughly corresponds to the English genitive construction. On a par with other elements that can head the CS (i.e., numerals, quantifiers, and nouns), the superlative adjective has nominal head properties and is the head of the superlative construction. However, it is shown that there is number ambiguity in the superlative construction that is not present in regular CS constructions, with a noun or a quantifier head. Number ambiguity shows in this construction only when the noun phrase modified by the superlative adjective is definite and plural. In this case, the superlative construction can be either singular or plural. This paper attributes this ambiguity to the quantificational nature of superlative adjectives and its interaction with definiteness within the superlative construction. Superlatives in Arabic, thus, are established as quantifiers, and the superlative construction as a Quantifier Phrase. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]