Causality in verbs and in discourse connectives: Converging evidence of cross-level parallels in Dutch linguistic categorization

Transcription

1 Journal of Pragmatics 40 (2008) Causality in verbs and in discourse connectives: Converging evidence of cross-level parallels in Dutch linguistic categorization Ninke Stukker a, *, Ted Sanders a, Arie Verhagen b a Utrecht Institute of Linguistics OTS, Utrecht University, Trans 10, 3512 JK Utrecht, The Netherlands b Leiden University Centre for Linguistics, Leiden University, P.O. Box 9515, 2300 RA Leiden, The Netherlands Received 27 November 2006; received in revised form 14 June 2007; accepted 27 October 2007 Abstract Several authors have proposed to describe the meaning and use of causality markers with reference to conceptual models of causality. If a parallel between semantic categories and conceptual categories exists, we would expect that similar conceptual models of causality are manifest across different types of linguistic constructions expressing causality. This cross-level similarity hypothesis is investigated in the present paper. So far, causality markers of different grammatical types have typically been studied in isolation. We argue that for a full understanding of the interaction between conceptual structure and linguistic structure, an integrative perspective on different types of causality markers is needed. We focus on causal verbs (manifest on the clausal level of the linguistic structure) and causal connectives (discourse level) in Dutch. Pursuing the research strategy of converging evidence, we first present theoretical considerations, andsubsequentlydiscussdata from language use suggestingthatcross-level parallels exist at an analytical level. Then, we report an experiment that aimed to test language users intuitions on the cross-level similarity hypothesis. The results are interpreted as empirical evidence for the parallels in meaning of causal verbs and discourse connectives. Remaining challenges for experimental studies of language users intuitions are discussed. # 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. Keywords: Causality; Causal auxiliary verbs; Discourse connectives; Conceptual models; Categorization; Converging evidence * Corresponding author. Tel.: ; fax: addresses: Ninke.Stukker@let.uu.nl (N. Stukker), Ted.Sanders@let.uu.nl (T. Sanders), A.Verhagen@let.leidenuniv.nl (A. Verhagen) /$ see front matter # 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. doi: /j.pragma

2 N. Stukker et al. / Journal of Pragmatics 40 (2008) Introduction 1 Causality is a fundamental concept in human thinking and reasoning. It is not surprising that most, if not all, languages in the world have a range of lexical expressions specifically designed for communicating causal relations. This paper focuses on two grammatically different types of causality markers in Dutch. We investigate the semantic contrasts expressed by different causal auxiliary verbs, marking causal relations expressed within one clause, and those expressed by different causal connectives, marking causal relations between clauses. Some examples 2 : Causal verbs: (1) [De extreme koude] cause deed zelfs [de rivieren bevriezen] effect. [The extreme cold] cause made/caused even [the rivers (to) freeze] effect. (2) [Ze] cause liet [haar zoon onder luid protest zijn bord leegeten] effect. [She] cause made/had [her son empty his plate] effect, despite his complaints. Causal connectives: (3) [Het was extreem koud] cause. Daardoor [waren zelfs de rivieren bevroren] effect. [It was extremely cold] cause. Because of that [even the rivers were frozen] effect. (4) [Het was extreem koud] cause. Daarom [zochten we een café op] effect. [It was extremely cold] cause. That s why [we entered a café] effect. (5) [Het is onbewolkt] cause. Dus [het wordt koud vandaag] effect. [The sky is clear] cause. So [It will be cold today] effect. These examples illustrate that Dutch, like most other languages, offers alternative options to mark causal relations, and that the presence of different marking options recurs in constructions of different grammatical type, manifest at different levels of the linguistic structure. The causal auxiliary verbs doen (1) roughly equivalent to English make, and laten (2) roughly equivalent to either English let or have, are used in constructions referred to as analytic causatives. They can be characterized as two-verb constructions that express a predicate of causation (finite form of doen or laten) and a predicate of effect, expressed as an infinitive (cf. Kemmer and Verhagen, 1994; Wolff and Song, 2003). Examples (3) (5) are causal coherence relations, relating discourse segments, minimally clauses, into a coherent whole (cf. Hobbs, 1979; Mann and Thompson, 1988; Sanders et al., 1992). They may or may not be linguistically marked with lexical or grammaticized expressions. An example of the latter type are the connectives under investigation in the present study. Like many other languages, Dutch offers a variety of connectives. In constructions expressing forward causality (where in presentation order the cause precedes the effect) the most frequently used ones are daardoor (not having a grammaticized counterpart in English; best approximated by because of that ), daarom ( that s why ) and dus ( so ). 1 This paper is based on Stukker (2005), especially chapter 6. 2 We focus on the causal relations mainly from a conceptual perspective. Therefore, the English glosses of our Dutch text material will not contain literal translations.

3 1298 N. Stukker et al. / Journal of Pragmatics 40 (2008) Why do language users need so many lexical contrasts for marking causal constructions? An obvious answer would be: because the markers have different meanings, and because these differences are salient enough to maintain specialized expressions for communicating them. An explanation suggested by several cognitive semanticists is that causality markers function as categorization devices, assigning the causal relation expressed to a specific conceptual type of causal relation. So far, causality markers manifest at different levels of linguistic structure have typically been studied in isolation. As a consequence, the notions used to describe the meaning and use of causality markers vary enormously among grammatical types. For example, causal verbs in a variety of languages have been characterized making use of the notions coercion, permission, volition, control, autonomy, directness (cf. Shibatani, 1976; Givón, 1976; Wierzbicka, 1988; Talmy, 1988a; Verhagen and Kemmer, 1997; Degand, 2001; Wolff and Song, 2003). Causal connectives, on the other hand, have been described with reference to notions that can hardly be related to those used for describing causal verbs, for example subjectivity (e.g. Pander Maat and Sanders, 2000; Pit, 2003), or related concepts such as speaker involvement (Pander Maat and Degand, 2001), and mental spaces (Dancygier and Sweetser, 2000; Verhagen, 2005). In view of the basic assumption underlying the studies mentioned, this is a surprising situation. If a parallel between semantic categories and conceptual categories holds, we would expect that similar conceptual models of causality are manifest across different types of linguistic constructions expressing causality, notwithstanding obvious grammatical differences. In this paper, we argue that an integrative approach of causality markers of different types is not only possible, but also highly desirable, if we are to fully understand the mechanisms underlying the linguistic expression of causality. We aim to make such a contribution to the study of causality, adding two new aspects to previous discussions. Firstly, we apply cognitive semantic theories and concepts originally developed for explaining clause-level phenomena, to connectives linguistic items operating on the level of discourse structure. Secondly, we test our cross-level similarity hypothesis empirically against data from language use. We ll proceed as follows: in section 3 we sketch the parallels between the linguistic levels and illustrate them with corpus examples of the causal verbs doen and laten, and the causal connectives daardoor, daarom, and dus. In section 4, we address the question whether such analytical results have any cognitive relevance. In order to provide some more direct evidence for the central idea of cross-level parallels, we set out to test the cross-level similarity hypothesis in an experiment, investigating the intuitions of language users themselves. We believe that this combination of methods is imperative if we ultimately aim at an integrative theory of causality markers that is descriptively adequate and cognitively plausible. Before we start reporting the empirical studies, we present a brief overview of arguments in favor of the cognitive assumption underlying the cross-level similarity hypothesis (section 2). We also discuss how the methodology of converging evidence used in this study contributes to a better understanding of the relation between linguistic causality markers and cognitive models of causality. 2. Conceptual models in linguistic causality markers The concept of causality lies at the core of our understanding of how the world functions. The Oxford English Dictionary defines causality as: the operation or relation of cause and effect. Cause is defined as that which produces an effect; that which gives rise to any action, phenomenon or condition. Exactly how this relation of cause and effect is to be defined has been a matter of debate from Aristotle s times until the present day, and seems to depend crucially on the chosen level of analysis. In this paper we will focus on the way causality is defined in human cognition. Findings from cognitive psychology and anthropology suggest that every-day human conceptual

4 N. Stukker et al. / Journal of Pragmatics 40 (2008) thought concerning causality is organized in models (cf. Michotte, 1963; Piaget and Garcia, 1974; Piaget and Inhelder, 1969; D Andrade, 1987). An important characteristic of these conceptual causality models is that they differ fundamentally from scientific models explaining how the world functions. The conceptual models structuring every-day thinking represent simplified theories, reflecting conceptual systems that are rooted in naive physics and psychology (cf. Lakoff, 1987; Talmy, 1988a). Psychological and anthropological research on causality suggests that the human mind distinguishes different types of causality. Michotte (1963), for example, suggests that in the human understanding of causality, categorization into different types plays a role. These findings are corroborated by anthropological studies like D Andrade (1987), who presents evidence suggesting that we invoke an elaborate Folk model of the mind in our every-day thinking about the causing of mental states (emotions, feelings, intentions, etc.). In this conceptual model, too, categorization into different types of mental states is an important notion. The idea that conceptual models and the act of categorization play an important role in language as well, has been present for decades (cf. Rumelhart, 1975; Schank and Abelson, 1977; Fillmore, 1976). It has recently been elaborated specifically in the field of cognitive semantics, a foundational characteristic of which is the assumption that a direct relation exists between semantic knowledge and world knowledge. Cognitive semanticists view language as a structured collection of meaningful categories that help us deal with new experiences and store information about old ones (Geeraerts, 1997:8; see also Langacker, 2000; Haiman, 1980; Lakoff, 1987; Taylor, 1995). An assumption that is particularly important for the purposes of the present paper is that with respect to content and structure, linguistic categories are analogous to conceptual categories (that exist independently from language). Following this line of reasoning, several authors have proposed that the semantic contrast between causality markers is adequately described with reference to the conceptual models of causality discussed above; more specifically, to the different categories of causality within these models (cf. Talmy, 1976, 1988a; Lakoff, 1987; Verhagen and Kemmer, 1997). These authors propose that causality markers function as categorization devices: when selecting a specific marker among the options available in a language, the language user assigns the causal relation expressed to a specific type ( category ) of causal relation. Starting from this assumption, Talmy (1988a) argues that different types of causality markers should be analyzed with reference to one invariable conceptual model, namely, the conceptual model of Force Dynamics, which describes how entities interact with respect to force. He argues that this model is rooted in human conceptual understanding of causality and claims that Force Dynamics makes it possible to generalize over semantic properties of grammatically different types of causal expressions in English, ranging from causal verbs and prepositions to modal expressions and causal connectives (Talmy, 1988a:50; see also Degand, ). Talmy s Force Dynamics theory has been influential until today. We want to investigate whether other sources than the analyst s intuitions introspection is the only source of evidence in Talmy s proposal point in the same direction. Recent insights have shown that the analyst s intuitions alone do not always provide a reliable source of evidence for questions concerning patterns of language use and their relation to conceptual structure (cf. Gibbs, 2006; Sanders and 3 We limit our discussion to the parallel proposed between conceptual categories and semantic categories, modeling the contrasts between various markers available for highly similar causal constructions (verbs or connectives). An integrative approach of causal expressions focusing on causal constructions (prepositions, verbs, and connectives) is proposed by Degand (1996, 2001). She shows that Talmy s common causative situation underlies all of the constructions investigated, while they differ in terms of metafunctions and strata as proposed in systemic functional grammar (cf. Halliday, 1985; Dik, 1978).

5 1300 N. Stukker et al. / Journal of Pragmatics 40 (2008) Spooren, 2007). Subsequent studies, based on analyses of corpora of natural language use, show that marking patterns in specific causality markers are often co-determined by more general cognitive models (for elaboration of this argument, see Kemmer and Verhagen, 1994; Verhagen and Kemmer, 1997). Furthermore, like many other cognitive semantic theories, Talmy s proposal predominantly focuses on expressions that function within clauses. Causal conjunctions, typically used to connect clauses at the level of discourse structure, are taken into account mainly in their non-typical function as prepositional markers (because of). The studies reported in the present paper aim to extend the integrative perspective on causality markers as proposed by Talmy beyond the clause-level, and aim to realize it in empirical research. We make use of the methodology of converging evidence (Gries et al., 2005; Sanders and Spooren, 2007). As a first step, the meaning and use of the causal verbs doen and laten, and of the causal connectives daardoor, daarom and dus in corpora of natural language use was investigated. In section 3, we summarize results of the corpus analyses and show that parallels in meaning and use of causal verbs and causal connectives exist at an analytical level. This first step yields a hypothesis that has descriptive adequacy. As a second step, the cognitive plausibility of our analytical results from language use was assessed. The actual usage of linguistic items is expected to contain strong indications of the knowledge language users have concerning their meaning and use (cf. Langacker, 1987, 2000; Bybee, 1985; Barlow and Kemmer, 2000, and contributions to that volume). However, more direct evidence regarding the cognitive plausibility of the cross-level similarity hypothesis do analytical findings have a parallel in the mind of language users? can be obtained by testing hypotheses against language users intuitions. Therefore the cross-level similarity hypothesis was additionally tested in an experimental study, which is reported in section Categorization of causality in Dutch language use 3.1. Causality marking at the clause level: animacy Verhagen and Kemmer (1997, 1992), Kemmer and Verhagen (1994) investigate the relation between conceptual models and the lexical semantics of the Dutch causal verbs doen ( make ) and laten ( have, let ). When analyzing empirical data from actual language use, they note a strong asymmetry in the participant types doen and laten are combined with: doen is typically used when the causal process relates inanimate elements, while laten is typically used with animate causal participants. Verhagen and Kemmer relate this patterning to the conceptual model of Naive Dualism, which captures the fundamental distinction we tend to make in our every-day thinking, namely between events ultimately originating from some mind, and events that originate from our inanimate, physical environment (Verhagen and Kemmer, 1997:70 72; Verhagen, 1995; see also other contributions to Stein and Wright, 1995). Verhagen and Kemmer observe that doen is predominantly used if the cause-part of the relation refers to an inanimate entity. According to the model of Naive Dualism, physical entities are taken to act directly on other entities or persons. This motivates an interpretation as direct causation 4 : doen is used when the activity of the cause-part is conceptualized as causing the 4 The notion of directness has been used for characterizing causal expressions by other authors as well. It should be noted, however, that the content of this label varies among studies. In many studies, the notion is used to contrast causal constructions with varying degrees of syntactic and semantic integratedness (cf. Kemmer and Verhagen, 1994). For example, lexical causatives ( direct ) are distinguished from other types of causatives (analytical, morphological) which count as more indirect (cf. Givón, 1975; Shibatani, 1976; Wierzbicka, 1988; Shibatani and Pardeshi, 2001; Wolff and Song, 2003).

6 N. Stukker et al. / Journal of Pragmatics 40 (2008) effected predicate immediately and directly (Verhagen and Kemmer, 1997:71 73). Representative examples 5 are (6) and (7): (6) Belangrijk is dat [ groene sneeuwklokjes] op een s zomers koele plaats geplant worden; warmte doet het blad te vroeg afsterven zodat de bol niet groeit, of geeft gevaar voor schimmels. It is important that [ green snowdrops] be planted in a summery place that is cool in summer; heat causes the leaf to die prematurely so that the bulb will not grow, or makes it prone to fungus. (7) (From a review of the Dutch magazine Filosofie Magazine). Het wegvallen van allerlei bindende ideologieën, gepaard aan een ongekend grote keuzevrijheid, doet individuen zoeken naar hun eigen weg door het bestaan. The fading away of all sorts of uniting ideologies, coupled with unprecedentedly large freedom of choice, makes individuals search for their own way through life. In (6) the heat causes the leaf to die directly; if the heat is present, nothing can prevent the leaf from dying. A similar understanding of (7) is likely: when interpreting this situation we assume that the mere occurrence of the fading away of all sorts of uniting ideologies and the unprecedentedly large freedom of choice bring about the searching for their own way unavoidably; there is nothing the individuals can do to avert the effect. Laten, on the other hand, is almost exclusively used in constructions with animate causes (Verhagen and Kemmer, 1997:65). The meaning and use of laten are best described as marking indirect causation see examples (8) and (9): (8) Jari Litmanen komt de komende tweeënhalf jaar uit voor Liverpool. [...] De Fin krijgt medewerking van Barcelona, dat hem ondanks een contract tot 2002 transfervrij laat vertrekken. Jari Litmanen will play for Liverpool for the next two and a half years[...].. The Finn received cooperation from Barcelona, which despite a contract valid until 2002, lets him leave without transfer. (9) [From an interview with dancer and repetitor Tatiana Leskova] Omdat de techniek van de huidige dansers beter is geworden, mag en moet je een oud ballet daaraan wel aanpassen. [...] Dus laat ik de enkele pirouettes van destijds nu dubbel draaien. Because the skills of today s dancers have improved, you may and you must adapt an old ballet to the circumstances. [...] Therefore, nowadays I have the single pirouettes from those days turned twice. According to the model of Naive Dualism, animate beings can only act on other animate beings via the intervening physical world. In other words: it is not possible to reach into another person s mind and directly cause them to act (Verhagen and Kemmer, 1997:72 73). This is exactly the interpretation that fits laten-marked causative constructions. In (8), the soccer club Barcelona is initiating the causal process, but cannot control its complete course; the effect of him leaving will take place only if an intermediary factor, associated in this example with Litmanen s intentions to join a different club, come into play. Hence, this intermediary force is seen as the 5 The fragments discussed in section 3 are examples from natural language use, taken from a corpus of newspaper texts (the Dutch daily newspaper Trouw, electronically available from Factlane (LexisNexis Nederland) see Stukker, 2005).

7 1302 N. Stukker et al. / Journal of Pragmatics 40 (2008) Fig. 1. Prototypical usage-types of doen and laten. force most directly involved in bringing about the effect. A similar interpretation holds for (9): the causer I induces the causal process, but the effect of pirouettes turned twice only occurs because of an activity of the dancers who perform the pirouettes. 6 Verhagen and Kemmer define Indirect Causation as a situation that is conceptualized in such a way that it is recognized that some other force besides the initiator is the most immediate source of energy in the effected event (Verhagen and Kemmer, 1997:67). The prototypical usage types 7 of doen and laten can be characterized as in Fig. 1. This patterning doen with inanimate causal participants and laten with animate ones characterizes the vast majority of usage-contexts of Dutch causal verbs (Verhagen and Kemmer, 1997; Degand, 2001; Stukker, 2005). Apart from these prototypical usage contexts, doen and laten occur in contexts that are non-standard in terms of participant configurations. An example is (10), a causal process containing animate participants, laten s prototypical usage context, marked with doen. (10) (From a book review) Askew raakt meer en meer de weg kwijt [...] Kit weet contact met hem te krijgen en hem te doen inzien dat hij [...]de sterke schouder kan zijn waarop zijn disfunctionele gezin kan leunen. Askew is losing his way more and more [...] Kit manages to stay in contact with him and to make him see that he [...] can be a strong shoulder for his dysfunctional family to lean on. These exceptions to the rule, however, should not be interpreted as counter-examples to the idea that causal verbs are directly related to the conceptual model of direct causation. What these conventional contexts have in common, is that the effect of the markers are best explained with reference to the prototypical usage contexts themselves. Corpus data suggest that doen + animate participants (see (10)) only occurs in contexts which demonstrably allow for an interpretation as direct causation, and these are contexts where doen brings about a rhetorical effect that fits the overall interpretation of the fragment within its context well (Verhagen and Kemmer, 1997:73 77; see also Stukker, 2005:63 67). The effect see in (10), for example, may or may not be intended by the causer Kit, but the occurrence of the process is ultimately beyond her complete control. The extent to which the causee, the experiencer of the causal effect him, controls the coming about of the effect see that he can be a strong shoulder for his dysfunctional 6 Note that in this respect Dutch laten differs from equivalents in other languages, such as English let, and French laisser. The latter can only be used to mark permissive or enablement relations, in which the effect occurs because of an inherent tendency of the causee, e.g. in example (8) forces associated with him (Talmy, 1988a,b, 2000; Verhagen and Kemmer, 1997:68). Dutch laten, on the other hand, can also be used to mark outright causal processes, defined as situations in which the causer forces the causee to carry out an activity they are not inherently inclined to perform, cf. (9). As a consequence, laten s meaning is relatively schematic, and best captured by the notion of indirect causation. For a more extensive discussion, see Verhagen and Kemmer (1997:69 70). 7 In line with the usage-based approach to language (cf. Langacker, 1987; Barlow and Kemmer, 2000, and contributions to that volume; Bybee, 2006), the term prototypicality is used here with reference to the level of usage of the constructions. The degree of prototypicality is determined on the basis of usage frequency (for a more elaborate discussion, see Stukker et al. (in prep.)).

8 N. Stukker et al. / Journal of Pragmatics 40 (2008) family to lean on is somewhat ambiguous, depending on contextual factors. These factors explain why doen fits the context of (10) so well: its effect can be characterized as backgrounding Askew s (factually present) contribution to bringing about the effect. This analysis fits the most obvious interpretation of this specific causal process, namely, that in (10) the causal effect comes about more or less against Askew s intentions; it is not likely that he contributed to it actively. In other words, an interpretation of (10) as an instance of direct causation, construed as a process with a cause-participant that can act directly on the effect-participant, rather than indirect causation, is licensed by specific and demonstrable context factors. This type of exploitative usage is relatively rare, but not uncommon (on doen see also Verhagen, 2000; examples of exploitative usage of connectives will be discussed in section 3.2). It has been explained as a normal fact of language use and it fits in with assumptions held in many branches of linguistics, namely the assumption that linguistic utterances are relatively underspecified : the mental representation built from an utterance is a result not only of explicit linguistic signals, but it is also influenced by the language user s knowledge of the specific context of use. Individual linguistic elements in the utterance give minimal, but sufficient clues for finding the domains and principles appropriate for building the mental representation (Fauconnier, 1994:xviii; see Verhagen, 1997 for a more elaborate discussion of the necessity of context-sensitivity of language; see discussion of implications of this idea for theories on coherence in Sanders and Spooren, 2001). The rhetorical function of doen in the context of (10) can be explained with reference to a basic tenet in cognitive semantics, viz. that an expression s meaning is not just an objective characterization of the situation described. Equally important is how the speaker chooses to construe the situation and portray it for expressive purposes; language use is inherently perspectivized Langacker (2002:315, 1987); cf. Talmy s (1988b, 2000) imaging systems ). Evidently, causality markers do not function as mere plug-ins, able to bring about any interpretation in any context; a minimum amount of congruence between a linguistic element s meaning and the context it is used in, is required. It is along these lines that the marking of (10) with doen instead of laten can be explained. The ambiguous context allows for different construals in terms of directness of the causal process. Where laten would have favored a construal as indirect causation, with a relatively autonomous role for the causee Askew marking with doen highlights the non-intentional aspects present in this specific context. In itself, the exploitative usage of doen underlines its function as a categorization device assigning the causal process to the conceptual category of direct causation, construing it as a causal relation between inanimate elements. The fact that contexts of use may be ambiguous for causality type plays a crucial role in the experiment reported in section Causality marking at the discourse level: subjectivity The meaning and use of the Dutch causal connectives daardoor ( because of that ), daarom ( that s why ) and dus ( so ) have been characterized with reference to the cognitive concept of subjectivity. This concept is rooted in the human cognitive ability to relate information to a speaking or thinking subject of consciousness (Sanders and Spooren, 1997; Verhagen, 2005) and may be defined as language users ability to express themselves and to adopt other people s perspectives (Pit, 2005:26). In linguistic theory, subjectivity has been defined as speaker foregrounding, or: the speaker s self expression (Langacker, 1987, 2002; Lyons, 1995). Presence or absence of speaker foregrounding in the causal relation is commonly assumed to be the major dimension determining the distribution of daardoor, daarom and dus (Pander Maat and Sanders, 2000, 2001; Pander Maat and Degand, 2001; Pit, 2003; Stukker, 2005). The degree

9 1304 N. Stukker et al. / Journal of Pragmatics 40 (2008) of speaker foregrounding in causal coherence relations can be analyzed with reference to the subject of consciousness (SOC; Lyons, 1995; see for a similar concept Langacker, 1990), defined in this context of discourse causality as a person whose intentional acting is seen as the ultimate source of the causal relation (Pander Maat and Sanders, 2000:64). 8 Subjectivity then is defined as the conceptual distance between the speaker and the SOC responsible for the causal relation (Pander Maat and Sanders, 2000:77). If the SOC coincides with the present speaker, the causal relation is maximally subjective. Subjective relations are typically marked with dus, and they are typically relations where an (implicit) speaker SOC performs an act of reasoning (Pander Maat and Sanders, 2000; Stukker, 2005). This type of causal relations is commonly referred to as epistemic causal relations (cf. Sweetser, 1990). An example is (11), where the causal relation is constructed between the situation that both the speaker and the addressee have a position of power, and the speaker SOC s conclusion that they can talk on the same level. (11) (The editor in chief of the radio show, With the Eye on Tomorrow tells about a letter he once received from a listener.) De goede man schreef: Mijnheer, u bent de baas van Het Oog, en ik ben de baas van mijn vrouw. We kunnen dus op niveau praten. Waarop de vraag volgt of Van Hoorn nu eindelijk iets kan doen aan die vermaledijde begintune. The good man wrote: Sir, you are the boss of The Eye, and I am the boss of my wife. Therefore we can talk on the same level. After this, the question follows whether Van Hoorn can finally do something about that cursed opening tune. Daarom and daardoor, on the other hand, are prototypically used in contexts where the causal relation is constructed between two situations in observable reality ( content causality, Sweetser, 1990). In these cases, the causal relations are, as a whole, reported by the speaker, who is not, contrary to epistemic causal relations, by default the relation s SOC. In these contexts, the distance between speaker and SOC is relatively large; accordingly, they are commonly categorized in language use as objective causal relations. Within the category of objective causal relations, Dutch connectives make a distinction between intentional causal relations with an agent SOC (in (12), zij they ), typically marked with daarom, and non-intentional causal relations without an SOC-role. The latter type are relations of pure cause, constructed between physical or uncontrollable mental processes, where human intervention does not play a role, typically marked with daardoor (Pander Maat and Sanders, 1995; Stukker, 2005); an example is (13). (12) Ook Koert Bakker en Jessica Gysel van relatiebemiddelingsbureau Fanclub menen dat de traditionele reclame klinisch dood is. Daarom organiseren zij voor Adidas hiphopparty s en straatvoetbalfeesten. Koert Bakker and Jessica Gysel from Fanclub PR Service also claim the traditional advertisement is as good as dead. That s why they are organizing hiphop parties and street soccer activities for Adidas. (13) De [schaatser Frans de Ronde] omschreef de Jaap Edenbaan als een grote kattebak. Overal lag zand. Daardoor schaatsten velen met bramen op hun ijzers [...]. The [skater Frans de Ronde] defined the Jaap Eden rink as a big kitty litter bin. There was sand everywhere. Because of this, many skaters skated with burrs on their blades[...]. 8 For equivalent concepts and definitions, see Pander Maat and Degand (2001) and Pit (2003).

10 N. Stukker et al. / Journal of Pragmatics 40 (2008) Fig. 2. Prototypical usage-types of daardoor, daarom and dus. In (13) one situation in the real world leads to another: the presence of sand on the skating rink causes the burrs on the skates blades, without intervention of a human intentional agent. By contrast, in causal relations with an agent SOC the cause-part of the relation presents a motivation the agent may have had for performing the action reported in the effect-part of the causal relation. For example, in (12) the perception that traditional advertisement is as good as dead leads to the intentional act performed in the real world of organizing hiphop parties and street soccer activities for Adidas. The prototypical usage types of dus, daarom and daardoor can be characterized as in Fig. 2. Apart from these prototypical usage types (see discussion in section 3.1), dus, daarom and daardoor may occur in contexts that are linguistically construed differently. Examples are (14) and (15): (14) (The first sentences from a review of the book Bird history of Amsterdam ) Nederland verstedelijkt. Daarom is het niet vreemd dat ook de stadse natuur steeds vaker aandacht krijgt van natuurvorsers. The Netherlands is becoming urbanized. That s why it is not at all odd that urban nature is getting more attention from naturalists. (15) (Bystanders rush to help out at the Volendam pub fire.) Ik woon vlakbij, dus ik ben brandwondencrème gaan halen. I live nearby so I ran to get burn ointment. Fragment (14) contains an epistemic causal relation. The situation that the Netherlands is becoming urbanized serves as an argument for the conclusion that it is not at all odd that urban nature is getting more attention from naturalists. This causal relation evidently contains an implicit speaker SOC: the speaker constructs the causal relation by presenting the situation in the first sentence as an argument for the conclusion presented in the next sentence. This is a typical usage-context for dus; however, (14) is marked with daarom. Corpus data suggest that daarom is used instead of dus in epistemic causal contexts where the speaker appears to background his or her SOC-role as a concluder in the causal relation (Stukker, 2005: ; Stukker et al., in prep.). They differ for example in degree of performativity : while the conclusions in dusmarked epistemic relations always concern new knowledge, daarom may also be used to mark epistemic relations with conclusions that either concern knowledge that is contextually available and already accepted, 9 or conclusions that are not regarded as disputable knowledge. Fragment (14) is of the latter type. The reviewer quotes from the book being reviewed; therefore not the reviewer herself is responsible for the conclusion presented in the second sentence, but the 9 An example where the givenness of the conclusion is linguistically marked (with zo so ), is: Maar bij ernstige brandwonden is het hele lichaam ziek, zegt Hermans De lever, de nieren, alle organen doen mee. Daarom/#dus is de zorg voor deze patiënten zo ingewikkeld. Serious burns make the whole body ill says Hermans. The liver, the kidneys, all organs are affected. That s why/#so the care for these patients is so complicated. In these cases, marking with dus ( so ) is ungrammatical (Stukker, 2005: ).

11 1306 N. Stukker et al. / Journal of Pragmatics 40 (2008) author of the book is. In line with this interpretation, daarom signals that the speaker must not be construed as the causal relation s SOC, the person responsible for this particular causal relation. The opposite strategy, namely rhetorical speaker foregrounding, occurs in causal relations containing an explicit actor SOC, a context where daarom is the default marker, marked with dus. Corpus data suggest that dus is used instead of daarom in these contexts if the context contains an argumentative flavor (Stukker, 2005: ; see also Pander Maat and Sanders, 2000:71 74 presenting a similar analysis), and, in this respect, resembles an epistemic causal relation. In (15) the relation as a whole is presented from the perspective of an embedded speaker (cf. Sanders and Spooren, 1997), the interviewee, which is signaled by the speaker of the text with quotation marks. This embedded speaker does not only convey the motivation for her action to run to get burn ointment, but also seems to argue that this was exactly the right thing to do under the circumstances given, thus invoking the conventional action schema (cf. topos, Anscombre and Ducrot, 1983): if in case of emergency some tool is needed, the person that has easiest access to it must go and get it. The examples of non-prototypical usage of connectives discussed here are not exhaustive, but they illustrate an important point: similar to what was reported for causal verbs (see section 3.1), usage-types of causal connectives that diverge from the prototypical usage configurations can be interpreted as speaker construals serving rhetorical purposes. With connectives as well, the effects of these construals is adequately analyzed with reference to the prototypical usage-context of the connective itself (Stukker, 2005: ; Stukker et al., in prep.). In other words, just like causal verbs, connectives can be used exploitatively whenever a specific context of use is sufficiently ambiguous with respect to causality type Cross-level parallels in Dutch linguistic categorization The discussion in the previous sections suggest that, despite obvious constructional differences, important parallels exist between the way language users categorize causal relations at the clause-level with causal verbs, and the way they categorize causal relations at the discourse-level with causal connectives at least from an analytical point of view. First, in both types of expressions it is the specific nature of the interaction between the cause factor and the effect factor that determines categorization. A further parallel exists in the way these force interactions are conceptualized. Both in verbs and in connectives, it is the distinction between animate and inanimate entities that determines categorization of causal events. Or more precisely, in causal relations marked with a connective, it is the presence or absence of an SOC, and in causal relations marked with a causal auxiliary verb it is the type of causal participants (causer or causee) that determines categorization (see Stukker, 2005:chapter 7, for a more elaborate discussion). In both types of causality markers, then, we see reflected the conceptual model of Naive Dualism. At this point, the following hypothesis on cross-level parallels between causal verbs and causal connectives in Dutch can be formulated: Cross-level hypothesis I: The clause level causality marker doen parallels the discourse level marker daardoor in marking inanimate causality. II: The clause level causality marker laten parallels the discourse level markers daarom and dus in marking animate causality. Yet, the parallel between verbs and connectives is not perfect. An important difference is that connectives allow for expressing more causality types than verbs do: dus, prototypically marking subjective causality, does not seem to have an equivalent causal verb at the clause-level. For this

12 moment we will leave this question aside and focus on daardoor, daarom, doen and laten only, but we will come back to this question in section Experiment: do language users experience parallels in causal verbs and discourse connectives? The corpus analyses reported in the previous section yielded a hypothesis that has descriptive adequacy. But do the analytical conclusions on cross-level similarities have any cognitive relevance? In line with the methodology of converging evidence (see the discussion in section 2), the results of the corpus analyses will be supplemented by experimental evidence. The remainder of this paper reports an experiment testing language users intuitions on conceptual parallels between causal verbs and causal connectives. In other words, the theoretically motivated hypothesis is tested in speakers own terms. A further advantage of experimental testing is the possibility of manipulating text material so as to put the comparability of causal verbs and causal connectives on edge Experimental task and hypotheses N. Stukker et al. / Journal of Pragmatics 40 (2008) The aim of the experiment is to investigate whether categorizations that language users make with doen and laten parallel the categorizations they make with daardoor and daarom in situations of real language use. The general claim under investigation is: Language users experience similarities between the causal verb doen and the causal connective daardoor; and between the verb laten and the connective daarom. Participants were asked to paraphrase intra-clausal causal relations marked with either doen or laten with an inter-clausal paraphrase of the relation, marked with daardoor or daarom. 10 For a number of reasons we chose to direct performance on the task somewhat by prefabricating usage-contexts and response options, rather than using, e.g. an open elicitation task. A prestructured task is believed to reduce the complexity of a task which in itself demands considerable skills in abstraction and metalinguistic reasoning. Another advantage was taken to be that homogeneity of the output of the experiment was favored. Finally, when using standardized answering options, it was expected that interpretative role of the analysts was reduced to a minimum. An example of an item used in the experiment is (16) 11 : (16) Zaterdagavond stond het openluchtfestival van Blokzijl op het punt te beginnen. [Enkele spetters regen] cause deden [de organisatoren het ergste vrezen] effect. On Saturday night, the open air festival of Blokzijl was about to start [A few drops of rain] cause made [the organizers fear for the worst] effect. Paraphrase [Er vielen enkele spetters regen] cause. [Some drops of rain fell] cause. a. Daardoor [vreesden de organisatoren het ergste] effect. Because of that [the organizers feared for the worst] effect. 10 This experimental design was inspired by Sanders and Verhagen (1996). However, the exact purposes of their test and the way items were constructed differ from the version presented here. 11 Underlining is added here only for ease of presentation; in the layout of the real experiment it was of course absent. A complete list of items used in the experiment is presented in Stukker (2005:appendix 6-3) (accessible online via igitur-archive.library.uu.nl/dissertations/ /app.pdf).

13 1308 N. Stukker et al. / Journal of Pragmatics 40 (2008) b. Daarom [vreesden de organisatoren het ergste] effect. That s why [the organizers feared for the worst] effect. In each item, a causative sentence was marked with a causal verb, either doen or laten. This sentence was followed by two inter-clausal paraphrases of the same causal relation. The paraphrases differed in only one respect: they were marked with either the connective daarom or daardoor. Subjects were asked to choose the paraphrase that, according to their intuitions, resembled the original intra-clausal causal relation best. The hypotheses tested are: Hypotheses I: Language users prefer a paraphrase marked with daardoor when the original causative constructions are marked with doen. II: Language users prefer a paraphrase marked with daarom when the original causative constructions are marked with laten Construction of items The material used in this experiment had to meet a number of demands. In order to enhance representativity and generalizability, usage-contexts were selected from corpora of natural language use. 12 Ideally the sample would have been built proportionally from prototypical and non-prototypical usage-contexts (cf. section 3). However, this was prevented by the experimental design chosen. There is specifically one demand that places considerable restrictions on the material to be used, namely that in the inter-clausal paraphrases, alternative markers (daarom or daardoor) fit equally well. Obviously, the task choose the paraphrase that resembles the causal sentence best is credible only if the paraphrases themselves don t differ in quality, and are perfectly ambiguous in the given context. The selected usage contexts must prevent that subjects make their choice for one of the alternatives on the basis of differences in appropriateness of the markers in those contexts. Therefore, only contexts of use were included in the experiment that were neither markedly intentional causal nor non-intentional causal ; these are the non-prototypical usage contexts (cf. section 3.2). Two types of contexts were employed to ensure this type of ambiguity. The first type contains an effect denoting predicate that refers to an intentional act, combined with a modifier that possibly (but ambiguously) amends the intentional aspect. An example is (17): (17) Het hoorspel War of the worlds maakte in het jaar 1938 heel wat emoties los. De nieuwsberichten over marsmannetjes waren nogal realistisch, en daarom/daardoor renden de mensen in paniek de straat op. In the year 1938 the radio play War of the worlds caused a lot of fuss. The news messages about Martians were rather realistic, and that s why/because of that people ran into the street in panic. In (17), the effect-denoting predicate renden ran, that in itself is inherently intentional, is modified by in paniek in panic The mental state of panicking is by definition non-intentional. Because of the juxtaposition of these two elements, the effect-denoting sentence has an ambiguous reading. It can be interpreted focusing either on the intentional aspect or on the non-intentional aspect (cf. the discussion in section 3). In these contexts both daardoor and daarom can be used in a natural way. 12 Mainly newspaper texts, see Stukker (2005:177) for an overview.

14 The second strategy consisted of selecting effect predicates denoting a mental state that is ambiguous to the degree in which the experiencer can control its occurrence, such as belief states and feelings (cf. D Andrade s (1987) Folk model of the mind). An example is (16) above, containing an animate locus of effect which is ambiguous for SOC-hood. The causal effect fearing may or may not be brought about intentionally. From the viewpoint of adequacy, daardoor and daarom fit this context equally well. Evidently, subtle meaning change occurs when alternating the markers. Daardoor backgrounds the degree of control the locus of effect may have had in bringing about the effected event, while daarom foregrounds this aspect. Of course we expected that it is precisely this subtle meaning difference that determines subjects choice; we expected that they would prefer the daardoor paraphrase if the preceding sentence was marked with doen, and daarom if the preceding sentence was marked with laten. A further concern was to construct two-clause paraphrases in such a way that elements essential in determining the choice for a causality marker in either analytic causatives or causal coherence relations be left unchanged. Because of the grammatical differences between analytic causative constructions and causal coherence relations, special care must be taken to ensure that structure and content of the two-clause paraphrases correspond to the simple clause originals at crucial aspects. We proceeded as follows: It was assumed that in both construction types, the causality category (intentional or non-intentional) is determined as a result of the nature of the interaction between the causal participants (see the discussion in section 3). This implies that when constructing an inter-clausal paraphrase out of an analytical causative construction, it is important that the point of application remain constant from the perspective of the causal effect, as the nature of the causee in analytic causatives and the SOC (or non-soc) in causal coherence relations determines categorization (see section 3) to an important extent. Generally this is not a problem, since the only conversion needed is to replace the infinitival form in the analytic causative construction by the corresponding finite form in the effect clause of the inter-clausal causal relation (cf. (16) in which infinitival vrezen fear from the causal sentence is replaced by the finite form vreesden feared ). It is equally important, for the same reason, that the point of application in the causal relation doesn t change essentially from the perspective of the cause-part. In extending the (nominal) causer to a complete clause, adding extra elements to the causal chain should be avoided. We made use of constructions in which mentioning of the causer was accompanied by different kinds of specifying information in modifier (adjectival and adverbial) phrases. In the analytic causative construction in (16), for example, the causal relation is constructed between the causer drops of rain and the causee the organizers who feared for the worst. The cause-part consists of only a noun phrase: the noun spetters drops, complemented with the modifiers enkele some and regen (of) rain. In the inter-clausal paraphrase, this cause-part is extended into a complete clause by adding the verb vielen fell and Dutch presentative er. An important difference lies of course in the switching of a noun phrase (part of proposition) to a situation (complete proposition), but the change in conceptualization that is brought about is limited to zooming out on the causal process: the content remains constant, it is only the relative attention different elements receive that has changed Statistical analysis N. Stukker et al. / Journal of Pragmatics 40 (2008) Statistical analysis was carried out with an itemized, one sample T-test. This test compares means per item with chance, which would be the expected score value if subjects choice of paraphrase were not influenced by the preceding causal verb (=H 0 ). Each time an individual

15 1310 N. Stukker et al. / Journal of Pragmatics 40 (2008) response was in accordance with H 1, a score 1 was allotted. If an individual response was contradicting H 1, score 0 was allotted. The effect per item was computed on the sum of individual scores. The direction of the effect is indicated by the value of these mean scores: if it is >.5, participants that responded in accordance with our hypotheses outnumber the ones who didn t; if it is <.5, it is the other way round. The level of acceptance was set to 5% ( p =.05). Since the T-test output is two-tailed and the hypothesis tested in this study is one-sided, a value of p <.05 does not automatically entail that the results of the item involved should be regarded as in accordance with hypothesis ; this can only be concluded if p <.05 and the mean score > Pilot experiment The experimental design was first tested in a pilot experiment. 13 Five doen-marked items and five laten-marked items were tested. The items were constructed following the procedure sketched above. Ambiguity of the paraphrases with respect to appropriateness of both daarom and daardoor as markers of the causal relation was evaluated intersubjectively by independent judges. In order to distract subjects attention from the experiment s goal, one third of the experiment consisted of fillers. Participants were 88 first-year students of Dutch Language and Culture and 9 students of other Language studies at Utrecht University attending a course on Text analysis, and 42 second-year students of Speech Therapy at the school of Higher Vocational Education in Rotterdam (HRO) attending a course on statistics. Hardly any effects were found in this version of the experiment. These findings were unexpected and contradicted previous findings (Sanders and Verhagen, 1996). Careful scrutiny of both the test instrument and the experimental procedure led to the tentative conclusion that the unexpected results may have been caused by a mismatch between the participants in the experiment and the level of abstractness of the task. The rather complex experimental task probably demands experimental participants with considerable abstract-analytical capacities, which the students participating in our experiment lacked. Several participants reported finding the task difficult. Furthermore, post hoc analysis suggests that we did not succeed in constructing perfectly ambiguous contexts for each of the items (see Stukker, 2005: for further details). These facts in combination may form an explanation for indications we have, that a considerable number of participants did not carry out the task the way it was intended. They rather appeared to compare the paraphrases with each other and pick out the nicest one, the one that was the best expression in the text, instead of comparing each paraphrase with the preceding causal sentence and picking out the paraphrase that resembled the original sentence best, as they were instructed to do. Hence, we decided to modify the experiment in two respects: participants with better developed analytic skills were selected, and the quality of the test instrument with respect to ambiguity of the paraphrases was ameliorated Experiment The experimental design of the pilot version was basically maintained. In order to reduce error variance as much as possible, different types of items were used. Thirty items were tested; Fig. 3 presents an overview. 13 It was prepared and carried out as a part of the master s thesis of Van Maaren (2002). A complete list of items used in the pilot experiment is presented in Stukker (2005:appendix 6-1) (accessible online via dissertations/ /app.pdf).

16 N. Stukker et al. / Journal of Pragmatics 40 (2008) Fig. 3. Item types. All of the items were newly constructed. A first adjustment to material construction was the character of the items. Twenty items were constructed following the procedure described in section 4.2. These will be referred to as natural text items. In an attempt to test the hypothesis more directly, a new type of items was added: the chameleon items (cf. Sanders, 1997). These items differed from the natural text items in that their usage context was ambiguous not only with respect to the use of daarom and daardoor in the paraphrases, but also with respect to the causal verbs: The analytic causative constructions in these items could be marked with both doen and laten. An example is (18): (18) [Tijdens een persconferentie lichtte de Minister van OCW de voorgestelde bezuinigingen toe.] De kritisch doorvragende journalisten deden/lieten hem vrezen voor de weergave van zijn plannen in de media. [During a press conference the Minister for Education presented the proposed cut-backs.] The persistently critical journalists made/had/let 14 him worry about the representation of his plans in the media. 14 The ambiguity in the Dutch version may not be present in English, acceptability of have or let in this context is debatable.

17 1312 N. Stukker et al. / Journal of Pragmatics 40 (2008) Paraphrase De journalisten bleven kritisch doorvragen; The journalists continued to pose critical questions; a. daardoor vreesde hij voor de weergave van zijn plannen in de media. because of that, he worried about the representation of his plans in the media. b. daarom vreesde hij voor de weergave van zijn plannen in de media. that s why he worried about the representation of his plans in the media. The purpose of this double ambiguity 15 was to test the hypothesis in the same usage context in two directions, as follows. Each chameleon item was inserted in the test instrument twice, once marked with doen and once marked with laten. IfH 1 holds, a chameleon item marked with doen leads to an overall preference of the daardoor-paraphrase. If, on the contrary, the same chameleon item is presented with laten, expectations are that in paraphrasing, preferences will shift to daarom. Findings like these would constitute even more direct and fine grained evidence for H 1. One important drawback of chameleons, however, is that they don t occur in real language use very frequently. Consequently, not all of the chameleon items included in the material are natural examples. The best chameleon candidates were causative constructions in which a rather typical laten-context had been marked with doen. This the type of exploitative use of doen discussed in section 3.1. Because of this specific character of the chameleons (animate causer, animate causee), we were quite sure that laten fitted the context as good as doen would, therefore the ambiguity of these causative constructions was not tested. All of the inter-clausal paraphrases (i.e.: all test items, leaving out the preceding intra-clausal relation) were pretested for ambiguity. They were presented in print as causal text fragments to thirteen test subjects representative of the test population. Participants were asked to mark the connective that, in their opinion, fitted the context best. It was assumed that the more ambiguous a given context was, the more dispersed the judgments of the group of subjects as a whole would be. We found indeed that with some items, preferences were distributed more or less evenly, while others appeared to give rise to a clear collective preference for one of the two options. The latter items were either revised or replaced by other contexts. Before including them in the test instrument, the resulting new paraphrases were pre-tested following the same procedure over again. Finally, in order to facilitate the performance of the experimental task, special attention was given to interpretability of the test items. This was done both with respect to the causal relations reported, and with respect to the text fragments as a whole. Only items expressing familiar causal schemes were included. To further facilitate interpretation, each item was introduced by a single sentence adding some context for interpreting the causal relation to follow, see for example (18). Information that was part of the original material for the natural text items but was not essential to interpreting the causal process (mainly modifiers), was left out. In order to distract subjects attention from the experimental goal, about half of the material consisted of fillers. 15 One reviewer noticed that the doen-version of item in (18) may suggest an interpretation of the questions of the journalists as the causer. Although this would strictly speaking be incorrect (journalists being the head of the nominal phrase), this interpretation is interesting because it implies an adaptation to the meaning of doen as a causality marker, illustrating the construal function of causality markers, described in section 3.1. In this specific context, doen evokes an interpretation of the journalists causing the fearing immediately and directly, as induced by a physical law (cf. the discussion of (6), (7) and (10) in section 3.1). In an interpretation along these lines, physical aspects of inherently animate participants in the process become foregrounded. It is exactly this type of variation in interpretation according to the marker chosen, that is exploited in this experiment.

18 4.6. Participants and procedure With the results of the pilot experiment in mind, advanced university students were selected as test subjects in the final version of the experiment. The experiment was presented as an integrated part of an advanced BA3-level course on cognitive processes of reading and writing. As an obligatory preparation for taking part in this course, all students had previously attended a course on text analysis. Therefore, all of the subjects were familiar with the idea that sentences in a text are connected by coherence relations, and with the idea that different types of causal relations may exist. Furthermore, all of the subjects were advanced level students either in Dutch Language and Culture or in Liberal Arts specializing in Language and Communication. Unlike the participants in the pilot-experiment, these participants can be expected to be more experienced analysts of language, and more proficient in performing an abstract analytical task such as the one at hand. Approximately 40 students enrolled for the course. The task was split up into three parts because of the heavy workload. The experimental sessions were held at fixed moments during three of the four seminars scheduled. Attendance per session fluctuated between 25 and 30 persons total. Each session lasted about min. Preceding the first session, a spoken instruction was provided by the experimentator. A summary of this instruction was attached as a title page to each copy of the experiment; participants were asked to reread it each session before they started working on the task. In the written as well as in the oral instruction, the need to compare the inter-clausal paraphrases to the intra-clausal version of the causal relation was emphasized Results N. Stukker et al. / Journal of Pragmatics 40 (2008) The results were analyzed per cluster of items (cf. Fig. 3), they will be discussed accordingly Natural text items Table 1 summarizes the findings for the doen-marked items. Though the exact strength varies over items, overall the doen-items show a strong tendency in the expected direction. Eight out of nine items have a mean score value >.5. This indicates that in these cases a majority of subjects judged in accordance with the hypothesis tested, which predicted that the daardoor-paraphrase resembled the original doen-marked sentence best. Five out of these eight items show a (strong) effect. How should these findings be interpreted? In order to determine their significance, the probability that the present findings must be attributed to chance can be estimated. In other Table 1 Results hypothesis doen parallels daardoor : natural text items Item code Degree of correspondence t (d.f.) p (25) (26) (30) <.001 * (30) <.001 * (25) (25) <.001 * (25).002 * (26).016 * (25).189 Significant results are indicated with *.

19 1314 N. Stukker et al. / Journal of Pragmatics 40 (2008) Table 2 Results hypothesis laten parallels daarom : natural text items Item code Degree of correspondence t (d.f.) p (30) (26) (26).000 * (25) (30).009 * (26).000 * (30).003 * Significant results are indicated with *. words: we have to compute the probability that H 0 is true while finding good and bad results in the present proportion. To that end, a binomial test was carried out. It turned out that the chance that H 0 holds in the present situation approaches zero ( p =.00003). This result indicates that the findings for doen-marked natural text items can be interpreted as support for the H 1 of this experiment: language users experience similarities between the causal verb doen and the causal connective daardoor. The natural text items marked with laten reveal a highly similar pattern, see Table 2. Of the seven items tested, five show a tendency in the expected direction. Four of these items show a (strong) effect. The significance of the proportion of items supporting the hypothesis was again estimated with a binomial test. Again, the probability that the present findings for laten must be attributed to chance appeared to very small ( p =.0002). This finding can be interpreted as an indication that the H 1 of this study holds for the laten-items as well: language users experience similarities between the causal verb laten and the causal connective daarom Chameleon items The chameleon items reveal a totally different picture. The results of the doen-marked versions of the items are summarized in Table 3. The results of the laten-marked versions are summarized in Table 4. None of the expectations formulated in section 4.1 are borne out by these data. Seven of the doen-marked chameleon items show a trend in the expected direction. But of only two of them, the effect is statistically significant. Three items score in the opposite direction. As a consequence, the statistical significance of these items can be ignored. According to an Table 3 Results hypothesis doen parallels daardoor : chameleon items Item code Degree of correspondence t (d.f.) p D (30).107 D (26).426 D (30).299 D (26).426 D (25).002 * D (26).016 D (25).059 D (25) <.001 * D (30).299 D (26) <.001 Significant results are indicated with *.

20 N. Stukker et al. / Journal of Pragmatics 40 (2008) Table 4 Results hypothesis laten parallels daarom : chameleon items Item code Degree of correspondence t (d.f.) p L (26).426 L (30).107 L (25).059 L (25).500 L (26).287 L (25).024 * L (30).107 L (30) <.001 L (26).092 L (30) <.001 * Significant results are indicated with *. estimation based on a binomial test, the probability that the present results must be attributed to chance is much bigger than with the natural text -items: p =.07. On the basis of these results, it cannot be concluded that language users experience similarities between doen and daardoor as causality markers. A similar picture emerges from the laten-versions. Here, only three out of ten items show a trend in the expected direction. Of these items, two items scores are statistically significant. Not surprisingly, a binomial test of these findings produces the same result as with the doen-items, namely that the probability of finding these proportions when H 0 is true, is.07. Therefore, for the laten-versions H 0 cannot be rejected either. Hence, the data for the chameleon items do not corroborate the idea of a cross-level similarity intuitively shared by language users. 5. Discussion and conclusion This paper started from the idea that choosing one causality marker over another to express a causal relation can be seen as an act of linguistic categorization. A basic assumption in cognitive semantic theory, the framework that lies at the basis of the issues investigated here, is that linguistic categories reflect conceptual categories in human cognition. Following this line of reasoning, we have argued that such a categorization approach results in the hypothesis of crosslevel similarities in language: If a parallel between semantic categories and conceptual categories exists, similar conceptual models of causality are expected to be manifest across different types of linguistic constructions expressing causality. We have focused on parallels between constructions that belong to different levels of the linguistic structure: causal verbs (clausal level) and causal connectives (discourse level) in Dutch. We tested the cross-level similarity hypothesis that Dutch language users experience parallels between the meaning and use of causal verbs and causal connectives. In section 3, we have first shown parallels in the meaning and use of causal verbs and causal connectives, as it was reflected in a corpus of newspaper texts. Subsequently, in section 4, we reported an experiment that aimed to test the cognitive plausibility of the cross-level similarity hypothesis. This section starts with an overview of the experimental findings. Next, we will discuss the methodological aspect of the study reported. Finally, we will discuss how this study contributes to our ultimate goal, which is to construct a descriptively adequate and cognitively plausible integrative theory on the meaning and use of causality markers at different levels of the linguistic structure.