Publications

Syrett, K., Lu, J., & Parrish, K. (2024). Perceptual benefits of linguistic diversity and language background: Evidence from auditory free classification of English dialects and Asian languages. Glossa: Psycholinguistics.

Gotowski, M., & Syrett, K. (2024). Using syntax and semantics to acquire subjective adjective meanings. Language Acquisition.

Syrett, K., & Becker, M. (2024). More hard words: Learning emotion and mental state adjectives from linguistic context. Language Acquisition.

Syrett, K. (2024). Variation by context: The importance of pragmatics and the discourse (commentary on Shin & Miller). Language Learning and Development.

Syrett, K. (2023). Syntactic bootstrapping with clausal complements of adjectives (commentary on Hacquard). Journal of Child Language.

Davies, C., Syrett, K., Taylor, L., Wilkes, S., & Zuniga-Montanez, C. (2022). Supporting adjective learning across curriculum by 5-7 year-olds: Insights from psychological research. Language and Linguistics Compass: Education and Pedagogy.

Davies, C., Ebbels, S., Nicoll, H., Syrett, K., White, S., & Zuniga-Montanez, C. (2022). Supporting adjective learning by children with Developmental Language Disorder: Enhancing metalinguistic approaches. International Journal of Language & Communication Disorders.

Syrett, K., & Aravind, A. (2022). Context sensitivity and the semantics of count nouns in the evaluation of partial objects by children and adults. Journal of Child Language.

Cépeda, P., Kotek, H., Pabst, K. & Syrett, K. (2021). Gender bias in linguistics textbooks: Has anything changed since Macaulay & Brice (1997)? Language.

Goldin, M., Syrett, K., & Sánchez, L. (2021). Perspective-taking with deictic motion verbs in Spanish heritage child speakers: Context-dependent cross-linguistic influence at the lexical level. Frontiers in Psychology (Language Sciences). Online.

Syrett, K., Austin, J., & Sanchez, L. (2021). Establishing upper bounds in English monolingual and Heritage Spanish-English bilingual language development. Language Acquisition, 1, 39-64.

Moyer, M., & Syrett, K. (2020). The study of questions (an advanced review). WIREs in Cognitive Science. Online.

Moyer, M., & Syrett, K. (2019). The semantics of questions (a primer). WIREs in Cognitive Science. Online.

Syrett, K., & Brasoveanu, A.. (2019). An experimental investigation of the scope of object comparative quantifier phrases. Journal of Semantics, 36, 285-315. Appendices with stimuli

Syrett, K., Latourrette, S., Ferguson, B., & Waxman, S. R. (2019). Crying helps, but being sad doesn’t: Infants constrain nominal reference using known verbs, not known adjectives. Cognition. 193.

Achimova, A., Syrett, K., Musolino, J., Déprez, V. (2017). Children’s developing knowledge of wh-/quantifier question-answer relations. Language Learning and Development, 1, 80-99.

Arii, T., Syrett, K., & Goro, T. (2017). Investigating the form-meaning mapping in the acquisition of English and Japanese measure phrase comparatives. Natural Language Semantics, 25, 53-90.

Syrett, K., Austin, J., Sanchez, L., Germak, C., Lingwall, A., Perez-Cortes, S., Arias-Amaya, A., & Baker, H. (2017). The influence of conversational context and the developing lexicon on the calculation of scalar implicatures: Insights from Spanish-English bilingual children. Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism, 7, 230-264.

Syrett, K., Lingwall, A., Perez-Cortes, S., Austin, J., Sanchez, L., Baker, H., Germak, C., & Arias-Amaya, A. (2017). Differences between Spanish monolingual and Spanish-English bilingual children in their calculation of entailment-based scalar implicatures. Glossa Special Issue: Acquisition of Quantification, 2, 1-19.

Arunachalam, S., Syrett, K., & Chen, Y. (2016). Lexical disambiguation in verb learning: Evidence from the intransitive frame in English and Mandarin Chinese. Frontiers in Psychology (Language Sciences),7,1-14.

Syrett, K., & Musolino, J. (2016). All together now: Collectivity, distributivity, and the semantics of togetherin child and adult language. Language Acquisition: A Journal of Developmental Linguistics, 23, 175-197.

Syrett, K. (2015a). Events and agents in the acquisition of universal quantification. Theoretical Linguistics, 41, 211-222.

Syrett, K. (2015b). Experimental support for inverse scope readings of finite-clause embedded Antecedent-Contained Deletion sentences. Linguistic Inquiry, 46, 579-592.

Syrett, K. (2015c). QR out of a tensed clause: Evidence from Antecedent-Contained Deletion.Ratio Special issue: Investigating Meaning (Ed. by N. Hansen and E. Borg), 28, 395-421.

Syrett, K., & Koev, T. (2015). Experimental evidence for the truth conditional contribution and shifting information status of appositives. Journal of Semantics, 32, 525-577. Appendices with stimuli

Syrett, K., Arunachalam, S., & Waxman, S. R. (2014). Slowly but surely: Adverbs support verb learning in 2-year-olds. Language Learning and Development, 10, 263-278.

Syrett, K., & Kawahara, S. (2014). Production and perception of listener-oriented clear speech in child language. Journal of Child Language, 41, 1373-1389. 

Syrett, K., Simon, G., & Nisula, K. (2014). Prosodic disambiguation of scopally ambiguous sentences in a discourse context. Journal of Linguistics, 50, 453-493.

Déprez, V., Syrett, K., & Kawahara, S. (2013). The interaction of syntax, prosody, and discourse in licensing French wh-in-situquestions. Lingua (Special issue: Prosody at the Grammatical Crossroad), 124, 4-19. workshop poster

Syrett, K. (2013). The role of cardinality in the interpretation of measurement expressions. Language Acquisition: A Journal of Developmental Linguistics, 20, 228-240.

Syrett, K., & Musolino, J. (2013). Collectivity, distributivity, and the interpretation of numerical expressions in child and adult language. Language Acquisition: A Journal of Developmental Linguistics, 20, 259-291.

Syrett, K., Musolino, J., & Gelman, R. (2012a). How can syntax support number word acquisition? Language Learning and Development, 8, 146-176.

Syrett, K., Musolino, J., & Gelman, R. (2012b). Number word acquisition: Bootstrapping, cardinality and beyond. (reply to commentaries). Language Learning and Development, 8, 190-195.

Syrett, K., & Lidz, J. (2011). Competence, performance and the locality of Quantifier Raising: Evidence from 4-year-old children. Linguistic Inquiry, 42, 305-337.

Syrett, K., Kennedy, C., & Lidz, J. (2010). Meaning and context in children’s understanding of gradable adjectives.Journal of Semantics, 27, 1-35.

Syrett, K., & Lidz, J. (2010). 30-month-olds use the distribution and meaning of adverbs to interpret novel adjectives. Language Learning and Development, 6, 258-282.

Syrett, K., & Lidz, J. (2009). QR in child grammar: Evidence from Antecedent-Contained Deletion. Language Acquisition: A Journal of Developmental Linguistics, 16, 67-81.

Syrett, K., & Arunachalam, S. (2018). (Eds.). Semantics in Language Acquisition, Trends in Language Acquisition (TiLAR) Series. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

(Individually-authored chapters (1, 12) listed in “Chapters in edited volumes.”

Syrett, K. (2023). Behavioral acquisition methods with preschool-age children. In Jon Sprouse (Ed.), Oxford Handbook of Experimental Syntax. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Kennedy, C., & Syrett, K. (2021). Numerals denote degree quantifiers: Evidence from child language.

Syrett, K. (2019). Antecedent-contained deletion. In C. Cummins & N. Katsos (Eds.), Oxford handbook of experimental semantics and pragmatics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Syrett, K. (2019). Distributivity. In C. Cummins & N. Katsos (Eds.), Oxford handbook of experimental semantics and pragmatics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Syrett, K., & Gor, V. (2019). The perils of interpreting comparatives with pronouns for children and adults. In D. Altshuler and J. Rett (Eds.), The semantics of plurals, focus, degrees, and times: Essays in honor of Roger Schwarzschild (pp. 185-216). Dordrecht: Springer.

Syrett, K. (2018). The historical emergence and current study of semantics in acquisition. In Syrett, K. & Arunachalam, S. (Eds.), Semantics in Language Acquisition, Trends in Language Acquisition (TiLAR) Series(pp. 1-18). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Syrett, K. (2018). Overt, covert, and clandestine operations: Ambiguity and ellipsis in acquisition. In K. Syrett & S. Arunachalam (Eds.), Semantics in Language Acquisition, Trends in Language Acquisition (TiLAR) Series(pp. 275-297). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Syrett, K. (2016). Comparatives and degree constructions. In J. Lidz, W. Snyder, & J. Pater (Eds.), Oxford Handbook of Developmental Linguistics (pp. 463-497). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Syrett, K. Adjectives (Acquisition of). (2014). In Patricia Brooks & Vera Kempe (Eds.), Encyclopedia of Language Development(pp. 1-3). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Reference Publications.

Déprez, V., Syrett, K., & Kawahara, S. (2012). Interfacing information and prosody: French in situ questions. In Irene Franco, Sara Lusini, and Andrés Saab (Eds.), Romance Languages and Linguistic Theory: Selected papers from ‘Going Romance’ 2010 24(pp. 135-154). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Patel, P., Syrett, K., & Aravind, A. Using bounds set by modals to investigate the status of partial objects and count nouns. In Proceedings of Experiments in Linguistic Meaning (ELM) 3.

Zhu, Z., & Syrett, K. (2022). Do Mandarin count classifiers individuate: Experimental evidence from a quantity judgment task. Proceedings of the 52nd Annual North East Linguistics Society (NELS). Amherst, MA: GLSA.

Gotowski, M., & Syrett, K. (2020). Investigating the hypothesis space of children’s interpretation of comparatives. Proceedings of the 44th Annual Boston University Conference on Language Development (pp. 154-167). Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Press.

Gor, V., & Syrett, K. (2019). Beyond Principle C: (Not)-at-issueness and plausibility influence acceptability of coconstrual. Proceedings of the 54th Annual Chicago Linguistic Society.

Moyer, M., & Syrett, K. (2019). Contextual, lexical, and structural factors licensing Mention-Some embedded questions. Proceedings of the 54th Annual Chicago Linguistic Society.

Moyer, M., & Syrett, K. (2019). (Non-)Exhaustivity in embedded questions: Contextual, lexical and structural factors. Proceedings of Sinn und Bedeutung 23.

Moyer, M., Husnain, Z., & Syrett, K. (2019). Won’t somebody think of the children? Beyond maximality with plural definite descriptions. InM. Brown and B. Dailey (Eds.), Proceedings of the 43rd Annual Boston University Conference on Language Development(pp. 441-453). Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Press.

Bary, C., Altshuler, D., Syrett, K., & de Swart, P. (2018). Factors licensing embedded present tense in speech reports. Proceedings of Sinn und Bedeutung 22.

Simon-Pearson, L., & Syrett, K. (2018). Assessing truth and speaker knowledge when utterances are not maximally true. In Anne B. Bertolini and Maxwell J. Kaplan (Eds.), Proceedings of the 42^ndAnnual Boston University Conference on Language Development (pp. 708-721). Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Press.

Law, J., & Syrett, K. (2017). Experimental evidence for the discourse potential of bare nouns in Mandarin. In Andrew Lamont and Katerina Tetzloff (Eds.), Proceedings of the 47^thAnnual North East Linguistics Society (NELS) Vol. 2(pp. 231-240).Amherst, MA: GLSA.

Arii, T., Syrett, K., & Goro, T. (2016). Setting the standard in the acquisition of Japanese and English comparatives. In Proceedings of the 50^thAnnual Chicago Linguistic Society (CLS).

Bajaj, V., & Syrett, K. (2016).  –hii: Modality meets exclusivity. Proceedings of the Penn Linguistics Conference (PLC), vol. 22 (1). http://repository.upenn.edu/pwpl/

Syrett, K., & Arunachalam, S. (2016). Young children’s developing expectations about the language of events. In Jennifer Scott and Deb Waughtal (Eds.), Proceedings of the 40^thAnnual Boston University Conference on Language Development (pp. 375-390). Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Press.

Gor, V., & Syrett, K. (2015). Picking up after sloppy children: What pronouns reveal about children’s analysis of English comparative constructions. In Elizabeth Grillo and Kyle Jepson (Eds.), Proceedings of the39th Annual Boston University Conference on Language Development(pp. 191-203). Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Press.

Syrett, K. (2015). Mapping properties to individuals in language acquisition. In Elizabeth Grillo and Kyle Jepson (Eds.), Proceedings of the 39th Annual Boston University Conference on Language Development (pp. 398-410). Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Press.

Arunachalam, S., & Syrett, K. (2014). Specifying event reference in verb learning. In Will Orman and Matthew Calleau (Eds.), Proceedings of the 38^thAnnual Boston University Conference on Language Development. Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Press.

Syrett, K., G. Simon, & Nisula, K. (2014). Prosodic disambiguation of scopally ambiguous sentences. In Hsin-Lun Huang, Ethan Poole, and Amanda Rysling (Eds.), Proceedings of 43^rdAnnual Meeting of the North East Linguistic Society (NELS)Vol. 2 (pp. 141-152). Amherst, MA: GLSA.

Achimova, A., Crosby, C., Déprez, V., Syrett, K., & Musolino, J. (2013). Which account of wh-/quantifier interaction should everyone adopt? A new take on a classic developmental puzzle. In Sarah Baiz, Nora Goldman, and Rachel Hawkes (Eds.), Proceedings of the 37^thAnnual Boston University Conference on Language Development(pp. 1-12). Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Press.

Arunachalam, S., Syrett, K., & Waxman, S. R. (2012). Can adverbs call attention to manner of motion for 2-year-olds learning verbs? In Biller, Alia K., Esther Y. Chung, and Amelia E. Kimball (Eds.), Proceedings of the 36^thAnnual Boston University Conference on Language Development(pp. 63-73). Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Press.

Syrett, K. (2010). The representation and processing of measure phrases by four-year-olds. In Katie Franich, Kate Iserman, & Lauren L. Keil (Eds.), Proceedings of the 34^th Annual Boston University Conference on Language Development(pp. 421-432). Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Press.

Syrett, K., & Lidz, J. (2006). Learning scope economy: Why children will QR out of a tensed embedded clause but adults won’t. In Christopher Davis, Amy Rose Deal, & Youri Zabbal (Eds.), Proceedings of 36^thAnnual Meeting of the North East Linguistic Society (NELS)(pp. 575-586). UMass, Amherst: GLSA.

Syrett, K., Bradley, E., Kennedy, C., & Lidz, J. (2006). Shifting standards: Children’s understanding of gradable adjectives. In Kamil Ud Deen, Jun Nomura, Barbara Schulz, & Bonnie D. Schwartz (Eds.), Proceedings of the Inaugural Conference on Generative Approaches to Language Acquisition – North America, Honolulu, HI, Vol. 2(pp. 353-364). Cambridge, Mass: UConn Occasional Papers in Linguistics 4.

Syrett, K., & Lidz, J. (2005). Children want to access every interpretation adults do. v1. In Leah Bateman, & Cherlon Ussery (Eds.), Proceedings of 35^thAnnual Meeting of the North East Linguistic Society (NELS). Charleston, SC: Booksurge Publishing, pp. 591-602. v2. In Alejna Brugos, Manuella R. Clark-Cotton, & Seungwan Ha(Eds.), Proceedings Supplement of the 29^thAnnual Boston University Conference on Language Development.

Lidz, J., McMahon, E., Syrett, K., Viau, J., Anggoro, F., Peterson-Hicks, J., Sneed, E., Bunger, A., Flevaris, T., Graham, A., Grohne, K., Lee , Y., & Strid, J. E. (2004). Quantifier Raising in 4-year-olds. In Alejna Brugos, Linnea Micciulla, & Christine E. Smith (Eds.),Proceedings of the 28^thAnnual Boston University Conference on Language Development (pp. 340-349). Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Press.

Learning about the structure of scales:  Adverbial modification and the acquisition of the semantics of gradable adjectives 

Dissertation submitted as part of the degree requirements for Ph.D. in Linguistics, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL (awarded 12/28/2007)

Committee: Jeffrey Lidz (chair), Christopher Kennedy, Stefan Kaufmann, Sandra R. Waxman

Macaulay, M., & Syrett, K. (2012). Why major in linguistics…and what does a linguist do? FAQ for the Linguistic Society of America. (Previous version: 2005

Access FAQ on LSA website (html version with pdf version at bottom of page)

Syrett, K. (2011). LSA Annual Meeting Poster FAQs. (Previous version, 2005: Syrett, K. How to design and present a successful poster.)