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Using parallel experiments in American English and Colloquial Singapore English, it finds partial amelioration in American English but not in CSE, indicating processing benefits rather than a universal grammatical mechanism.",{"@graph":14,"@context":73},[15,34,56],{"@type":16,"itemListElement":17},"BreadcrumbList",[18,23,27,31],{"item":19,"name":20,"@type":21,"position":22},"https://docshare.wps.com","Home","ListItem",1,{"item":24,"name":25,"@type":21,"position":26},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/","Document",2,{"item":28,"name":29,"@type":21,"position":30},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/research-report/","Research & Report",3,{"item":32,"name":10,"@type":21,"position":33},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/wh-island-effects-and-d-linking-effects-across-languages/203209/",4,{"url":32,"name":10,"@type":35,"image":36,"author":41,"headline":10,"publisher":44,"fileFormat":47,"inLanguage":8,"description":12,"dateModified":48,"datePublished":49,"encodingFormat":47,"isAccessibleForFree":50,"interactionStatistic":51},"DigitalDocument",{"url":37,"@type":38,"width":39,"height":40},"https://docshare.wps.com/thumbnails/wh-island-effects-and-d-linking-effects-across-languages/203209.png","ImageObject",300,407,{"name":42,"@type":43},"Dozel","Person",{"url":19,"name":45,"@type":46},"DocShare","Organization","application/pdf","2026-10-29","2026-09-04",true,{"@type":52,"interactionType":53,"userInteractionCount":55},"InteractionCounter",{"@type":54},"ViewAction",13,{"@type":57,"mainEntity":58},"FAQPage",[59,65,69],{"name":60,"@type":61,"acceptedAnswer":62},"What are wh-island effects in embedded wh-question extraction?","Question",{"text":63,"@type":64},"Extraction out of embedded questions is degraded and is commonly labeled the wh-island effect. The paper illustrates this contrast using examples where extraction from wh-islands becomes unacceptable.","Answer",{"name":66,"@type":61,"acceptedAnswer":67},"How does the d-linking effect relate to wh-island effects?",{"text":68,"@type":64},"The discourse-linking (d-linking) effect claims partial improvement when the moved element is lexically restricted, such as d-linked which-NPs. The paper discusses explaining this improvement via fRM and via processing-based retrieval accounts.",{"name":70,"@type":61,"acceptedAnswer":71},"What do the experiments show in American English versus Colloquial Singapore English?",{"text":72,"@type":64},"In American English, the paper replicates wh-island effects and partial amelioration for d-linked wh-elements. In Colloquial Singapore English, wh-island effects appear but partial amelioration does not; improvements in long-distance dependencies are treated as processing, and no d-linking effects are found in wh-in-situ questions.","https://schema.org",{"og:url":32,"og:type":75,"og:title":10,"og:site_name":45,"og:description":12},"article",{"robots":77,"canonical":32},"index,follow",{"doc_id":79,"site_id":7},203209,1788556848,{"code":4,"msg":82,"data":83},"success",[84,88,92,96,101,106,111,115,120,123,127],{"id":22,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":85,"show_sort_weight":86,"slug":87},"Story & Novel",90,"story-novel",{"id":26,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":89,"show_sort_weight":90,"slug":91},"Literature",80,"literature",{"id":33,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":93,"show_sort_weight":94,"slug":95},"Exam",70,"exam",{"id":97,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":98,"show_sort_weight":99,"slug":100},5,"Comic",60,"comic",{"id":102,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":103,"show_sort_weight":104,"slug":105},6,"Technology",50,"technology",{"id":107,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":108,"show_sort_weight":109,"slug":110},7,"Healthcare",40,"healthcare",{"id":112,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":29,"show_sort_weight":113,"slug":114},8,30,"research-report",{"id":116,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":117,"show_sort_weight":118,"slug":119},9,"Religion & Spirituality",20,"religion-spirituality",{"id":118,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":121,"show_sort_weight":118,"slug":122},"World Cup","world-cup",{"id":124,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":125,"show_sort_weight":124,"slug":126},10,"Lifestyle","lifestyle",{"id":128,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":129,"show_sort_weight":97,"slug":130},19,"General","general",{"code":4,"msg":82,"data":132},{"doc_id":79,"user_id":133,"nickname":42,"user_avatar":134,"doc_module":4,"category_id":112,"category_name":29,"doc_title":10,"doc_description":12,"doc_content":135,"file_id":136,"file_url":137,"file_type":138,"file_size":139,"view_count":55,"is_deleted":4,"is_public":22,"is_downloadable":22,"audit_status":22,"page_count":116,"language":140,"language_code":8,"site_id":7,"html_lang":8,"table_of_contents":141,"faqs":142,"seo_title":143,"seo_description":12,"update_tm":80,"read_time":144,"preview_page_count":4},962085662650,"https://ap-avatar.wpscdn.com/davatar_29158cc5080c5b710cf443261637dec0","Wh-Island Effects and D-Linking Effects  \nAcross Languages Zheng Shen and Beth Chan  \n1. Background on wh-island effects and d-linking effects  \nExtraction out of embedded questions is observed to be degraded, often labeled as the wh-island effect (Ross 1967), shown in (1) . The wh-island effect is claimed to be (partially) ameliorated when the moved element is lexically restricted and has the form which NP (Rizzi 1990, Friedmann et al. 2009, Villata et al. 2016) as shown in (2) . We will refer to this effect as the discourse-linking (d-linking) effect.  \n(1) *What did the waiter wonder [whether the chef burned   ]?  \n(2) ??Which dish did the waiter wonder [whether the chef burned   ]?  \nFeatural Relativized Minimality (fRM) (Villata et al. 2016, Rizzi 2001) is the prevailing grammatical analysis for wh-island effects and d-linking effects shown in (3) and (4) .  \n(3) Featural Relativized Minimality (Villata et al. 2016: ex. 5)  \nIn   X   Z   Y    \nA local relation is disrupted between X and Y when  \na. Z structurally intervenes between X and Y  \nb. Z matches the specification in morphosyntactic features of X  \n(4) Intervention is defined in hierarchical terms through c-command:  \nZ structurally intervenes between X and Y when Z c-commands Y and Z does not c-command X.  \nThe unacceptability of (1) may be attributed to a violation of fRM, and its derivation is schematisedin (5) . According to fRM, the matrix C bears a [+Q] feature which attracts a lower wh-element bearing [+Q] over a higher wh-element whether which also bears the same [+Q] feature. Given that whether isc-commanded by the matrix C and c-commands the base-generated position of what (or its trace position), the configuration in (1) is disrupted.  \n(5) a. *C [+􀀦] did the waiter wonder whether [+􀀦] the chef burned what [+􀀦]?  \nb. *What C [+􀀦] did the waiter wonder whether [+􀀦] the chef burned t?  \nThe d-linking effect in (2) may also be explained by fRM. Friedmann et al. (2009) proposes that if the intervenor Z (in (3)) partially matches the features of the higher element X, the penalty in acceptability and fRM effect is reduced. For questions with a d-linked wh-element, the matrix C head is specified as [+Q, +N], the intervening wh-element whether only partially matches its feature specification, shown in  \n(6) . Thus the island effect is ameliorated.  \n(6) a. ??C [+􀀦,+􀀣 ] did the waiter wonder whether [+􀀦] the chef burned which dish [+􀀦,+􀀣 ]?  \nb. ??Which dish [+􀀦,+􀀣 ] C [+􀀦,+􀀣 ] did the waiter wonder whether [+􀀦] the chef burned t?  \n*  \nZheng Shen, National University of Singapore, [zhengshen522@gmail.com](zhengshen522@gmail.com); Beth Chan, National University of Singapore. Thanks for the feedback from NUS Syntax/Semantics reading group and audience from WCCFL 42, especially Peter Jenks and Yimei Xiang. All errors are ours.  \n© 2025 Zheng Shen and Beth Chan. Proceedings of the 42nd West Coast Conference on Formal Linguistics, ed. Shweta Akolkar et al., 356-363. Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Proceedings Project.  \n357  \nOn the other hand, the d-linking effect has also received processing-based analyses. For example, Hofmeister & Sag (2010) proposes that which-NPs are easier to retrieve and this makes the long distance dependency easier to compute. The improved rating might result from such processing effect.  \nAgainst this background, this paper examines two issues related to wh-island effects and d-linking effects: 1 . Does the amelioration effect of d-linked wh-elements extend to other languages with whmovement? 2 . How do d-linked wh-elements affect wh-in situ questions?  \nTo investigate these issues, we conducted parallel experiments in American English to replicate the empirical profiles of wh-island and d-linking effects from previous experiments (Villata & Sprouse 2023) and in Colloquial Singapore English (CSE) which allows both wh-fronting and wh-in situ questions. Topreview the results, we replicated the wh-island effects and the partial amelioration effec","cbCaii3VcwbfmBzw","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaii3VcwbfmBzw","pdf",451208,"English","# Background on wh-island effects and d-linking effects\n## Featural Relativized Minimality (fRM)\n## Processing-based accounts\n# Issues examined in the paper\n# Wh-fronting questions\n## Experiment 1: American English","[{\"question\":\"What are wh-island effects in embedded wh-question extraction?\",\"answer\":\"Extraction out of embedded questions is degraded and is commonly labeled the wh-island effect. The paper illustrates this contrast using examples where extraction from wh-islands becomes unacceptable.\"},{\"question\":\"How does the d-linking effect relate to wh-island effects?\",\"answer\":\"The discourse-linking (d-linking) effect claims partial improvement when the moved element is lexically restricted, such as d-linked which-NPs. The paper discusses explaining this improvement via fRM and via processing-based retrieval accounts.\"},{\"question\":\"What do the experiments show in American English versus Colloquial Singapore English?\",\"answer\":\"In American English, the paper replicates wh-island effects and partial amelioration for d-linked wh-elements. In Colloquial Singapore English, wh-island effects appear but partial amelioration does not; improvements in long-distance dependencies are treated as processing, and no d-linking effects are found in wh-in-situ questions.\"}]","Wh-Island Effects and D-Linking Effects Across Languages | PDF",23]