Does 'All' Mean 'Every'? Exploring Scope Preferences of Universal Quantifiers in Italian and Mandarin Chinese

Quantifiers indicate the number of entities referenced in an utterance. Doubly quantified sentences can be ambiguous in expressing either surface or inverse scope. While previous studies - mostly in English - investigated the preferred interpretation of quantifiers, cross-linguistic investigations remain limited

In this study, we examine the scope preferences in two typologically distinct languages, Italian and Mandarin Chinese, focusing on universal quantifiers “all” (IT: “tutti”, ZH: “所有”) and “every” (IT: “ogni”, ZH: “每只”/“每个”).

Using a cumulative-window, word-by-word, self-paced reading paradigm, we collected reading times (RTs) from 30 Chinese and 40 Italian participants. Participants read sentence-pairs and rated on a 1-to-5 scale, how likely the second sentence interpreted the first. The subject of the first (context) sentence contained a quantifier (ALL/EVERY), and the second (target) sentence had either collective (COLL) or distributive (DIST) reading.

In Chinese, significant differences were found for mean RTs between EVERY-COLL and EVERY-DIST, with EVERY-DIST being processed faster (p = 0.023). In Italian, significant differences were found between all the pair-wise comparisons (ps < 0.0001), except between ALL-DIST and EVERY-DIST (p = 0.057). The ALL quantifier generally facilitated the COLL interpretation, while EVERY primed the DIST interpretation.

Interpretation ratings show that Italian participants ranked EVERY-DIST highest, followed by ALL-DIST, ALL-COLL, and EVERY-COLL. All combinations significantly differed from each other (ps < 0.0001), except ALL-DIST and ALL-COLL (p = 0.05). Similarly, in Chinese, EVERY-DIST was rated highest, followed by ALL-COLL, ALL-DIST, and EVERY-COLL. All combinations showed significant differences (ps < 0.0001).

Our investigation revealed that both languages consistently preferred EVERY-DIST. While Chinese RTs and ratings confirmed a preference for ALL-COLL over ALL-DIST, in Italian, ALL facilitates the reading of COLL, but speakers find both interpretations compatible.