Veridicality and the acquisition of think

Peter van Elswyk

doi:10.1007/s10988-025-09430-2

Veridicality and the acquisition of think

Peter van Elswyk^*

^*Corresponding author for this work

Philosophy

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

1 Scopus citations

Abstract

Across numerous languages, the attitude verb think is learned later than other attitude verbs like want. But why? This essays advances a new hypothesis: children initially treat think as a veridical yet non-factive verb akin to a class of verbs I call confirmatives. This hypothesis is argued to better explain existing data that troubles other hypotheses, and to find support from the ease with which children represent knowledge but not belief.

Original language	English (US)
Article number	104954
Pages (from-to)	353-370
Number of pages	18
Journal	Linguistics and Philosophy
Volume	48
Issue number	2
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1007/s10988-025-09430-2
State	Published - Apr 2025

Keywords

Acquisition of attitude verbs
Hedged assertion
Mindreading
Veridicality

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Philosophy
Linguistics and Language

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10.1007/s10988-025-09430-2

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Veridicality and the acquisition of think

Abstract

Keywords

ASJC Scopus subject areas

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