Asymmetries in nominal copular sentences: Psycholinguistic evidence in favor of the raising analysis Matteo Greco * , Paolo Lorusso, Cristiano Chesi, Andrea Moro Center for Neurocognition, Epistemology and Theoretical Syntax (NETS), Scuola Universitaria Superiore IUSS Pavia (University School for Advanced Studies IUSS Pavia), Piazza della Vittoria 15, 27100 Pavia, Italy Received 25 March 2020; received in revised form 3 July 2020; accepted 4 July 2020 Available online Abstract This work explores two kinds of asymmetries within the class of nominal copular (NC) constructions under the unified theory of copular sentences deriving the two basic configurations from a unique underlying structure via raising, namely canonical vs. inverse. Using acceptability judgments, we first tested wh- sub-extraction from both determiner phrases (DPs) in both configurations. We then collected acceptability for the same sentences without involving sub-extraction, and compared these results with the acceptability of pre- and post-verbal subject placement in transitive, unergative and unaccusative predicates. We observed the following. (i) Sub- extractions from predicates in canonical form are the most acceptable. (ii) In the remaining conditions, sub-extractions from predicates are more acceptable than those from subjects, and those from canonical are more acceptable than those from inverse NC sentences. The preference for canonical NC sentences is also confirmed when sub-extraction is absent. (iii) There is a general preference for pre- verbal subjects with all verbal predicates (especially strong in transitive and unergative predicates, milder with unaccusatives). The best acceptability results obtained with sub-extraction from predicates in canonical form are in line with the unified theory; the necessity to occupy a pre-verbal position for (presuppositional) subjects captures all the major remaining contrasts. © 2020 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. Keywords: Copular sentences; Predicative structures; Acceptability judgement paradigm 1. Introduction Copular sentences are those whose main verb is be and its equivalents across different languages (see Moro, 2010, 2018 and references cited therein; Verhaar, 1967, 1968a, 1968b, 1969, 1972, 1973). This verb can be followed by any constituent, including determiner phrases (DPs), adjectival phrases (APs), prepositional phrases (PPs), bare noun phrases (NPs) in some Romance languages and more (1). www.elsevier.com/locate/lingua Available online at www.sciencedirect.com ScienceDirect Lingua 244 (2020) xxx * Corresponding author at: Scuola Universitaria Superiore IUSS Pavia (University School for Advanced Studies IUSS Pavia), Piazza della Vittoria 15, 27100 Pavia, Italy. E-mail addresses: matteo.greco@iusspavia.it (M. Greco), paolo.lorusso@iusspavia.it (P. Lorusso), cristiano.chesi@iusspavia.it (C. Chesi), andrea.moro@iusspavia.it (A. Moro). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lingua.2020.102926 0024-3841/© 2020 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.