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Abstract
In this thesis, I investigate the feasibility of an interactive computational model for improving the lexical semantic inferencing of the user. The model assumes lexical semantic inferencing to be a function of lexical knowledge and lexical semantic entailment scales enabling implicature. During processes of user-computer question answering, implicature scales are targeted for enrichment, and their component lexical items are added to thequestion-answer exchange. Particular emphasis is placed on the role of question words in a question-answer exchange and their relation to scalar implicature.