Implicational hierarchy

Implicational hierarchy, in linguistics, is a chain of implicational universals. A set of chained universals is schematically shown as in (1):

(1) A < B < C < D

It can be reformulated in the following way: If a language has property D, then it also has properties A, B, and C; if a language has a property C, then it also has properties A and B, etc. In other words, the implicational hierarchy defines the possible combinations of properties A, B, C, and D as listed in matrix (2):

	A	B	C	D
Type 1:	+	+	+	+
Type 2:	+	+	+	-
Type 3:	+	+	-	-
Type 4:	+	-	-	-
Type 5:	-	-	-	-

Implicational hierarchies are a useful tool in capturing linguistic generalizations pertaining the different components of the language. They are found in all subfields of grammar.

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