Two experiments are reported to analyze the psychological causality implicit in language. In Study 1, an extension of the existing verb classifications is empirically tested to account for the finding that many action verbs give rise to attributions to the sentence object. Study 2 examines whether implicit causality for these agent-evocator verbs is mediated by the same mechanisms that are assumed to mediate this effect for other kinds of interpersonal actions and states. Taken together, results suggest that (a) the introduction of an action verb schema that gives rise to object attributions is a useful extension of the existing classifications of interpersonal verbs and (b) the mediation of implicit causality in all kinds of interpersonal verbs is governed by perceived covariation information. Thus, the present data support an explanation of implicit causality that is based on classical attribution variables.
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