A Corpus-Assisted Analysis of Conjoined Wh-Questions in English

This corpus study investigates conjoined wh-questions (CWHs), where two or more coordinated wh-phrases appear at the beginning of a sentence (e.g., When and where did they first meet?). Previous research suggests that English speakers readily accept adjunct coordination but generally reject argument coordination, while mixed patterns (involving an adjunct and an argument) are subject to interspeaker variation. Using data from the Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA), this study confirms that English strongly favors adjunct coordination (over 90% of CWHs), while mixed coordination is uncommon (under 8%), and argument coordination is virtually absent. Notably, all coordinated arguments in the corpus were optional, suggesting structural constraints on CWHs. Finally, the data support a biclausal analysis of CWHs, reinforcing the idea that coordinated wh-phrases originate in separate clauses.