The Developing Communicator: Pragmatics, Sense Conventions and Non-Literal Uses of Language

Project Information

DEVCOM

Grant agreement ID: 853211

DOI

10.3030/853211

Project closed

EC signature date 25 February 2020

Start date 1 September 2020

End date 31 August 2025

Funded under

• EXCELLENT SCIENCE - European Research Council (ERC)

Total cost

€ 1 500 000,00

EU contribution

€ 1 500 000,00

Coordinated by

UNIVERSITETET I OSLO
Norway

Periodic Reporting for period 4 - DEVCOM (The Developing Communicator: Pragmatics, Sense Conventions and Non-Literal Uses of Language)

Reporting period: 2025-03-01 to 2025-08-31

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

Children are born communicators. However, a puzzling feature of pragmatic development is the difficulties children face with non-literal uses of language (‘non-literal uses’ for short), that is, cases where in order to understand the speaker’s intended meaning they have to go beyond the conventional senses of the words and sentences the speaker has used (e.g. understanding a parent’s metaphorical intention in saying “I love you so much I could eat you up!”). How can children be early experts at a range of pragmatically complex tasks requiring attention to speakers’ intentions, but act like ‘literal listeners’ in other contexts?

The overarching objective of the DEVCOM project was to provide an account of the stages and factors involved in children’s developing competence with non-literal uses of language, thereby contributing to a coherent understanding of children’s pragmatic development. The project broke new ground by adopting a global perspective on children’s pragmatic difficulties, investigating the novel hypothesis that children’s growing sensitivity to sense conventions which determine the publicly accepted meaning of words in their language, impedes their pragmatic reasoning with non-literal uses during the pre-school years. According to this hypothesis, preschoolers’ tendency for literal interpretation is not the result of poor pragmatic abilities, but arises because attending to conventional senses serves a crucial function at a particular stage of language learning. The project used a set of novel, child-friendly experimental methodologies to test children’s comprehension and production of non-literal uses, both in typical and atypical development (autism). The empirical results have provided input to a novel theoretical account of pragmatic development that addresses the developmental puzzle of non-literal uses of language, with broad implications for the fields of language acquisition, developmental psychology, and philosophy of language.

The project has provided crucial empirical and theoretical input to cognitive theories of pragmatic development, as well as new insight into the crucial shaping effect of language on human cognition. The project’s novel methodology has resulted in designs that allow for replication and inspiration for further research in the field. The more detailed insights provided by the project into the role of conventions in the acquisition of non-literal uses of language are useful to professionals working and interacting with children, particularly relevant in educational settings. Extending our knowledge of the underlying causes of a challenging domain of children’s language and communication, the project results should inform the development of educational programs and help optimize children’s learning contexts and outcomes. Furthermore, the project has provided increased knowledge about the sources of the difficulties that children with Autism Spectrum Conditions experience with non-literal uses, applicable to the design of support and intervention programmes to improve the social and academic functioning of this group, contributing to the foundations for an inclusive education in which children with autism have equal opportunities

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

Stage 1: Kick-off (September 2020-February 2021) was dedicated to recruitment of team members, setting up a project website (https://www.hf.uio.no/ifikk/english/research/projects/devcom/) literature reviews, development and refinement of theoretical hypotheses. We organized a kick-off workshop on 7 January 2020 with the Scientific Advisory Board, where team members presented and got feedback on their research plans.

Stage II: Experimental Designs (March 2021-August 2022) and Stage III: Data Collection, Analysis and Writing Up (September 2022-February 2024): We designed, piloted, and ran a set of experimental studies with children and adults, recruited from around the Oslo area. We ran several studies that test children’s comprehension of lexical innovation (noun-noun compounds and denominal verbs), imprecise uses of adjectives, metonymy, and different types of metaphor. Our results provide some evidence that younger children may be ‘more pragmatic’ than older children, whose focus on literal, conventional meanings appear to be stronger.

Stage III: Data Collection, Analysis & Writing Up (September 2022–February 2024) and Stage IV: Theoretical Development and Monograph Writing (March 2024–September 2025).
Stage III and Stage IV were devoted to finalizing all aspects of the data collection and writing up the experimental studies as journal articles. During this period, the project organised two workshops (DEVCOM Summer Workshop 2023, Workshop on Pragmatic Development 2025) and an international conference (DEVCOM Closing Conference 2024) at the University of Oslo.

As per January 2026, the project has given rise to 11 journal articles, published in high-impact journals in cognitive science, linguistics, pragmatics and developmental psychology (e.g. Journal of Child Language, Journal of Pragmatics, Mind & Language, Language Development Research, Philosophical Transactions B). Several further articles are forthcoming. In addition, members of the project team have presented key findings at several international conferences and workshops. Three PhD theses have come out of the project, two of which were successfully defended in Spring 2025 (Neff, Martin-Gonzalez). Finally, the PI is currently working on a monograph entitled “Figuring Out: Children’s Acquisition of Non-Literal Language” under contract with Cambridge University press. The monograph fulfils three main purposes: First, it summarises and synthesises the empirical findings of DEVCOM into a coherent whole. Second, it reconceptualises previous findings in the light of the new knowledge gained about the development of non-literal uses. Third, it presents a novel theoretical account of pragmatic development that addresses the developmental puzzle of non-literal uses of language. Expected publication date is 2027.

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

Overarching the research of the project is the novel hypothesis that pre-school children’s growing sensitivity to sense conventions might impede their pragmatic reasoning with non-literal uses of language. One major achievement of the project is a task that taps into children’s and adults’ sensitivity to conventions in different domains, including language, categorization, artifact use, pretence and rule-based games. Our findings suggest a developmental spurt that starts around the age of 5 with a particular sensitivity to conventions (Iversen, Ronderos & Falkum, in prep). Before this age, children tend to be pragmatically flexible (Ronderos, Mathisen, Noveck & Falkum, in prep.). Theoretical work has also been dedicated to the exploration of this hypothesis, focusing on typically-developing children (Allott & Falkum, in prep; Falkum, 2022, in prep.), and individuals with autism (Vicente & Falkum, 2021).

These findings will be further nuanced when the empirical results from all the subprojects are put together to give a fuller picture of children's abilities with non-literal uses of language and pragmatic development more generally. This will fill a critical gap in cognitive theories of pragmatic development and open up new avenues of research. The PI is currently working on a monograph (under contract with Cambridge University Press) aimed at fulfilling this purpose.

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