Relevance theory

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The relevance theory is a linguistically shaped cognition theory that was developed by Dan Sperber and Deirdre Wilson in 1986. It is based on Paul Grice's conversation maxim of relevance , but dispenses with his principle of cooperation and instead sets up two principles of its own. Like Paul Grice's theory, relevance theory provides an inference model for communicative processes.

Relevance principles

The relevance theory establishes two basic principles: the cognitive relevance principle and the communicative relevance principle. The cognitive relevance principle states that human cognition is geared towards maximizing relevance. This is due to the way in which our cognitive system has developed: selection pressure in the direction of higher efficiency has led to this system automatically picking up potentially relevant stimuli and our processing system automatically drawing relevant conclusions from them. The communicative relevance principle states that utterances always generate the expectation of being relevant. The reason for this principle is the fact that every utterance is an ostensive stimulus , an observable event that was produced to attract attention. A speaker encourages his audience to assume that what he is saying is relevant.

Definition of relevance

Relevance is defined in relevance theory as a function of processing costs and cognitive effect ( positive cognitive effect ). The processing costs are a measure of the effort that a listener or recipient of an utterance or information has to put in to absorb it and make it usable. A (positive) cognitive effect is achieved when information is particularly important for the situation in which a recipient is or when a significant change in the representation of the recipient's environment is triggered. The lower the processing costs and the higher the cognitive effect of a stimulus, the more relevant this stimulus is.

For example, if a train traveler approaches a stranger on the platform without knowing the timetable and asks when the next train will arrive at this platform, the train traveler can get different answers:

  1. "Sometime after two o'clock."
  2. "At 3:30 pm."
  3. "9000 seconds past one o'clock."

Answer 1 is imprecise and has a smaller positive effect on rail travelers who, according to this answer, still do not know when the train will arrive exactly. Answer 3 is logically equivalent to answer 2, but converting seconds into hours and minutes means high processing costs. Answer 2 is therefore the most relevant answer that the train traveler can get.

Application of theory

When two individuals communicate with each other, they are both relevance-driven. The listener of an utterance processes it according to the communicative relevance principle. The speaker knows this and tries to make his utterance relevant to his ability and willingness. The possibility of predicting listener behavior is based on the theory of mind . In order to get from an utterance to information that is important for the current situation or the current topic of conversation, a listener goes through a procedure similar to the inference chain in Grice's principle of cooperation :

  1. Take the path of lowest processing costs
  2. Test hypotheses about the input in accessibility order
  3. Stop when relevance expectations are met

The hypotheses in step 2 are divided into

  • Hypotheses for explicit content or Explikaturen ( explicatures )
  • Contextual Assumptions ( implicated premises )
  • Contextual conclusions ( implicated conclusions )

Understanding is an online process, which is why these hypothesis-building processes do not follow one another or in an orderly manner, but occur spontaneously. An example of a relevance-driven inference process would be e.g. B .:

  1. Background: John owes Mary money, which Peter knows about. Peter and Mary meet and Peter asks if John has already paid her the money back.
  2. Mary answers. "He forgot to go to the bank"
  3. Peter now has to process Mary's answer according to relevance criteria:
    1. 'He? forgot to go to Bank1 / Bank2 '- "He" is an uninterpreted pronoun, Bank1 / Bank2 expresses the lexical ambiguity of bank / financial institution and bank seat.
    2. Forgetting to go to Bank1 (financial institution) can result in not being able to return your money. - The resolution of the ambiguity is a contextual assumption.
    3. John forgot to go to Bank1. - The resolution of the anaphor "He" to John is an explication of Mary's statement.
    4. John couldn't repay Mary the money because he forgot to go to Bank1. - Inferred from the last two steps and thus a contextual conclusion.

At this point at the earliest, John established a sufficient reference to the context of the conversation according to the relevance principles for Mary's answer.

criticism

The relevance theory criticizes, among other things, how the definitions of relevance, processing costs and cognitive effect are precisely related. In order to assess a cognitive effect, the relevance principles themselves are consulted. This results in a circular definition of relevance, since it is its own explanatory basis. The assertion that both a cognitive effect and its processing costs are not absolute, but can only be measured intuitively, is criticized on the one hand, but at the same time represents an attempt to weaken yet another point of criticism: How can one know the specific processing costs for a cognitive effect or how can you know which processing costs are lowest if you have not yet processed anything?

Criticism is also directed at the inference mechanism of relevance theory; Although the authors provide a basic formal system of deduction, they fail to examine its properties more closely. Elsewhere, this deductive mechanism is classified as insufficient to capture all context-dependent nuances of meaning, which is problematic for a model of human cognition.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Dan Sperber, Deirdre Wilson: Relevance: Communication and Cognition , Blackwell, Oxford 1st A. 1986.
  2. ↑ Deirdre Wilson, Dan Sperber: Relevance Theory , in: L. Horn, G. Ward (eds.): Handbook of Pragmatics , Blackwell, Oxford 2002, p. 254
  3. ^ Deirdre Wilson, Dan Sperber: Relevance Theory , in: Handbook of Pragmatics . Blackwell, Oxford 2002, p. 251
  4. ^ Deirdre Wilson, Dan Sperber: Relevance Theory , in: Handbook of Pragmatics . Blackwell, Oxford 2002, p. 278
  5. ^ Deirdre Wilson, Dan Sperber: Relevance Theory , in: Handbook of Pragmatics . Blackwell, Oxford 2002, pp. 260-264
  6. ↑ Stephen C. Levinson: A review of Relevance , in Journal of Linguistics , 25, 1989. p. 459
  7. ^ Deirdre Wilson, Dan Sperber: Relevance Theory , in: Handbook of Pragmatics . Blackwell, Oxford 2002, p. 254
  8. ↑ Stephen C. Levinson: A review of Relevance , in Journal of Linguistics , 25, 1989. p. 459
  9. ↑ Stephen C. Levinson: A review of Relevance , in Journal of Linguistics , 25, 1989. p. 463
  10. ↑ Stephen C. Levinson: A review of Relevance , in Journal of Linguistics , 25, 1989. p. 457
  11. ^ Louise Cummings: The scientific reductionism of relevance theory: The lesson from logical positivism , in Journal of Pragmatics , 29, 1998. pp. 1-12