Comprehending Conversational
Utterances: Experimental Studies of the
Comprehension of Speaker Meaning
Thomas Holtgraves
Dept. of Psychological Science
Ball State University
Muncie, IN
USA
Speaker Meaning
• What a speaker intends to convey with an
utterance on a particular occasion of use
(Clark, 1985)
• Often different from literal or direct meaning
• Fundamental issue: How do language users
comprehend indirect speaker meaning?
• What are the social, cognitive, and neural
processes that underlie comprehension?
Examples of Nonliteral Speaker
Meaning
Types of Nonliteral Meaning
Commonly studied:
Metaphor – My job is a jail.
Ironic sarcasm – You’re a great friend (when one isn’t)
Indirect requests – Could you open the window?
Less commonly studied:
Implicit Speech acts
Indirect replies
Different Comprehension Processes Involved
Implicit Speech Acts
Speech Act Theory
• John Austin and John Searle
• Language use as action
• Illocutionary act – specific act(s) speaker
intends the hearer to recognize
– Take the form of speech act verbs (e.g., criticize,
thank, apologize, offer, etc.)
• Implicit speech acts do not contain the speech
act verb (I’ll definitely do it tomorrow)
Speech Act Processing
• Is speech act recognition involved in utterance
comprehension?
 Necessary? (Not according to relevance theory)
 Good enough processing in conversations; quick
take on speaker meaning (via speech act
recognition)
Speech Act Activation Experiments
(Holtgraves & Ashley, 2001; Holtgraves, 2008)
Jenny and Emily had been close friends since grade
school.
Now there were rooming together at college.
Emily was very forgetful.
Today, Jenny was sure Emily didn’t remember her
dentist appointment.
Jenny: Don’t forget to go to your dentist
appointment today.
+
REMIND
Sample Experimental Materials
Jenny and Emily had been close friends since grade school.
Now there were rooming together at college.
Emily was very forgetful.
Today, Jenny was sure Emily didn’t remember (had forgotten) her
dentist appointment.
Jenny: Don’t forget (I’ll bet you forgot) to go to your
dentist appointment today.
Probe: Remind
Recognition Probe Reaction Times (ms)
Holtgraves, 2008
920
900
880
860
840
820
800
780
760
740
720
Speech Act
Control
Written
Auditory
Implicit Speech Act Comprehension
Experiments
• Lexical Decision Procedure (Word/Nonword):
– Judge speech act words (e.g., remind) faster after
speech act utterances than control utterances
• Participants vs. Observers
– Conversation Bot (SAM):
• Participants demonstrate automatic speech act
activation
– SAM: Don’t take a class from Harmon, he’s terrible
» WARN
Speech Acts and Memory
Holtgraves (2008)
• Do Speech acts play a role in long-term
representation?
• Participants read scenarios/utterances
– Speech act/control versions
– Rated scenarios (incidental memory)
– Intervening task (recall states)
• Memory test
– Recognition or Recall
False Memory for Speech Act Verbs
18%
16%
14%
12%
10%
Speech Act
Control
8%
6%
4%
2%
0%
Recognition
Recall
What are the Neurophysiological
Underpinnings of Speech Act
Comprehension?
Does Everyone Automatically
Recognize Speech Acts?
Speech Act Recognition in
Parkinson’s Disease
 Parkinson’s Disease (PD) can display cognitive
and social deficits as well as motor deficits
 Are social deficits due to pragmatic deficits
(speech act recognition)?
 PD (N = 28) and age matched controls (N = 32)
performed lexical decision task following
speech act/control scenarios (rewritten for PD).
- Assess executive function (stroop task)
Lexical Decision Times (ms)
Holtgraves & McNamara, 2010
1900
1700
1500
1300
Speech Act
Control
1100
900
700
500
Control Participants
Parkinson's Participants
Speech Act Priming and Utterance
Production
• Speech act priming correlated with underinformativeness in interactions
– Interviews coded for under-informativeness
• Failure to recognize others’ intentions related to lack of
informativeness in utterance production
Neural Underpinnings
• Why speech act recognition disrupted in PD?
• Our results suggest executive cognitive function:
– Speech act priming correlated with stroop
interference for PD Ps(r = - .81) but not control Ps (r =
.05).
• Action verb/motor circuit connection
• Speech act deficit due to motor impairment
• Comprehension of action entails some simulation of action
(embodied cognition)
• Upper body impairment - more lower body verbs
Neural Underpinnngs of Speech Act
Comprehension: Lateralization
• Role of right hemisphere (RH) in speaker
meaning
– Evidence from RHD participants (poor at
recognizing nonliteral meanings)
– RH intention recognition (imaging data)
• Predict RH specialized for Speech Act
comprehension
• Speech Act Comprehension materials
– Lateralize targets to RVF/LH or LVF/RH
Jenny: Don’t forget to go to your dentist
appointment today.
+
REMIND
Lexical Decision Speed as a Function of
Utterance Type and Visual Field
Holtgraves, 2012
Indirect Replies
Context-Dependent
Speaker Meaning
Indirect Replies
• Replies that violate the Relation Maxim (be
relevant)
• No preferred reading out of context
(particularized implicatures)
Example:
• Nick: What did you think of my
presentation?
• Paul: It’s hard to give a good presentation.
Indirect Replies
–How are indirect replies interpreted?
–Why are they interpreted this way?
–How do people make this
interpretation?
–What are the neural underpinnings of
this process?
Model: Grice + Goffman
• Relevance violation is noticed/inference
generated
• Inference based on perceived reason for violation
• Relevance violations occur because of face
management
• Recipients realize this and use it as an
interpretive frame
• In general, relevance violations should be
interpreted as conveying FT information
Relevance Violation Experiments
Which inference?
• Participants read scenarios, questions and
replies
• Manipulate context:
– Positive (presentation was good)
– Negative (presentation was bad)
– No information
• Ask Ps to:
• Interpret replies
• Time reply comprehension
90.00%
80.00%
70.00%
60.00%
50.00%
40.00%
30.00%
20.00%
10.00%
0.00%
j
No Information
Negative
Information
Positive Information
Percent Negative Interpretations
Indirect replies interpreted just as
negatively in no information contexts as in
negative information contexts
2800
2700
2600
2500
2400
2300
2200
2100
2000
No Information
Negative
Information
Positive Information
Reply Comprehension Speed (in ms) as a Function
of Context
Indirect replies interpreted just as quickly
in no information contexts as in negative
information contexts
Relevance Violation Experiments
Comprehension Processes
• Manipulate context: Force literal or
indirect reading
• Assess: reply comprehension speed
indirect meaning priming
literal priming
2800
2600
2400
2200
2000
1800
1600
1400
1200
1000
Indirect Reading
Literal Reading
Reply Comprehension Speed (ms)
• Process is time-consuming (replies
with indirect meanings take longer
than matched controls)
1900
1800
1700
1600
1500
1400
1300
1200
1100
1000
Indirect Reading
Literal Reading
Sentence Verification Speed (ms)
Sentence verification judgments for indirect
interpretations faster following replies with indirect
meanings relative to replies with literal meaning: Indirect
meaning activated on-line (at comprehension, not posthoc)
Dispreferred Markers and Reply
Comprehension
• If recognition of face management drives
interpretive process, then factors suggesting
face management is operative should facilitate
comprehension
• Indirect Reply comprehension faster if
preceded by:
– “Well”
– Brief delay (2 s)
Neural Correlates
Basnakova et al., 2011
• fMRI while comprehending indirect replies
• Face-saving vs. informative indirect replies
(It’s hard to give a good presentation)
– Greater activation of:
• Right Anterior Cingulate Cortex (empathy)
• Right Superior Temporal Gyrus (inferencing)
• Right Inferior Frontal Cortex (contextual integration)
Summing Up
• Nonliteral speaker meaning is pervasive in conversation
• Many different types of nonliteral meaning
• Different social, cognitive, and neural processes involved
in their comprehension
• Social processes: face management
– Comprehension is a mirror image of production (FM)
• Cognitive processes: good enough processing
• Neural processes: RH and frontal networks involved in
perspective taking and inferencing (networks different
from classic language networks)
• Process models require more research on real-time
pragmatic processing (e.g., EEG)