Symposium – Pragmatics

Friday 9th of May 9.45 – 11.15

Aula Magna

Pragmatics and communication in Ageing symposium

Effective communication is at the heart of social interactions. However, little is known about how the pragmatic skills that support communication evolve along the lifespan in response to age-related cognitive, affective, and social modifications. By describing the pragmatic profile of older adults via innovative assessment approaches, including ecological ones, their use of prosocial language, and intervention methods to improve communicative skills, this symposium aims to settle a novel field of investigation, focused on pragmatics in older adulthood and its role in supporting well-being, with possible applications in both clinical and community settings. 

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Abstracts

Talk 1 – Pragmatic competence and aging: Insights into cognitive and socio-cognitive correlates.

by Irene Ceccato¹

Authors: Irene Ceccato¹, Elena Cavallini², Luca Bischetti³, Eleonora Marocchini⁴, Veronica Mangiaterra³, Serena Lecce², Valentina Bambini³

¹ Dipartimento di Psicologia, Università di Chieti-Pescara

² Department of Brain and Behavioral Sciences, University of Pavia

³ Laboratory of Neurolinguistics and Experimental Pragmatics (NEP), University School for Advanced Studies IUSS, Pavia

⁴ Social Sciences Unit, Institute for Globally Distributed Open Research and Education, Göteborg, Sweden

The study of pragmatic competence has been largely neglected within the aging literature, despite its critical role in social functioning. Here we present a research program including several studies that we conducted on the topic of the complex interplay between aging, pragmatics, and both cognitive and socio-cognitive processes. With respect to pragmatic comprehension, particularly figurative language, our studies showed that aging adversely affects the comprehension of both humor and metaphor. Moreover, evidence indicated that theory of mind (ToM) differentially contributes to figurative language comprehension depending on the specific demands of the pragmatic task. With respect to pragmatic production, our investigation focused on off-topic verbosity (OTV), defined as extended speech lacking in focus and coherence. Our studies confirmed the higher prevalence of OTV among older adults relative to their younger counterparts. Furthermore, we developed a novel instrument to assess OTV comprehensively, incorporating both frequency and severity during semi-structured autobiographical interviews. Analyses of cognitive and socio-cognitive correlates of OTV across young-old and old-old cohorts revealed both convergences and divergences between these aging phases, underscoring the selective contributions of processing speed, inhibitory control, and theory of mind. Collectively, these findings affirm the interdependence of pragmatic competence and social cognition, while also advancing a more nuanced understanding of their relationship.

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Talk 2 – Prosocial speed acts: inks to pragmatics and aging.

By Madeleine Long

Authors: Madeleine Long and Sarah MacPherson

School of Philosophy, Psychology and Language Sciences, University of Edinburgh

Prosocial speech acts (i.e., those in which the aim is to protect the listener’s feelings/self-image) are ubiquitous in everyday speech, enabling people to build and maintain relationships. This study investigated the use of prosocial speech acts over the adult lifespan, revealing that prosocial linguistic behavior is influenced by a combination of differences in audience design and communicative styles at different ages. Collectively, these findings highlight the importance of situating prosocial speech acts within the pragmatics and aging literature, allowing us to uncover the factors modulating prosocial linguistic behavior at different developmental stages. 

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Talk 3 – Pragmatics affects wellbeing in senior citizens: an ecological momentary assessment study.

by Chiara Barattieri di San Pietro¹

Authors: Chiara Barattieri di San Pietro¹, Valentina Bambini¹, Alessia Rosi², Lara Fracassi², Serena Lecce², Elena Cavallini²

¹ Laboratory of Neurolinguistics and Experimental Pragmatics (NEP), University School for Advanced Studies IUSS, Pavia

² Department of Brain and Behavioral Sciences, University of Pavia

Pragmatic abilities are crucial to regulate social interactions, but with age their decline can pose a risk to maintaining social engagement. Traditional in-lab, paper-and-pencil, and retrospective questionnaires can introduce memory biases and, most importantly, miss momentary variations in use. We assessed age differences in the effects of both expressive (respecting the topic of the conversation and expressing concisely) and expressive (following the thread of the discourse and understand jokes or idioms) pragmatic abilities on everyday wellbeing (happiness and life satisfaction) via Ecological Momentary Assessment (EMA). The analysis of the answers submitted by 82 young and 80 senior participants to both open and closed questions, collected for seven days, five times a day, indicate that the pragmatic success in social interactions is a strong predictor of wellbeing irrespective of age, and that in particular seniors’ quality of life is significantly and positively modulated by the ability to follow the thread of the discourse. This is the first study that applies the EMA methodology to the study of pragmatics and social communication in everyday settings.

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Talk 4 – Specific efficacy of the advanced cognitive pragmatic treatment to improve communicative ability in healthy aging.

by Francesca Bosco

Author: Francesca Bosco

GIPSI Research Group, Department of Psychology, University of Turin, Turin, Italy

The aim of the study is to investigate the efficacy of a novel cognitive training, the Advanced-CPT, in improving pragmatics ability in aging healthy. We expect taking part to the Advanced-CTP leads to pragmatic improvements, not detectable after unstructured social activities, i.e. control group sessions. We also expect the Advanced-CPT to determine a specific effect on pragmatic ability, rather than a generalized improvement involving also cognitive and Theory of Mind skills.