Communicating Causality

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Michael Franke
• Subject Area: Applied Linguistics, Computational Linguistics
• Term: since 2024
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 547376651

Knowledge of causal processes is vital for all aspects of our lives, from mundane consumer choices to high-impact socio-political decision making. Much of our causal knowledge is acquired not from individual experience, but from cultural transmission via language. While theorists have amassed a large body of philosophical and psychological understanding about causation, surprisingly little research has been devoted to a theoretical understanding of the processes that underlie communication of causal information and the role of the linguistic signal in this transmission. The main objective of this project is to introduce a new pragmatic framework, the "CommuniCause" approach, which offers a unified explanation for a number of puzzling phenomena about causal language and cognition. CommuniCause brings together two important strands of research that have been isolated until now, in a way that will benefit both communities. It draws on established philosophical theorizing and recent computational models of individual causal cognition, but is distinguished by its focus on linguistic factors. CommuniCause promises advances to linguistic pragmatics as well, by confronting theories and models with a range of intricate puzzles that have not previously been treated from a linguistic perspective. The project explores the extent to which this pragmatic approach can explain key features of causal inference. One is the problem of causal selection, how we identify one event as the cause of another. Another puzzle involves the interpretation of statements of correlational evidence: Why do people interpret "Aspartame is linked to cancer" as implying that aspartame consumption causes cancer, and not the other way around? The CommuniCause perspective suggests treating such puzzles as traces of pragmatic reasoning: in interpreting what others have said, we can use what we know about how speakers make choices to infer what they are probably trying to convey. In a number of experiments, we explore the detailed predictions of the framework for how speakers choose to express causal information, how causal and non-causal language is interpreted, and how linguistic framing influences causal reasoning. We argue that language matters in causal thought and talk more than previously realized. A particularly interesting, practically relevant contribution is the juxtaposition of causal and non-causal language. We investigate when speakers choose non-causal expressions (e.g., "If A, then B" or "A is associated with B") to convey causal meaning, to address why listeners infer causal information from non-causal expressions. Contrary to widespread conception, we do not consider such inferences a fault or an irrationality. Rather, the CommuniCause approach is able to shed light on the efficiency and systematicity of this phenomenon, thereby providing a better grip on avoiding miscommunication between domain experts and lay audiences in important areas like health communication.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• International Connection: United Kingdom
• Partner Organisation: Arts and Humanities Research Council
• Cooperation Partner: Daniel Lassiter, Ph.D.