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Where Next for Pragmatics and Mind Reading? A Situation-Based view (Response to Kissine)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2026

Napoleon Katsos and
Clara Andrés-Roqueta
Napoleon Katsos*
Affiliation:
University of Cambridge
Clara Andrés-Roqueta*
Affiliation:
Universitat Jaume I de Castellón
*
Katsos, Department of Theoretical and Applied Linguistics, English Faculty Building, University of Cambridge, TR-24, CB3 9DP, Cambridge, UK, [nk248@cam.ac.uk]
Andrés-Roqueta, Department of Developmental, Educational, Social and Methodological Psychology, Universitat Jaume I de Castellón, Av/ Sos Baynat, s/n, 12071, Castellón, Spain, [candres@uji.es]
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Abstract

Our commentary is mainly concerned with Kissine's first argument in his 2021 target article: that mind reading is not necessarily needed for pragmatics. We fully agree with Kissine, and we present (i) additional recent empirical evidence in support of this view and (ii) a new model of pragmatics and mind reading, based on the situation of language use rather than the type of pragmatic phenomenon that is instantiated. The last part of our commentary concerns the logical validity of Kissine's argument, taking into account important concepts in autism research such as heterogeneity, equifinality, and neurodiversity, but also evaluating how relevant the empirical evidence from learning language from TV is to the debate on nativism vs. constructivism. We conclude that there is much to love (as regards pragmatics) and some to query (as regards the conclusions we can draw about nativism vs. constructivism) in this timely and thought-provoking article.

Keywords

pragmaticsmind readingautistic spectrum disorders (ASD)developmental language disorder (DLD)theory of mind (ToM)structural language

Information

Type
Perspectives
Information
Language , Volume 97 , Issue 3 , September 2021, pp. e184 - e197
Copyright
Copyright © 2021 Linguistic Society of America

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