How Efficiency Shapes Human Language

Edward Gibson; Richard Futrell; Steven P Piantadosi; Isabelle Dautriche; Kyle Mahowald; Leon Bergen; Roger Levy

doi:10.1016/j.tics.2019.02.003

How Efficiency Shapes Human Language

Trends Cogn Sci. 2019 May;23(5):389-407. doi: 10.1016/j.tics.2019.02.003. Epub 2019 Apr 18.

Authors

Edward Gibson¹, Richard Futrell², Steven P Piantadosi³, Isabelle Dautriche⁴, Kyle Mahowald⁵, Leon Bergen⁵, Roger Levy⁶

Affiliations

¹ Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA. Electronic address: egibson@mit.edu.
² University of California, Irvine, CA, USA.
³ University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA.
⁴ University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK.
⁵ University of California, San Diego, CA, USA.
⁶ Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA. Electronic address: rplevy@mit.edu.

PMID: 31006626
DOI: 10.1016/j.tics.2019.02.003

Abstract

Cognitive science applies diverse tools and perspectives to study human language. Recently, an exciting body of work has examined linguistic phenomena through the lens of efficiency in usage: what otherwise puzzling features of language find explanation in formal accounts of how language might be optimized for communication and learning? Here, we review studies that deploy formal tools from probability and information theory to understand how and why language works the way that it does, focusing on phenomena ranging from the lexicon through syntax. These studies show how a pervasive pressure for efficiency guides the forms of natural language and indicate that a rich future for language research lies in connecting linguistics to cognitive psychology and mathematical theories of communication and inference.

Keywords: communication; cross-linguistic universals; language complexity; language efficiency; language evolution; language learnability.

Publication types

Review

MeSH terms

Communication
Efficiency*
Humans
Language*
Learning
Linguistics