COMCOG

Welcome to COMCOG – Communication and Cognition at Heidelberg University

At COMCOG, we examine the interaction between language, cognition, and context from a pragmatic perspective. Our research focuses on how communication is shaped by cognitive processes and contextual factors. We study various aspects of communication, from sentence structure to the role of gestures and other modalities in discourse.

How do we communicate meaning through words, gestures, and context?

We explore the mental mechanisms that guide communication—how meaning is constructed and interpreted depending on the context, the participants, and the forms of expression used. Our work on connectives, discourse markers, and multimodal elements highlights the importance of context in shaping effective communication.

A Range of Research Methods

Our research combines theoretical, descriptive, and applied studies, with an emphasis on experimental methods such as eye-tracking. These approaches allow us to observe cognitive processes during communication, providing insights into how language functions in real-time across different languages and settings.

News

Our new publication “(Re)Categorizing lexical encapsulation: an experimental approach” in the Journal of Pragmatics provides insights into the cognitive processing of anaphoric reference mechanisms and highlights that adding new information is a key factor in processing effort.

New forthcoming publications in Experimental Linguistics (for more information see “News” or “Publications”):

• Manual de pruebas experimentales para la lingüística actual
• Cognitive Processing of Nominal Anaphoric Encapsulation and Coreference in Native Spanish Speakers: An Experimental Approach with Eye-Tracking

New publication “Generative AI: Simplifying Text for Cognitive Impairments and Non-native Speakers” coauthored by Óscar Loureda in collaboration with Valentina Ospina-Henao, Sebastián López Flórez, V. Juan M. Núñez & Fernando De la Prieta.

On June 20, the results of the eye-tracking study on “The processing of pragmatically marked utterances in speakers with sickle cell disease” were presented at the VII International Conference on Clinical Linguistics (CILC2024). The project was conducted by HCIAS researchers Adriana Cruz & Mathis Teucher and PhD student Linier Escobar from the University of Panama.

From the 16 to the 18 of May, HCIAS PhD student Celia Hernández Pérez participated in the 37th Annual Conference on Human Sentence Processing held at the University of Michigan with the presentation of the poster “The processing of anaphoric encapsulation versus coreference in Spanish: An experimental approach with eye-tracking”.