The Development of Pragmatic Competence in Metonymy and Metaphor Processing

My research focuses on non-literal uses of language, specifically metaphor (e.g. 'Sally is an iceberg') and metonymy (e.g. 'The ham sandwich left without paying'), and poses the key question: how do children acquire competence in producing and comprehending metaphor and metonymy, in relation to other linguistic, cognitive and pragmatic skills that may support figurative language development (e.g. receptive vocabulary size, semantic knowledge, 'theory of mind', etc.)?
The aim of my project is to investigate the developmental trajectories of metaphor comprehension vs. metonymy comprehension, and to determine whether different 'skill sets' are required for the two phenomena. The answer will help to adjudicate a prominent theoretical debate between relevance theorists and cognitive linguists as to whether metonymy and metaphor are distinct pragmatic phenomena.
I intend to combine cross-sectional and longitudinal research, using behavioural methods to investigate the acquisition of metonymy and metaphor in a group of 60 typically developing children aged 7,0 to 12,0. In the course of my empirical work, I will also investigate property activation in metonymy and metaphor processing, in order to elucidate the on-line processes responsible for the derivation of metonymic vs. metaphorical interpretations. Further, looking ahead to post-doctoral work with clinical populations, I hope to carry out a pilot study to examine metonymy and metaphor development in children with autism (ASD). My ultimate goal in identifying linguistic, cognitive and pragmatic abilities that underpin metonymy and metaphor development is to guide educational and clinical programmes aimed at enhancing the communication competencies of all children.