Any behavior humans can perform, they can performed in an “ostensive” way, that is, overtly attracting attention and providing evidence of meaning. The communicative principle of relevance is a lawlike generalization about ostensive stimuli and hence about human communication. Here I present the principle as a pair of simple and general empirical statements: one on the audience side and one on the communicator side. I also summarize recent developments: Experimental tests have proved supportive, theoretical analyses have connected the principle to evolutionary and developmental perspectives, and the principle has been used more broadly than before, far beyond the traditional domains of semantics and pragmatics. These developments consolidate the communicative principle of relevance as fundamental to understanding human interaction.

中文翻译：

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相关性的交际原则


人类可以执行的任何行为，他们都可以以 “表面 ”的方式进行，即公开吸引注意力并提供意义证据。相关性的交际原则是关于表面刺激的法则概括，因此也是关于人类交流的概括。在这里，我将该原则介绍为一对简单而一般的经验陈述：一个在听众方面，一个在传播者方面。我还总结了最近的发展：实验测试已被证明是支持的，理论分析将该原理与进化和发展观点联系起来，并且该原理的使用比以前更广泛，远远超出了语义学和语用学的传统领域。这些发展巩固了相关性的交际原则，将其作为理解人类互动的基础。