ABSTRACT
A firm grasp of the cognitive aspects of argument processing is essential if we are to understand argument reception, that is, how arguments are understood and evaluated. While quantitative studies in social psychology, and communication science more broadly, have yielded crucial insights into, among other things, the effects of argumentation on people’s attitudes and the features of argumentative messages that may influence persuasive outcomes, qualitative research is equally crucial to understand the cognitive mechanisms responsible for these effects. Cognitive pragmatics and cognitive psychology, which both develop cognitive models of communication, may be used for an informed introspective qualitative analysis of argumentation at the theoretical level, by allowing us to model how arguments may be received by their addressees. This research connects with evolutionary accounts of communication, which make room for cognitive functions or modules specifically dedicated to the processing of arguments, and at the same time lends itself to quantitative methodologies for validation. This chapter takes stock of these recent trends to ground our analysis of argument reception (i.e., argument comprehension, reconstruction and persuasiveness).
