Figurative language as a tool of communication: An essay on the inherence of analogical thinking and the cognition of metaphors


Figurative language forms a central part of human communication - by flouting the literal meaning of a word, we can hope to achieve a deeper effect with our language. We often consider figurative speech to be a stylistic choice, a tool in a persuader's kit used to command the attention of their audience, but could there be a deeper cognitive function associated with the use of metaphors? Does the literature around metaphorical and analogical thought support the use of figurative speech in coaching, education, and other fields? This essay will investigate current theories surrounding the use of implicit learning (i.e. using figurative speech) as a means of learning complex or abstract situations (Fasold et al. 51), focusing on contemporary research in pedagogical and sports science. A combination of psychological, philosophical, and linguistic approaches will be taken in order to determine how exactly figurative language affects us, and whether there is an intrinsic property of human nature making it particularly effective.


1 Analogical and relational thinking as a human property

Before we can analyse the use of metaphors specifically, it is important to understand how the human brain responds to relational thought in general - i.e. the ability to compare and be cognisant of similarities between unrelated (and possibly unfamiliar) domains. In this regard, Gentner calls upon structure-mapping theory in order to explain how connections can be made between domains of knowledge. She posits that structural similarities between other domains (specifically, water flow and crowd movement) and an unfamiliar domain (in her case, electricity) are used to inform an individual's understanding of new ideas (111). The "pervasiveness" (124) of these structural analogies seeks to suggest that they form a crucial part of thinking and learning new ideas. Furthermore, the analogy used had a tangible impact on the inferences made towards electricity (118), with the strengths and weaknesses of the models being reflected in the individual's understanding of the unfamiliar domain. Gentner's study would seek to imply that relational thought is an effective tool in developing new ideas, and further studies even propose this as an intrinsic part of human nature - Christie et al. find that children perform better in memory and spatial tasks if relational matches are provided. Moreover, while apes were also capable of this relational mapping, the children were able to do so at a significantly better rate, with a 68% lead over the apes, suggesting a level of "human relational superiority" (531).


These studies perhaps suggest that humans are naturally capable of forming relational maps between familiar and unfamiliar domains, and it is not unreasonable to extrapolate this to a linguistic area - it may be that figurative language has some tangible effect on our cognition of new information, which would subsequently support the notion that figurative language is deeper than a stylistic choice. This speaks to Pinker's messianic theory, one that suggests that we "can directly think only about concrete experiences [...] to think is to grasp a metaphor" (238). Indeed, these studies may uncover the idea that the mind is a sort of imperfect archivist, making sense of new information by digging up known structures and knowledge, and that figurative language is a means of prompting the mind of finding an explanation more quickly; the index cards of the mind.


Studies around implicit learning in the world of sports may support this idea. Moran et al. find that analogies with a directional component (ADCs) may be particularly effective in sports performance (2058) - particularly, away-directioned language (e.g. "Sprint as if you are being chased up a hill") showed sprint time and jump height improvements over internal cues (e.g. "Focus on driving your legs back"), with results that "support the use of ECs [external cues] and ADCs in sprinting" (2059). The aforementioned study of Fasold et al. similarly found that "handball skills could be trained in a pictorially metaphorical way" (51), and that while explicit instructions were more effective for simple ideas in the short term, complex ideas were better understood long-term with analogical instructions. This could indicate that figurative language is useful in breaking down complex ideas that are not immediately intuitive, further representing it as a prompt for the mind. Fasold et al. in particular posit that the analogical language serves to spread the cognitive workload away from working memory, engaging the reasoning regions of the brain to better comprehend complex or demanding tasks (51). However, these studies may also show that analogical language is not always the most effective in eliciting improved performance, a prospect which will be discussed later on in determining whether the meaning of figurative speech is more important than its actual figurative nature.


Overall, the psychological literature does seem to suggest that there could be something special about figurative speech and its relation to human cognition. In particular, the sporting studies could be used to argue that figurative language speaks not only to the mind but also to the body, a form of embodied cognition in which the mind is just an interface for the body and its motor functions and an area of interest in philosophy, with Merleau-Ponty arguing that "the body is the vehicle of being in the world," contrary to the Cartesian idea of thought and existence (94). It is certainly interesting to consider that language could speak to us on a subconscious or biological level rather than a purely cognitive one.


2 The semantic argument and the "dead metaphor"

We have looked at the way in which empirical psychological evidence and established philosophical thought might evince some deeper link between analogical thinking and the mind, but it is also important to consider the counter- argument, which places metaphors and analogies as simple linguistic tools, and suggests that metaphors are little more than synonyms of their desired meaning. We can again look to Pinker for this in what he refers to as the killjoy theory, in which he refers to a category of metaphors that are "semantic fossils" (238). This is more widely known as a dead metaphor, a metaphor that has lost its literal meaning and is synonymous with what it aims to represent. Naturally, a large number of metaphors used are not common and historic enough to fall into this category, but the semantic shift of common metaphors to idioms is convincing evidence that metaphors are no more special than any other linguistic construction - after all, if we processed figurative language differently to normal language, this would prevent it from undergoing the same constant semantic movement that literal words and phrases do. In fact, some of the evidence seems to support the notion that figurative language is processed very similarly to its literal counterparts - in the study carried out by Moran et al., non-analogical external cues (e.g. "focus on driving the ground back") and even neutral cues ("run as fast as you can") proved just as, if not more effective than their ADC counterparts (2058). Moreover, there is a distinct lack of a dividing line between metaphor and literal language, and a number of linguists, most notably Lakoff, suggest that there is a continuum between the literal and the figurative (Cacciari 449), further undermining the idea of figurative language as a distinct and special linguistic endeavour.


From a pragmatic point of view, it makes sense that we consider metaphors as lexically equivalent - the coop- erative principle states that as humans, we aim to make our language informative and relevant (Grice 46), and so arguably when approaching a metaphor the mind assumes relatively safely that the literal meaning is not the in- tended one, given its irrelevance to the conversation as a whole, and thus jumps to considering its intended meaning without any further processing of the literal sense of the phrase. This again supports the counterargument, as it suggests that we process language based on its intended meaning, and so would not consider a figurative depiction of the same idea any differently (as is supported by Moran et al.). Grice does, however, note that his maxims of cooperation are not hard and fast rules, and are regularly flouted with the aim of implying some other idea (49), and it could be argued that metaphors are in fact a deliberate flouting of the maxims of Quantity and Relation in order to imply the underlying meaning of the metaphor by forcing the interlocutor to consider a seemingly irrelevant proposition - to declare that someone has, for example, "kicked the bucket" would otherwise be a particularly bizarre statement - but as communicators we use euphemisms and innuendo all the time, constructions which violate Grice's rules and increase the mental bandwidth needed to follow a conversation, and we do not seek to consider these as special or unique in the same way in which some argue on behalf of metaphors.


3 The value of figurative speech in communication and education

Whether or not metaphors have any unique cognitive or subconscious properties, it is impossible to deny their value as a tool in a communicator's linguistic arsenal, and we must consider whether it really matters if metaphors are biologically special, taking a more utilitarian approach to this facet of language. While they may not provide any direct benefit on sporting performance, it can be argued that metaphors are useful in building morale and a rapport between players and coaches, as a result of the common ground associated with shared metaphors or idioms (Mey 307). Additionally, they can prove as useful tools in persuading people towards a particular idea or solution - Thibodeau & Boroditsky find that individuals are more likely to favour a prevention-based approach to crime when it is described as a "virus", and an enforcement-based solution when it is described as a "beast" (5), suggesting that the metaphors used in marketing or political texts can be significant in favouring a particular bias or outcome. On a layer above this, it can be argued that it is possible to observe the use of metaphors to draw conclusions about a speaker - a storyteller making heavy use of metaphors may be labelled as descriptive and immersive, for example, but a politician doing the same thing may be branded as a disingenous demagogue.


Relational thinking and metaphor can also find its use in teaching. The idea of forming mental connections between ideas (connectionism) is already heavily practiced in learning regular verb or gender patterns in second language acquisition (Mitchell & Myles 124), so it is not absurd to propose that the same sort of mental network- building can be undertaken using metaphors - in SLA, the learning of metaphors and idioms in the target language can not only build understanding of the culture around it, but can also help to form these mental links by considering the literal meaning of the metaphor and comparing it with similar metaphors in English - research into idiom acquisition finds that the process is easiest for phrases identical or similar to English (Cooper 258). In this way, it is clear to see that metaphors are a crucial part of a language and its culture, and students who learn the idioms of their L2 are likely to have improved communication skills in the language (Samani & Hashemian 249). Outside of the world of language, it has already been established from the aforementioned work of Gentner that metaphors prove very useful in explaining and understanding abstract or complex concepts in STEM education.


4 Conclusion

There are some overall conclusions that can be drawn from the empirical and theoretical evidence covered in this essay. Firstly, it is clear that regardless of its cognitive mechanisms, figurative language has particularly significant uses in a wide range of fields, and is perhaps one of the most useful tools of rhetoric that a language user can employ. Furthermore, it is clear that figurative language can play a role in forcing ourselves to break down a complex idea and observe it piece by piece, as has been observed by its use in scientific discourse and learning. We are also able to safely conclude that the thinking processes that allow metaphors to exist are uniquely strong in humans, and that this forms a possible explanation for why figurative language is so effective in these fields. On the other hand, it is much more difficult to subscribe to the idea that metaphors are fundamentally processed differently by the brain in casual usage - the psychological evidence suggests that the use of metaphors alone rather than as a tool to express a wider idea is of little use compared to straightforward, literal language, implying that it is the way in which metaphors are used that is significant rather than any sort of subconscious 'magic' formed by the use of figurative speech, or any biological effect that is claimed in terms of processing metaphors. It is, of course, important to note that the ways in which metaphors are proposed to be useful are not one-size-fits-all by any means - for some learners, athletes, or listeners, metaphors will be more effective than other methods in terms of engaging a specific idea or mindset within the individual's cognition. The possibly underwhelming outcome of this essay is by no means a criticism of metaphor or a derision of its uses but rather an emphasis on the beauty of human language as a whole, a recognition that it is not figurative speech that is fundamentally different from human language, but rather human language and the way in which we process it that is fundamentally different from any other observed cognitive phenomenon. To summarise, figurative speech is merely a piece of the wider puzzle of linguistic gap-filling in which we participate every day, in every context.


Works cited


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