Redundant Reference as an Interactional Resource: Social Situation and Recipient Familiarity in Referential Choice

In interpersonal communication, speakers often provide more information than is minimally necessary for referent identification, thereby producing redundant reference. Although such expressions have often been treated as cooperative, less is known about whether, and how, they are systematically shaped by social-interactional considerations. The present research addressed this question through three language-production experiments examining the joint effects of visual scene characteristics (color and number of distractors) and social-interactional factors (social situation and recipient familiarity) on redundant reference. Across the three experiments, redundant reference emerged not as mere informational excess, but as an adaptive referential strategy jointly shaped by referential information demands, social situations, and recipient familiarity. Together, these findings provide empirical evidence for understanding redundant reference as a flexible referential choice from a social-cognitive perspective.