The process of answering direction-giving questions when someone is lost on a university campus: The role of pragmatics

Two experiments investigated how college students answered direction-giving questions when a confederate asked for directions to a destination on a university campus. The experiments applied the QUEST model (Graesser and Franklin, 1990) to direction giving, emphasizing the pragmatic component of the model that focuses on establishing common ground and dealing with the questioner's goals. The two experiments had different articulations of the direction-giving question (i.e. 'How do you get to destination X?' versus 'Where is destination X?'), and a different destination. The answers generated by subjects supported both aspects of the pragmatic component.