The view that language structure is shaped by the semantic and pragmatic properties of the messages being communicated, and by the mechanisms of language perception and production. Standing in contrast to the ‘generative approach’, it holds that the function of language (viz., communication) constrains the range of grammatical rules both between and within natural languages. Linguists favoring the cognitive-functionalist approach consider grammar to be a system for coding relationships between utterances and their meanings, and that grammar is an inventory of mappings between utterances and their pragmatic and semantic interpretations. The coding system is thought to bear the following features: 1. grammatical rules consist of utterance-meaning pairs, which are not necessarily represented in an explicit way, 2. production and comprehension of novel expressions derive from regularities between input-output pairs, 3. manipulation of conventional expressions underlies much of grammatical competence, 4. when similar patterns reinforce each other, prototypes emerge, 5. frequency of use maintains any irregular grammatical patterns, and 6. diverse set of cognitive abilities constrains the linguistic coding of events. In recent years, connectionist models have been increasingly used to test some of the claims of the cognitive-functionalist approach (e.g., using backpropogation networks to extract regularities and the degree to which they resemble how speakers detect cues in meaning).
See Backpropogation, Connectionist models, Form, Generative grammar approach, Iconic mapping, Linguistics, Pragmatics, Semantics, Transformational grammar approach, Utterances