Three principles of information flow: conversation as a dialogue game

This chapter brings together the insights of several linguists, logicians, computer scientists and philosophers that have studied the flow of information in language use and, specifically, dialogue. These insights are summarized in terms of three principles of information flow: (1) Information flow = context change, (2) Information flow is context-dependent and (3) Effective information flow is a cooperative endeavour. Each of these principles is discussed using examples from both naturally-occurring and scripted dialogues.