Abstract

About twenty-five years ago, Bruno Bara coined the term Neuropragmatics, a neologism intended to draw attention to a field of research that was not yet well established at the time, investigating the connections between the mental processes involved in communication, especially in the attribution of communicative intentions, and the brain areas associated with these processes. This paper presents the research conducted with Bruno in this area. In particular, it discusses the Intention Processing Network model proposed by our research group, a model according to which a number of brain areas are specifically and differentially involved in the understanding of different types of intentions, including communicative intentions. Independent and converging findings from different experimental paradigms are also analysed, including neuroimaging (especially narrative and pragmatic processing, and one-way interactions), lesion, neurodegeneration, and brain stimulation studies. Finally, the implications of these findings are discussed in the light of a pragmatic approach to understanding actions and in relation to the key role of Theory of Mind abilities in processing communicative intentions.