The paper argues that cognitive mechanisms responsible for implicatures are the same no matter what language someone uses. However, linguistic knowledge, conceptual knowledge, encyclopedic knowledge and contextual effect that are all needed for producing and comprehending implicatures vary significantly in ELF users. They cannot be expected to act in accordance with the conventions and norms of the societal culture of native English-speaking communities. It is claimed that in ELF discourse participants must create their own temporary norms and conventions with implicatures among them. Consequently, it seems mistaken to test L2 users or ELF speakers on the use of L1-based conversational and/or frozen implicatures (functioning as idioms) as many studies have done.

The paper offers a modified understanding of implicatures with the notion of “simplicature”, and a model to explain the relationship and interplay between factors that affect implicature processing: linguistic knowledge, conceptual knowledge, encyclopedic knowledge and contextual effect.

该论文认为，不管某人使用哪种语言，造成暗示的认知机制都是相同的。但是，在ELF用户中，产生和理解隐含含义所需的语言知识，概念知识，百科全书知识和上下文效果差异很大。不能指望他们按照以英语为母语的社区的社会文化惯例和规范行事。据称，在ELF语篇中，参与者必须创建自己的临时规范和公约，其中包含隐含含义。因此，正如许多研究所做的那样，测试L2用户或ELF说话者是否使用基于L1的会话和/或冻结含义（成语功能）似乎是错误的。

本文以“简单”的概念对含意进行了修改，并提供了一个模型来解释影响含意处理的因素之间的关系和相互作用：语言知识，概念知识，百科知识和语境效果。