Evidence in support of this conclusion comes from experiments [11••], computational and mathematical models [12] and data from a wide range of languages [13].
Transmission to new learners, communicative use, interactions among speakers in a community, and the structure of the world, all leave their imprint on the structure of languages (see Figure 2 for a description of two structural design features of language that have been claimed to be adaptations arising from cultural evolution: combinatoriality and compositionality). The headline conclusion so far is that language evolves to maximise expressivity under pressures for communication whilst minimising complexity under pressure to be learnable. Evidence in support of this conclusion comes from experiments [11••], computational and mathematical models [12] and data from a wide range of languages [13].