# Are Multimodal Large Language Models Pragmatically Competent Listeners in Simple Reference Resolution Tasks?

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2506.11807 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2506.11807/

## Key facts

- Cited by 3 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Placed in MLLM training and visual instruction tuning, one of 16 directions in Multimodal LLMs / vision-language models.
- Builds on 10 of its 28 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 13 Jun 2025.

## Placed in

- Multimodal LLMs / vision-language models / [MLLM training and visual instruction tuning](https://mlsanity.com/mllm/mllm-training-and-visual-instruction-tuning/)

## Builds on (most cited first, 10 of 10)

- [Improved Baselines with Visual Instruction Tuning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2310.03744/) (2023)
- [Qwen2-VL: Enhancing Vision-Language Model's Perception of the World at Any Resolution](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2409.12191/) (2024)
- [Sparks of Artificial General Intelligence: Early experiments with GPT-4](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2303.12712/) (2023)
- [Qwen-VL: A Versatile Vision-Language Model for Understanding, Localization, Text Reading, and Beyond](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2308.12966/) (2023)
- [Janus-Pro: Unified Multimodal Understanding and Generation with Data and Model Scaling](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2501.17811/) (2025)
- [Can Language Models Encode Perceptual Structure Without Grounding? A Case Study in Color](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2109.06129/) (2021)
- [Language Model Behavior: A Comprehensive Survey](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2303.11504/) (2023)
- [Colors in Context: A Pragmatic Neural Model for Grounded Language Understanding](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1703.10186/) (2017)
- [Language Models as Models of Language](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2408.07144/) (2024)
- [Character Sequence Models for ColorfulWords](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1609.08777/) (2016)

## Built on by (most cited first, 3 of 3)

- [Are BabyLMs Deaf to Gricean Maxims? A Pragmatic Evaluation of Sample-efficient Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2510.04764/) (2025)
- [On the Same Wavelength? Evaluating Pragmatic Reasoning in Language Models across Broad Concepts](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2509.06952/) (2025)
- [Reference Games as a Testbed for the Alignment of Model Uncertainty and Clarification Requests](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2601.07820/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

We investigate the linguistic abilities of multimodal large language models in reference resolution tasks featuring simple yet abstract visual stimuli, such as color patches and color grids. Although the task may not seem challenging for today's language models, being straightforward for human dyads, we consider it to be a highly relevant probe of the pragmatic capabilities of MLLMs. Our results and analyses indeed suggest that basic pragmatic capabilities, such as context-dependent interpretation of color descriptions, still constitute major challenges for state-of-the-art MLLMs.