• Login
    View Item 
    •   Home
    • Faculty/ Researcher Works
    • Faculty/ Researcher Works
    • View Item
    •   Home
    • Faculty/ Researcher Works
    • Faculty/ Researcher Works
    • View Item
    JavaScript is disabled for your browser. Some features of this site may not work without it.

    Browse

    All of TUScholarShareCommunitiesDateAuthorsTitlesSubjectsGenresThis CollectionDateAuthorsTitlesSubjectsGenres

    My Account

    LoginRegister

    Help

    AboutPeoplePoliciesHelp for DepositorsData DepositFAQs

    Statistics

    Most Popular ItemsStatistics by CountryMost Popular Authors

    Arbitrary symbolism in natural language revisited: When word forms carry meaning

    • CSV
    • RefMan
    • EndNote
    • BibTex
    • RefWorks
    Thumbnail
    Name:
    Arbitrary symbolism in natural ...
    Size:
    452.5Kb
    Format:
    PDF
    Download
    Genre
    Journal Article
    Date
    2012-08-06
    Author
    Reilly, J
    Westbury, C
    Kean, J
    Peelle, JE
    Subject
    Acoustics
    Adult
    Factor Analysis, Statistical
    Female
    Humans
    Judgment
    Male
    Principal Component Analysis
    Reaction Time
    Regression Analysis
    Semantics
    Symbolism
    Young Adult
    Show allShow less
    Permanent link to this record
    http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12613/5454
    
    Metadata
    Show full item record
    DOI
    10.1371/journal.pone.0042286
    Abstract
    Cognitive science has a rich history of interest in the ways that languages represent abstract and concrete concepts (e.g., idea vs. dog). Until recently, this focus has centered largely on aspects of word meaning and semantic representation. However, recent corpora analyses have demonstrated that abstract and concrete words are also marked by phonological, orthographic, and morphological differences. These regularities in sound-meaning correspondence potentially allow listeners to infer certain aspects of semantics directly from word form. We investigated this relationship between form and meaning in a series of four experiments. In Experiments 1-2 we examined the role of metalinguistic knowledge in semantic decision by asking participants to make semantic judgments for aurally presented nonwords selectively varied by specific acoustic and phonetic parameters. Participants consistently associated increased word length and diminished wordlikeness with abstract concepts. In Experiment 3, participants completed a semantic decision task (i.e., abstract or concrete) for real words varied by length and concreteness. Participants were more likely to misclassify longer, inflected words (e.g., "apartment") as abstract and shorter uninflected abstract words (e.g., "fate") as concrete. In Experiment 4, we used a multiple regression to predict trial level naming data from a large corpus of nouns which revealed significant interaction effects between concreteness and word form. Together these results provide converging evidence for the hypothesis that listeners map sound to meaning through a non-arbitrary process using prior knowledge about statistical regularities in the surface forms of words. © 2012 Reilly et al.
    Citation to related work
    Public Library of Science (PLoS)
    Has part
    PLoS ONE
    ADA compliance
    For Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) accommodation, including help with reading this content, please contact scholarshare@temple.edu
    ae974a485f413a2113503eed53cd6c53
    http://dx.doi.org/10.34944/dspace/5436
    Scopus Count
    Collections
    Faculty/ Researcher Works

    entitlement

     
    DSpace software (copyright © 2002 - 2023)  DuraSpace
    Temple University Libraries | 1900 N. 13th Street | Philadelphia, PA 19122
    (215) 204-8212 | scholarshare@temple.edu
    Open Repository is a service operated by 
    Atmire NV
     

    Export search results

    The export option will allow you to export the current search results of the entered query to a file. Different formats are available for download. To export the items, click on the button corresponding with the preferred download format.

    By default, clicking on the export buttons will result in a download of the allowed maximum amount of items.

    To select a subset of the search results, click "Selective Export" button and make a selection of the items you want to export. The amount of items that can be exported at once is similarly restricted as the full export.

    After making a selection, click one of the export format buttons. The amount of items that will be exported is indicated in the bubble next to export format.