Abstract:In three experiments, we investigated the influence of two types of language on memory for object location: demonstratives (this, that) and possessives (my, your). Participants first read instructions containing demonstratives/possessives to place objects at different locations, and then had to recall those object locations (following object removal). Experiments 1 and 2 tested contrasting predictions of two possible accounts of language on object location memory: the Expectation Model (Coventry, Griffiths, & … Show more
“… Figure 2 . The participant reads out the instruction card, then memorizes the object location and finally instructs the experimenter to move the indication stick and align it with where the edge of the object was 14 . Please click here to view a larger version of this figure.…”
The memory game paradigm is a behavioral procedure to explore the relationship between language, spatial memory, and object knowledge. Using two different versions of the paradigm, spatial language use and memory for object location are tested under different, experimentally manipulated conditions. This allows us to tease apart proposed models explaining the influence of object knowledge on spatial language (e.g., spatial demonstratives), and spatial memory, as well as understanding the parameters that affect demonstrative choice and spatial memory more broadly. Key to the development of the method was the need to collect data on language use (e.g., spatial demonstratives: "this/that") and spatial memory data under strictly controlled conditions, while retaining a degree of ecological validity. The language version (section 3.1) of the memory game tests how conditions affect language use. Participants refer verbally to objects placed at different locations (e.g., using spatial demonstratives: "this/that red circle"). Different parameters can be experimentally manipulated: the distance from the participant, the position of a conspecific, and for example whether the participant owns, knows, or sees the object while referring to it. The same parameters can be manipulated in the memory version of the memory game (section 3.2). This version tests the effects of the different conditions on object-location memory. Following object placement, participants get 10 seconds to memorize the object's location. After the object and location cues are removed, participants verbally direct the experimenter to move a stick to indicate where the object was. The difference between the memorized and the actual location shows the direction and strength of the memory error, allowing comparisons between the influences of the respective parameters.
“… Figure 2 . The participant reads out the instruction card, then memorizes the object location and finally instructs the experimenter to move the indication stick and align it with where the edge of the object was 14 . Please click here to view a larger version of this figure.…”
The memory game paradigm is a behavioral procedure to explore the relationship between language, spatial memory, and object knowledge. Using two different versions of the paradigm, spatial language use and memory for object location are tested under different, experimentally manipulated conditions. This allows us to tease apart proposed models explaining the influence of object knowledge on spatial language (e.g., spatial demonstratives), and spatial memory, as well as understanding the parameters that affect demonstrative choice and spatial memory more broadly. Key to the development of the method was the need to collect data on language use (e.g., spatial demonstratives: "this/that") and spatial memory data under strictly controlled conditions, while retaining a degree of ecological validity. The language version (section 3.1) of the memory game tests how conditions affect language use. Participants refer verbally to objects placed at different locations (e.g., using spatial demonstratives: "this/that red circle"). Different parameters can be experimentally manipulated: the distance from the participant, the position of a conspecific, and for example whether the participant owns, knows, or sees the object while referring to it. The same parameters can be manipulated in the memory version of the memory game (section 3.2). This version tests the effects of the different conditions on object-location memory. Following object placement, participants get 10 seconds to memorize the object's location. After the object and location cues are removed, participants verbally direct the experimenter to move a stick to indicate where the object was. The difference between the memorized and the actual location shows the direction and strength of the memory error, allowing comparisons between the influences of the respective parameters.
“…Exposure to language and linguistic structure, both written and spoken, modulates cognitive functions that have hitherto been considered non-linguistic (Athanasopoulos et al, 2015;Boiteau & Almor, 2017;Chatterjee, Southwood, & Basilico, 1999;Coventry, Griffiths, & Hamilton, 2014;Dobel, Diesendruck, & Bölte, 2007;Fuhrman & Boroditsky, 2010;Gudde, Coventry, & Engelhardt, 2016;Hendricks & Boroditsky, 2017;Kranjec, Lehet, Bromberger, & Chatterjee, 2010;Levinson, 2003;A Maass & Russo, 2003;Román, El Fathi, & Santiago, 2013;Stroustrup & Wallentin, 2018;Tylén, Weed, Wallentin, Roepstorff, & Frith, 2010;Winawer et al, 2007).…”
Section: Left-right Bias In Imagery Caused By Readingmentioning
We investigated biases in the organization of imagery by asking participants to make stick-figure drawings of sentences containing a man, a woman and a transitive action (e.g. She kisses that guy). Previous findings show that prominent features of meaning and sentence structure are placed to the left in drawings, according to reading direction (e.g. Stroustrup & Wallentin, 2018). Five hundred thirty participants listened to sentences in Danish and made 8 drawings each. We replicated three findings: 1) that the first mentioned element is placed to the left more often, 2) that the agent in the sentence is placed to the left, and 3) that the grammatical subject is placed to the left of the object. We further tested hypotheses related to deixis and gender stereotypes. By adding demonstratives (e.g. Danish equivalents of this and that), that have been found to indicate attentional prominence, we tested the hypothesis that this is also translated into a left-ward bias in the produced drawings. We were unable to find support for this hypothesis. Analyses of gender biases tested the presence of a gender identification and a gender stereotype effect. According to the identification hypothesis, participants should attribute prominence to their own gender and draw it to the left, and according to the stereotype effect participants should be more prone to draw the male character to the left, regardless of own gender. We were not able to find significant support for either of the two gender effects. The combination of replications and null-findings suggest that the left-ward bias in the drawing experiment might be narrowly tied to left-to-right distribution in written language and less to overall prominence. No effect of handedness was observed.
“…Experimental evidence has shown that this distinction does not encode purely metric distance between the speaker and the referent. In single-referent contexts, the contrast between proximal and distal demonstratives maps onto the functional distinction between peripersonal and extrapersonal space, that is, between space within and outside reach (Caldano & Coventry, in press;Coventry, Griffiths, & Hamilton, 2014;Coventry, Valdés, Castillo, & Guijarro-Fuentes, 2008;Gudde, Coventry, & Engelhardt, 2016). However, when multiple competing referents are present, their relative distance also matters when speakers choose between proximal and distal demonstratives (Bonfiglioli, Finocchiaro, Gesierich, Rositani, & Vescovi, 2009;Rocca, Wallentin, Vesper, & Tylén, 2018).…”
“…Demonstratives provide indications on the position of objects (or locations) relative to the position of the speaker and conversational dyad (Coventry et al, 2014(Coventry et al, , 2008Gudde et al, 2016;Peeters et al, 2015). It is therefore crucial that the two speakers in the dialogue are assigned specific and distinct spatial origins.…”
Spatial demonstratives are powerful linguistic tools used to establish joint attention. Identifying the meaning of semantically underspecified expressions like "this one" hinges on the integration of linguistic and visual cues, attentional orienting and pragmatic inference. This synergy between language and extralinguistic cognition is pivotal to language comprehension in general, but especially prominent in demonstratives.In this study, we aimed to elucidate which neural architectures enable this intertwining between language and extralinguistic cognition using a naturalistic fMRI paradigm. In our experiment, 28 participants listened to a specially crafted dialogical narrative with a controlled number of spatial demonstratives. A fast multiband-EPI acquisition sequence (TR = 388ms) combined with FIR modelling of the hemodynamic response was used to capture signal changes at word-level resolution.We found that spatial demonstratives bilaterally engage a network of parietal areas, including the supramarginal gyrus, the angular gyrus, and precuneus, implicated in information integration and visuospatial processing. Moreover, demonstratives recruit frontal regions, including the right FEF, implicated in attentional orienting and reference frames shifts. Finally, using multivariate similarity analyses, we provide evidence for a general involvement of the dorsal ("where") stream in the processing of spatial expressions, as opposed to ventral pathways encoding object semantics.Overall, our results suggest that language processing relies on a distributed architecture, recruiting neural resources for perception, attention, and extra-linguistic aspects of cognition in a dynamic and context-dependent fashion.The 60 regions of interest included in the similarity analysis correspond to all sub-regions of the frontal, temporal, parietal and occipital lobes in AAL2 (see Table 2 in Rolls et al., 2015). The opercular, triangular and orbital part of the inferior frontal gyrus were collapsed into a single region of interest. Homologue regions in left and right hemisphere were kept as separate ROIs.
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