Lexical knowledge without a lexicon?

Elman, Jeffrey L.

doi:10.1075/ml.6.1.01elm

Cited by 51 publications

(27 citation statements)

References 112 publications

(108 reference statements)

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“…The here-demonstrated rapidity, flexibility, and context dependency of language-induced motor activity to one and the same word are not compatible with such view. Rather, following Evans and Green (2006) and Elman (2011), we believe that words are “operators” that alter mental states (i.e., situation models) in context-dependent and lawful ways. If the timing under which an effect occurs is indicative of its source (lexical meaning or post-lexical) the early language-driven motor effects that we observed in our experiments allow suggesting that motor activity takes part in the action word meaning construction in conditions in which the action is in the linguistic focus.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 89%

“…“conceptual stability”; Hoenig et al, 2008. See also Elman, 2011). However, within a theoretical frame that considers lexical meaning access as an interactive process, integrating information from many different sources, the question of whether language-induced motor activation is an integral part of lexical meaning or a mere effect of the ensuing construction of a situation model (Hauk et al, 2008a,b; Chatterjee, 2010; Bedny and Caramazza, 2011) does not make sense.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Action relevance in linguistic context drives word-induced motor activity

Aravena

Courson

Frak

et al. 2014

Front. Hum. Neurosci.

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Many neurocognitive studies on the role of motor structures in action-language processing have implicitly adopted a “dictionary-like” framework within which lexical meaning is constructed on the basis of an invariant set of semantic features. The debate has thus been centered on the question of whether motor activation is an integral part of the lexical semantics (embodied theories) or the result of a post-lexical construction of a situation model (disembodied theories). However, research in psycholinguistics show that lexical semantic processing and context-dependent meaning construction are narrowly integrated. An understanding of the role of motor structures in action-language processing might thus be better achieved by focusing on the linguistic contexts under which such structures are recruited. Here, we therefore analyzed online modulations of grip force while subjects listened to target words embedded in different linguistic contexts. When the target word was a hand action verb and when the sentence focused on that action (John signs the contract) an early increase of grip force was observed. No comparable increase was detected when the same word occurred in a context that shifted the focus toward the agent's mental state (John wants to sign the contract). There mere presence of an action word is thus not sufficient to trigger motor activation. Moreover, when the linguistic context set up a strong expectation for a hand action, a grip force increase was observed even when the tested word was a pseudo-verb. The presence of a known action word is thus not required to trigger motor activation. Importantly, however, the same linguistic contexts that sufficed to trigger motor activation with pseudo-verbs failed to trigger motor activation when the target words were verbs with no motor action reference. Context is thus not by itself sufficient to supersede an “incompatible” word meaning. We argue that motor structure activation is part of a dynamic process that integrates the lexical meaning potential of a term and the context in the online construction of a situation model, which is a crucial process for fluent and efficient online language comprehension.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 89%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Action relevance in linguistic context drives word-induced motor activity

Aravena

Courson

Frak

et al. 2014

Front. Hum. Neurosci.

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“…These results suggest that word forms do not need to correspond to memorized senses or referents to be meaningful. As such, they call into question the necessity of the "mental lexicon" as a construct (Casasanto & Lupyan, in press;Dilkina, McClelland, & Plaut, 2010;Elman, 2004Elman, , 2009Elman, , 2011.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Meaningless words promote meaningful categorization

Lupyan

Casasanto

2014

Lang. cogn.

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On traditional accounts, word meanings are entries in a mental lexicon. Nonsense words lack such entries, and are therefore meaningless. Here, we show that under some circumstances nonsense words function indistinguishably from conventional words. The "nonsense" words "foove" and "crelch" led participants to select systematically different clusters of adjectives and were reliably matched to different species of alien creatures (e.g., "crelches" were pointy and narrow and "fooves" were large and fat). In a categorization task in which participants learned to group two species of aliens primarily on the basis or roundness/pointiness, these novel labels facilitated performance as much as conventional words (e.g., "round," "pointy"). The results expand the scope of research on sound symbolism and support a nontraditional view of word meaning according to which words do not have meanings by virtue of a conventionalized formmeaning pairing. Rather, the "meaning" of a word is the effect that the word form has on the user's mental activity.

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“…Alternatively, one could argue that performing linguistic tasks involves rather specialized skills and that no strong relationship to general cognitive speed is to be expected. For 1 Note that the structure and contents of the mental lexicon is subject to extensive debate among cognitive scientists (see Taft, 2015, for a recent review), ranging from views where the mental representations accessed are "linguistically sophisticated" (Jackendoff, 2002) to views where the mental lexicon as a central storage is completely abandoned (Elman, 2011). Future research is needed to delineate between the various accounts.…”

Section: The Choice Of Linguistic and Nonlinguistic Tasksmentioning

confidence: 99%

Shared lexical access processes in speaking and listening? An individual differences study.

Hintz¹,

Jongman²,

Dijkhuis³

et al. 2020

Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cogni

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Lexical access is a core component of word processing. In order to produce or comprehend a word, language users must access word forms in their mental lexicon. However, despite its involvement in both tasks, previous research has often studied lexical access in either production or comprehension alone. Therefore, it is unknown to which extent lexical access processes are shared across both tasks. Picture naming and auditory lexical decision are considered good tools for studying lexical access. Both of them are speeded tasks. Given these commonalities, another open question concerns the involvement of general cognitive abilities (e.g., processing speed) in both linguistic tasks. In the present study, we addressed these questions. We tested a large group of young adults enrolled in academic and vocational courses. Participants completed picture-naming and auditory lexical-decision tasks as well as a battery of tests assessing nonverbal processing speed, vocabulary, and nonverbal intelligence. Our results suggest that the lexical access processes involved in picture naming and lexical decision are related but less closely than one might have thought. Moreover, reaction times in picture naming and lexical decision depended as least as much on general processing speed as on domain-specific linguistic processes (i.e., lexical access processes).

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Lexical knowledge without a lexicon?

Cited by 51 publications

References 112 publications

Action relevance in linguistic context drives word-induced motor activity

Action relevance in linguistic context drives word-induced motor activity

Meaningless words promote meaningful categorization

Shared lexical access processes in speaking and listening? An individual differences study.

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