Understanding perceptual change as a movement in literal and metaphorical sentences

Abstract

Results of the studies on the way language and body coordinate in communication (through language and gesture) have significant implications for language, education, and cognitive studies. However, there is a lack of convenient research in this area analyzing perceptual changes within individuals. To fill this gap, we investigated the embodied realizations of literal sentences representing perceptual changes and metaphorical sentences describing the phenomena in terms of perceptual changes. We classified sentences that referred to a visual, auditory, haptic, gustatory, or olfactory change. Participants listened to four narratives that contained five literal sentences describing a real perceptual change and five metaphorical sentences that described a phenomenon in terms of a perceptual change. We analyzed the recorded videos of the participants. The total number of literal sentences that described a real perceptual change was obtained for each modality (visual, auditory, haptic, gustatory, olfactory) separately. Also, the total number of gestures used with each category of these literal statements was obtained. Only iconic and non-iconic gestures that described such perceptual changes as the movement of an object in the space were counted. The results revealed that gestures accompanied at least 53% of literal and 56% of metaphorical sentences. These results suggest that literal and metaphorical perceptual change sentences could be understood as movements at a conceptual level. The similarity between embodied realizations of literal and metaphorical sentences supports one of the main assumptions of the strong version of embodied cognition. ABOUT THE AUTHORSOmid Khatin-Zadeh holds a PhD. In TEFL. His major fields of interest are Psycholinguistics, Embodied Language, Metaphor, and Schema. He is currently a research associate at the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China.Zahra Eskandari holds a PhD. in TEFL. Her major fields of interest are Cognitive Linguistics, Psycholinguistics, and English Language Teaching. She currently researches psycholinguistic aspects of metaphor in language and mind.Hassan Banaruee holds a PhD. in TEFL. He is a research fellow in cognitive linguistics, particularly in metaphor, motion events, and multimodality.María José Seckel Santis is a teacher educator. She obtained a PhD in Mathematics Education from Universidad de Barcelona. Her major fields of interest are Teacher Education and the Teaching and Learning of mathematics.Danyal Farsani holds a BSc in Mathematics from the University of Coventry and a PhD in Education from the University of Birmingham. He major fields of interest are interaction, Psycholinguistics and, Embodied Cognition.

EFL learners' learning styles and their reading performance

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