Words have a weight: language as a source of inner grounding and flexibility in abstract concepts

Dove, Guy; Barca, Laura; Tummolini, Luca; Borghi, Anna M.

doi:10.1007/s00426-020-01438-6

Cited by 43 publications

(39 citation statements)

References 185 publications

(197 reference statements)

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“…On the other hand, there is also support within the present results for the idea that language plays a significant scaffolding or facilitating role in abstract thought, in keeping with the Words as Social Tools (WAT) thesis (Borghi et al, 2019;Borghi et al, 2017), the Language is an Embodied Neuroenhancement Scaffold (LENS) theory (Dove, 2019;Dove, Barca, Tummolini, & Borghi, 2020), and other related proposals (Boroditsky, 2001;Davis & Yee, 2019;Lupyan, 2009). This includes the fact that PWA response times were proportionately slower as a function of Trial Concreteness ratings and that PWA confidence response times correlated with their linguistic abilities.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 84%

Assessing abstract thought and its relation to language with a new nonverbal paradigm: Evidence from aphasia

et al. 2021

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In recent years, language has been shown to play a number of important cognitive roles over and above the communication of thoughts. One hypothesis gaining support is that language facilitates thought about abstract categories, such as democracy or prediction. To test this proposal, a novel set of semantic memory task trials, designed for assessing abstract thought nonlinguistically, were normed for levels of abstractness. The trials were rated as more or less abstract to the degree that answering them required the participant to abstract away from both perceptual features and common setting associations corresponding to the target image. The normed materials were then used with a population of people with aphasia to assess the relationship of abstract thought to language. While the language-impaired group with aphasia showed lower overall accuracy and longer response times than controls in general, of special note is that their response times were significantly longer as a function of a trial's degree of abstractness. Further, the aphasia group's response times in reporting their degree of confidence (a separate, metacognitive measure) were negatively correlated with their language production abilities, with lower language scores predicting longer metacognitive response times. These results provide some support for the hypothesis that language is an important aid to abstract thought and to metacognition about abstract thought.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 84%

Assessing abstract thought and its relation to language with a new nonverbal paradigm: Evidence from aphasia

et al. 2021

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“…There are numerous proposals that language is particularly important to the meanings of abstract concepts (e.g., Paivio, 1991 ; Borghi et al, 2019 ; Borghi, 2020 ; Dove et al, 2020 ). In the developmental context, it has been proposed that abstract words are learned through linguistic cues.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Development of Abstract Word Knowledge

2021

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The development of children’s word knowledge is an important testing ground for the embodied account of word meaning, which proposes that word meanings are grounded in sensorimotor systems. Acquisition of abstract words, in particular, is a noted challenge for strong accounts of embodiment. We examined acquisition of abstract word meanings, using data on development of vocabulary knowledge from early school to University ages. We tested two specific proposals for how abstract words are learned: the affective embodiment account, that emotional experience is key to learning abstract word meanings, and the learning through language proposal, that abstract words are acquired through language experience. We found support for the affective embodiment account: word valence, interoception, and mouth action all facilitated abstract word acquisition more than concrete word acquisition. We tested the learning through language proposal by investigating whether words that appear in more diverse linguistic contexts are earlier acquired. Results showed that contextual diversity facilitated vocabulary acquisition, but did so for both abstract and concrete words. Our results provide evidence that emotion and sensorimotor systems are important to children’s acquisition of abstract words, but there is still considerable variance to be accounted for by other factors. We offer suggestions for future research to examine the acquisition of abstract vocabulary.

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“…Three different mechanisms, that are not necessarily exclusive, might underlie such a mouth activation (for details see Borghi et al, 2019): (A) Reenactment of the past experience of acquiring abstract concepts, which typically occurred through the verbal linguistic mediation (Granito et al, 2015;Barca et al, 2017Barca et al, , 2020Mazzuca et al, 2018). (B) Re-explanation to ourselves of the word meaning, through the use of inner speech (Zannino et al, 2021;Villani et al, 2021;Dove et al, 2020;Borghi, 2020). (C) A motor preparation to ask additional explanations of word meaning to others, derived from the feeling of uncertainty and the metacognitive awareness that the owned knowledge of that concept is scarce and not adequate (i.e., Social Metacognition, Borghi et al, 2019;Fini & Borghi, 2019; see Borghi, Fini, & Tummolini, 2021;Borghi, 2020;Dove et al, 2020; see also Prinz, 2012;Shea, 2018).…”

Section: Institutional Concepts Vs Other Categoriesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…(B) Re-explanation to ourselves of the word meaning, through the use of inner speech (Zannino et al, 2021;Villani et al, 2021;Dove et al, 2020;Borghi, 2020). (C) A motor preparation to ask additional explanations of word meaning to others, derived from the feeling of uncertainty and the metacognitive awareness that the owned knowledge of that concept is scarce and not adequate (i.e., Social Metacognition, Borghi et al, 2019;Fini & Borghi, 2019; see Borghi, Fini, & Tummolini, 2021;Borghi, 2020;Dove et al, 2020; see also Prinz, 2012;Shea, 2018). The case of Institutional concepts, which can be considered as highly complex words, may include either the mediation of inner and overt speech or simulation of listening to someone else speaking.…”

Section: Institutional Concepts Vs Other Categoriesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Is justice grounded? How expertise shapes conceptual representation of institutional concepts

Villani

D’Ascenzo

Borghi

et al. 2021

Psychological Research

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Using abstract concepts is a hallmark of human cognition. While multiple kinds of abstract concepts exist, they so far have been conceived as a unitary kind in opposition to concrete ones. Here, we focus on Institutional concepts, like justice or norm, investigating their fine-grained differences with respect to other kinds of abstract and concrete concepts, and exploring whether their representation varies according to individual proficiency. Specifically, we asked experts and non-experts in the legal field to evaluate four kinds of concepts (i.e., institutional, theoretical, food, artefact) on 16 dimensions: abstractness-concreteness; imageability; contextual availability; familiarity; age of acquisition; modality of acquisition; social valence; social metacognition; arousal; valence; interoception; metacognition; perceptual modality strength; body-object interaction; mouth and hand involvement. Results showed that Institutional concepts rely more than other categories on linguistic/social and inner experiences and are primarily characterized by positive valence. In addition, a more subtle characterization of the institutional domain emerged: Pure-institutional concepts (e.g., parliament) were perceived as more similar to technical tools, while Meta-institutional concepts (e.g., validity) were characterized mainly by abstract components. Importantly, for what concerns individual proficiency, we found that the level of expertise affects conceptual representation. Only law-experts associated Institutional concepts with exteroceptive and emotional experiences, showing also a more grounded and situated representation of the two types of institutional concepts. Overall, our finding highlights the richness and flexibility of abstract concepts and suggests that they differ in the degree of embodiment and grounding. Implications of the results for current theories of conceptual representation and social institutions are discussed.

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Words have a weight: language as a source of inner grounding and flexibility in abstract concepts

Cited by 43 publications

References 185 publications

Assessing abstract thought and its relation to language with a new nonverbal paradigm: Evidence from aphasia

Assessing abstract thought and its relation to language with a new nonverbal paradigm: Evidence from aphasia

Development of Abstract Word Knowledge

Is justice grounded? How expertise shapes conceptual representation of institutional concepts

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