In usage-based linguistic theories, the assumption that high-frequency language strings are mentally represented as unitary chunks has been invoked to account for a wide range of phenomena. However, neurocognitive evidence in support of this assumption is still lacking. In line with Gestalt psychological assumptions, we propose that a language string qualifies as a chunk if the following two conditions are simultaneously satisfied: The perception of the whole string does not involve strong activation of its individual component parts, but the component parts in isolation strongly evoke the whole. Against this background, we explore the relationship between different frequency metrics and the chunk status of derived words (e.g., "government," "worthless") in a masked visual priming experiment with two conditions of interest. One condition investigates "whole-to-part" priming (worthless-WORTH), whereas the other one analyzes "part-to-whole" priming (tear-TEARLESS). Both conditions combine mixed-effects regression analyses of lexical decision RTs with a parametric fMRI design. Relative frequency (the frequency of the whole word relative to that of its onset-embedded part) emerges as the only frequency metric to correlate with chunk status in behavioral terms. The fMRI results show that relative frequency modulates activity in regions that have been related to morphological (de)composition or general task performance difficulty (notably left inferior frontal areas) and in regions associated with competition between whole, undecomposed words (right inferior frontal areas). We conclude that relative frequency affects early stages of processing, thereby supporting the usage-based concept of frequency-induced chunks.

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This review compares how humans process action and language sequences produced by other humans. On the one hand, we identify commonalities between action and language processing in terms of cognitive mechanisms (e.g., perceptual segmentation, predictive processing, integration across multiple temporal scales), neural resources (e.g., the left inferior frontal cortex), and processing algorithms (e.g., comprehension based on changes in signal entropy). On the other hand, drawing on sign language with its particularly strong motor component, we also highlight what differentiates (both oral and signed) linguistic communication from nonlinguistic action sequences. We propose the multiscale information transfer framework (MSIT) as a way of integrating these insights and highlight directions into which future empirical research inspired by the MSIT framework might fruitfully evolve. This article is categorized under: Psychology > Language Linguistics > Language in Mind and Brain Psychology > Motor Skill and Performance Psychology > Prediction

This paper argues that neurolinguistics has the potential to yield insights that can feed back into corpus-based Cognitive Linguistics. It starts by discussing how far the cognitive realism of probabilistic statements derived from corpus data currently goes. Against this background, it argues that the cognitive realism of usage-based models could be further enhanced through deeper engagement with neurolinguistics, but also highlights a number of common misconceptions about what neurolinguistics can and cannot do for linguistic theorizing.

Across the various entrenchment definitions given in the cognitive linguistics literature, it is possible to identify the following recurring key ingredients: high frequency of use, great ease of processing, great strength of representation, high fluency of composition, and chunk status. Although the term entrenchment itself has little currency outside of usage-based cognitive linguistics, several strands of neurolinguistic and psycholinguistic research have investigated frequency effects on language processing and can therefore contribute to sharpening the cognitive linguistics notion of entrenchment. The present chapter aims to review this research, to discuss how it can be integrated into an empirically informed and coherent picture of linguistic entrenchment, and to outline some promising avenues for further research. Section 6.2 provides an overview of how the notion of entrenchment has been defined in the cognitive linguistics literature, with a special focus on assumptions that are relevant to operationalizing entrenchment for experimental purposes. Section 6.3 presents experimental studies attesting to the fact that high-frequency expressions are processed with greater speed and accuracy than matched low-frequency expressions, probably as a result of enhanced fluency of composition. Section 6.4 reviews psycholinguistic and neurolinguistic research testing the relationship between chunk status and usage frequency. Section 6.5 highlights outstanding questions and sketches some possible directions in which future research might fruitfully proceed. Section 6.6 concludes the chapter.Note that this review focuses on the entrenchment of transparent multimorphemic sequences, thus deliberately excluding relevant research on noncompositional sequences (e.g., all of a sudden, kick the bucket, by and large, see Croft, 2001, p. 15) and monomorphemic words (an overview of relevant research and further references can be found in Blumenthal-Dramé, 2012, and Schmidʼs introduction to this volume). This should clearly not be taken to imply that the notion of entrenchment is irrelevant or even inapplicable to nontransparent sequences or single words. However, by virtue of their being arbitrary form-meaning associations, such strings inherently have to be represented in a holistic fashion at some level, no matter how frequent. The maximally strong prediction that frequency on its own can induce chunk status-which, as will become clear later, must be seen as the theoretically most relevant entrenchment criterion-can only be tested on the basis of strings for which there is no logical