Heterogenous abstract concepts: is “ponder” different from “dissolve”?

Muraki, Emiko J.; Sidhu, David M.; Pexman, Penny M.

doi:10.1007/s00426-020-01398-x

Cited by 30 publications

(32 citation statements)

References 59 publications

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“…One possible explanation concerns the heterogeneity of both abstract and concrete concepts; for instance, abstract words refer to a wide variety of concepts, including words that refer to emotions, mental states, interospections, social concepts, etc. ( Kiefer and Harpaintner, 2020 ; Muraki et al, 2020b ). Desai et al (2018) proposed four categories of abstract words: numerical, emotional, morality, and theory of mind.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Similarly, Borghi et al (2019) also provided evidence for four types of abstract words: philosophical/spiritual, physical/spatial/quantitative, self-sociality, and emotive/inner states. In two recent studies, Muraki and colleagues found that different types of abstract verbs can be distinguished in terms of associated behavioral and neural responses ( Muraki et al, 2020a , b ). The inference is that different types of abstract words are associated with different combinations of linguistic, sensory, emotion, and other information.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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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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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Development of Abstract Word Knowledge

2021

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“…Only very recently, some authors have started to investigate fine-grained differences among types of ACs without considering them as an indistinct whole [6,[17][18][19][20]. Importantly, some recent studies have focused on the neural representation of abstract social concepts, comparing them with other concepts [21,22].…”

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Abstract concepts in interaction: the need of others when guessing abstract concepts smooths dyadic motor interactions

et al. 2021

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concepts (ACs, e.g. ‘justice’) are more complex compared with concrete concepts (CCs) (e.g. ‘table’). Indeed, they do not possess a single object as a referent, they assemble quite heterogeneous members and they are more detached from exteroceptive and more grounded in interoceptive experience. Recent views have hypothesized that interpersonal communication is particularly crucial to acquire and use ACs. The current study investigates the reliance of ACs/CCs representation on interpersonal behaviour. We asked participants to perform a motor interaction task with two avatars who embodied two real confederates. Before and after the motor interaction task, the two confederates provided participants with hints in a concept guessing task associated with visual stimuli: one helped in guessing ACs and the other, CCs. A control study we performed both with the materials employed in the main experiment and with other materials, confirmed that associating verbal concepts with visual images was more difficult with ACs than with CCs. Consistently, the results of the main experiment showed that participants asked for more hints with ACs than CCs and were more synchronous when interacting with the avatar corresponding to the AC's confederate. The results highlight an important role of sociality in grounding ACs.

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“…In conclusion, our results are in line with the framework positing a cerebral distribution of semantic dimensions characterizing different categories of abstract concepts according to their content. While the present study was limited to nouns, conceptual differences, for example between emotional and mental states, are prominent also in the case of abstract verbs 60 , 61 , and needs to be further investigated. Additional studies are also needed to explore additional abstract dimensions/categories, including for example morality 12 or theoretical 62 information, as well as their interactions.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

In search of different categories of abstract concepts: a fMRI adaptation study

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Catricalà

Canini

et al. 2021

Sci Rep

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Concrete conceptual knowledge is supported by a distributed neural network representing different semantic features according to the neuroanatomy of sensory and motor systems. If and how this framework applies to abstract knowledge is currently debated. Here we investigated the specific brain correlates of different abstract categories. After a systematic a priori selection of brain regions involved in semantic cognition, i.e. responsible of, respectively, semantic representations and cognitive control, we used a fMRI-adaptation paradigm with a passive reading task, in order to modulate the neural response to abstract (emotions, cognitions, attitudes, human actions) and concrete (biological entities, artefacts) categories. Different portions of the left anterior temporal lobe responded selectively to abstract and concrete concepts. Emotions and attitudes adapted the left middle temporal gyrus, whereas concrete items adapted the left fusiform gyrus. Our results suggest that, similarly to concrete concepts, some categories of abstract knowledge have specific brain correlates corresponding to the prevalent semantic dimensions involved in their representation.

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Heterogenous abstract concepts: is “ponder” different from “dissolve”?

Cited by 30 publications

References 59 publications

Development of Abstract Word Knowledge

Development of Abstract Word Knowledge

Abstract concepts in interaction: the need of others when guessing abstract concepts smooths dyadic motor interactions

In search of different categories of abstract concepts: a fMRI adaptation study

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