The influence of vertical spatial orientation on property verification

Šetić, Mia; Domijan, Dražen

doi:10.1080/01690960600732430

Cited by 58 publications

(83 citation statements)

References 20 publications

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“…When the words branch and root were presented on the screen, participants were faster to judge the words were related when branch was presented vertically above root, compared to when root was presented above branch. Similar results have been shown when only one word (e.g., eagle) was being presented either on the top or the bottom of the screen (Šetić & Domijan, 2007). In these studies, words are assumed to activate perceptual representations, with attention being focused on the respective regions.…”

Section: Grounding Concrete Conceptssupporting

confidence: 67%

Abstract Concepts in Grounded Cognition

Lakens¹

2017

Preprint

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concepts in grounded cognitionAbstracte concepten in gegronde cognitie References 115 Summary in Dutch 133Curriculum Vitae 139 5 Introduction M orality, time, and valence are highly abstract concepts. Exactly how people are able to think and talk about abstract concepts is a question that has intrigued philosophers and scientists for centuries. In this thesis I focus on the question how people represent the meaning of abstract concepts, by investigating whether abstract concepts are understood through the use of metaphors. Metaphors allow people to think about abstract concepts in terms of concrete experiences. For example, the scales of Lady Justice are a metaphor for justice. People might not be able to see the future, but it can be represented as being ahead of us. Black knights in fairytales are usually evil, and the color of their armor is a metaphoric representation of the relation they have with the knights in shining armor. These and similar metaphors are not only used to intentionally communicate the meaning of abstract concepts, but these metaphoric representations also underlie abstract conceptual thought. How the meaning of abstract concepts is grounded in concrete experiences is the topic of this dissertation.Broadly speaking, two views exist on how abstract concepts are represented in our mind. On the one hand, amodal views share the common theme that people think in a purely symbolic language, where concepts 6 are represented as artificial symbols, and computational operations are performed upon these symbols during conceptual processing (Dennett, 1969;Fodor, 1975;Pylyshyn, 1984;Jackendoff, 2002). These artificial symbols are inherently non-perceptual; none of the original sensory or motor information from any modality (e.g., vision, touch, sound, smell, etc) which created these symbols is present when the final amodal symbols are used to represent concepts. On the other hand, several views on the representation of concepts have emerged over the last decennium which all share the idea that conceptual processing is perceptual in nature (e.g., Barsalou, 1999;Gallese & Lakoff, 2005;Glenberg & Kaschak, 2002;Jeannerod, 2001;Pulvermüller, 1999;Zwaan, 2004). According to these grounded approaches to cognition, conceptual thought consists of representations built on concrete sensorimotor information. For example, understanding the word 'kick' is assumed to depend at least in part on the activation of the muscles used to perform a kicking motion.As a result of the growing number of empirical studies that have investigated the role of sensorimotor activation in language comprehension, a consensus is emerging that sensorimotor areas in the brain are activated when people read words related to concrete concepts (Zwaan, 2009;Mahon & Caramazza, 2009;Vigliocco & Meteyard, 2008). For example, thinking about the color of a banana activates brain areas in the visual cortex (Simmons, Ramjee, Beauchamp, McRae, Martin, & Barsalou, 2007). Thinking about the color of a banana leads to remarkably similar pattern...

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Section: Grounding Concrete Conceptssupporting

confidence: 67%

Abstract Concepts in Grounded Cognition

Lakens¹

2017

Preprint

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“…activates an implicit perceptual simulation in the object's typical location (Šetic & Domijan, 2007;Zwaan & Yaxley, 2003). Viewing small or large numbers also activates a perceptual simulation of left-right space and automatically orients attention toward number-congruent location (Fischer, 2003;Fischer et al, 2003;Galfano, Rusconi, & Umilta, 2006).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The spatial representation of power in children

Schubert

2017

Cogn Process

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Previous evidence demonstrates that power is mentally represented as vertical space by adults. However, little is known about how power is mentally represented in children. The current research examines such representations. The influence of vertical information (motor cues) was tested in both an explicit power evaluation task (judge whether labels refer to powerless or powerful groups) and an incidental task (judge whether labels refer to people or animals). The results showed that when power was explicitly evaluated, vertical motor responses interfered with responding in children and adults, i.e., they responded to words representing powerful groups faster with the up than the down cursor key (and vice versa for powerless groups). However, this interference effect disappeared in the incidental task in children. The findings suggest that children have developed a spatial representation of power before they have been taught power-space associations formally, but that they do not judge power spontaneously.Keywords: children; power; space; representation 3 The Spatial Representation of Power in ChildrenAn essential question that has received much attention within the domain of cognitive psychology is how abstract concepts are mentally represented. In the social domain, one of these abstract concepts is power. Systematic research over the last decade has demonstrated representation of power as magnitude, specifically spatial magnitude (Chiao et al., 2009;Chiao, 2010;Giessner & Schubert, 2007; Jiang et al., 2015ab;Mason, Magee, & Fiske, 2014;Schubert, 2005;Zanolie et al., 2012).However, little is known about how power is mentally represented in children. The current research examines the spatial representation of power in children. Modal Representations of PowerIn the psychological literature, power has been defined as the ability or capacity to influence others through the control of resources (Galinsky, Gruenfeld, & Magee, 2003;Keltner, Gruenfeld, & Anderson, 2003). When we talk about power in our daily life, we often use vertical information in our language. For example, leaders who supervise their employees have "high" status, or are "up" in the hierarchy, whereas the employees are at the "lower" levels of the hierarchy. Simply put, power is often metaphorically understood, presented, and communicated nonverbally as vertical height in physical space: "control is up, lack of control is down" (Lakoff, 1987;Lakoff & Johnson, 1980). Understanding the spatial representation of power is important because of its broad implications and use in communication in relations ranging from the interpersonal to societal. It concerns mate selection (Meier & Dionne, 2009) and leadership in organizations (Giessner & Schubert, 2007). For 4 example, Meier and Dionne found that males preferred female pictures which were presented near the bottom of the screen, whereas females preferred male pictures which were presented near the top of the screen, presumably because powerful males and powerless females are seen desirable in ...

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“…So why does the cue word have any 1 This spatial interference effect differs both methodologically and theoretically from the spatial iconicity effect, whereby words elicit faster responses when presented or responded to in their associated (iconic) location. That is, upward association words (e.g., "eagle") elicit faster responses when presented at the top of a display or when responding entails upward movement or pressing a high button, whereas downward association words (e.g., "snake") elicit faster responses when presented at the bottom of a display or when responding entails downward movement or pressing a low button (Kaup et al, 2012;Lachmair et al, 2011;Lebois, Wilson-Mendenhall, & Barsalou, in press;Meier et al, 2007;Schubert, 2005;Šetić & Domijan, 2007;Thornton, Loetscher, Yates, & Nicholls, 2013;Zwaan & Yaxley, 2003). Methodologically, the iconicity effect differs from the interference effect in that iconicity entails responding to the word itself rather than a separate visual target.…”

Section: The Spatial Interference Effectmentioning

confidence: 99%

Words, objects, and locations: Perceptual matching explains spatial interference and facilitation

Estes

Verges²,

Adelman

2015

Journal of Memory and Language

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[NEEDS REVISING]Many common words have spatial associations (e.g., "bird," "jump") that, counterintuitively, hinder identification of visual targets at their associated location. For example, "bird" hinders identification at the top of a display. This spatial interference has been attributed to perceptual simulation: "bird" shifts attention upward and evokes the perceptual representation of a bird, which impairs target identification by preoccupying the visual system. We propose an alternative explanation based on perceptual matching: target objects and locations are coded independently for their congruence with the cue word, and codes that are inconsistent with one another hinder identification. "Bird" hinders identification of a square target in the upper visual field because the target object mismatches the cue but its location matches the cue, thereby creating inconsistent codes that slow responding. We tested these competing accounts by comparing spatial interference from strongly visual (e.g., "bird") and nonvisual (e.g., "arise") cue words. Across two experiments with a large sample of nouns (Experiment 1) and verbs (Experiment 2), words of strong and weak visual strength and imageability elicited equivalent spatial interference. Thus, spatial interference is attributable to perceptual matching rather than perceptual simulation. Moreover, results supported a graded model of perceptual matching, whereby target identification times are proportional to the physical distance between the expected (i.e., associated) and observed (i.e., actual) target locations.

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The influence of vertical spatial orientation on property verification

Cited by 58 publications

References 20 publications

Abstract Concepts in Grounded Cognition

Abstract Concepts in Grounded Cognition

The spatial representation of power in children

Words, objects, and locations: Perceptual matching explains spatial interference and facilitation

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