The mental representation and social aspect of expressives

Donahoo, Stanley A.; Lai, Vicky T.

doi:10.1080/02699931.2020.1764912

Cited by 4 publications

(10 citation statements)

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“…However, if tabooness depends on proficiency, which refers to the general English proficiency, regardless of British or American dialect, of our American English speakers in this specific experiment context, no difference was expected between native and nonnative taboo words. Based on results by Donahoo and Lai (2020), we also expected more positive LPC amplitude for native taboo words (American), as compared to all categories of non-taboo words (negative, positive, neutral). For nonnative taboo words (British), on the other hand, we expected no difference in LPC compared with native, nontaboo words, given their lack of social context of acquisition.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 79%

“…Emotional priming effects have been seen in both L1 and L2 (Kazanas and Altarriba 2016). In terms of taboo words, they have been shown to have slower reaction times than non-taboo words (Sulpizio et al 2019) and negative words (Donahoo and Lai 2020), while their accuracies in LDT do not significantly differ from other words in L1. In taboo Stroop tasks, bilinguals showed taboo related delays in response time to both L1 and L2 (Eilola and Havelka 2011;Eilola et al 2007).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 98%

“…In Wabnitz et al (2012), passive reading of emotional and taboo words elicited increased P100 for taboo, but not for valence and arousal matched positive or negative words. In Donahoo and Lai (2020), a taboo effect was seen in the LPC using a LDT paradigm. Despite the difference in time-course, these results indicate that taboo words are processed differently than matched emotional words.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…They represent a social, rather than a physical, threat (Wabnitz, Mortens, & Neuner, 2012). In other words, they are both socially and emotionally significant (Donahoo and Lai 2020). Developmentally, taboo word meanings are learned through social interaction (Vingerhoets et al 2013) and cultural understanding (Jay 2009).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Positive words were included to capture the full spectrum of valence, as well as emulate previous studies (Chen et al 2015;Conrad et al 2011;Opitz and Degner 2012;Sulpizio et al 2019). If the social nature of taboo words (Donahoo and Lai 2020;Janschewitz 2008;Reilly et al 2020) depends on their acquisition in naturalistic, social interactions, then taboo words in the native dialect were expected to show a heightened affective perception, in the form of a more positive LPC amplitude, while those in the non-native dialect were not. However, if tabooness depends on proficiency, which refers to the general English proficiency, regardless of British or American dialect, of our American English speakers in this specific experiment context, no difference was expected between native and nonnative taboo words.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Social acquisition context matters: Increased neural responses for native but not nonnative taboo words

Sendek

Herzmann

Pfeifer

et al. 2021

Cogn Affect Behav Neurosci

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This study examined whether the context of acquisition of a word influences its visual recognition and subsequent processing. We utilized taboo words, whose meanings are typically acquired socially, to ensure that differences in processing were based on learned social taboo, rather than proficiency. American English-speaking participants made word/non-word decisions on American taboo (native dialect), British taboo (non-native dialect), positive, neutral, and pseudo- words while EEG was recorded. Taboo words were verified as taboo by both American and British English speakers in an independent norming survey. American taboo words showed a more positive amplitude of the Late Positive Complex (LPC), a neural correlate of emotionality and social processing, compared with British taboo words and all other word categories. Moreover, in an item-wise analysis, LPC amplitudes of American taboo words were positively correlated with their taboo ratings. British taboo words did not show this effect. This indicates that American participants, who had very limited social contact with British English, did not have the same perception of social threat from British taboo words as they had from American taboo words. These results point to the importance of social context of acquisition in establishing social-affective meaning in language.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 79%