The Representation of Abstract Words: Why Emotion Matters

Although much is known about the representation and processing of concrete concepts, knowledge of what abstract semantics might be is severely limited. In this article we first address the adequacy of the 2 dominant accounts (dual coding theory and the context availability model) put forward in orde...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of experimental psychology. General 2011-02, Vol.140 (1), p.14-34
Main Authors: Kousta, Stavroula-Thaleia, Vigliocco, Gabriella, Vinson, David P, Andrews, Mark, Del Campo, Elena
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Abstraction
Adult
Affect - physiology
Affective Behavior
Affectivity. Emotion
Association
Biological and medical sciences
Cognition - physiology
Cognitive Processes
College Students
Concept Formation
Concept Formation - physiology
Context Effect
Decision Making - physiology
Emotional Response
Emotions
Emotions - physiology
English
Experimental psychology
Familiarity
Female
Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology
Human
Humans
Knowledge (General)
Language
Language Usage
Lexicology
Male
Miscellaneous
Personality. Affectivity
Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry
Psychology. Psychophysiology
Reaction Time - physiology
Regression (Statistics)
Semantics
Theory
Word Recognition
Words (Phonetic Units)
Young Adult
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Description
Summary:Although much is known about the representation and processing of concrete concepts, knowledge of what abstract semantics might be is severely limited. In this article we first address the adequacy of the 2 dominant accounts (dual coding theory and the context availability model) put forward in order to explain representation and processing differences between concrete and abstract words. We find that neither proposal can account for experimental findings and that this is, at least partly, because abstract words are considered to be unrelated to experiential information in both of these accounts. We then address a particular type of experiential information, emotional content, and demonstrate that it plays a crucial role in the processing and representation of abstract concepts: Statistically, abstract words are more emotionally valenced than are concrete words, and this accounts for a residual latency advantage for abstract words, when variables such as imageability (a construct derived from dual coding theory) and rated context availability are held constant. We conclude with a discussion of our novel hypothesis for embodied abstract semantics. (Contains 7 footnotes, 3 tables, and 9 figures.)
ISSN:0096-3445
1939-2222
DOI:10.1037/a0021446