Hostname: page-component-76fb5796d-skm99 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-25T20:52:53.365Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Effects of motion type and modality on word learning in English

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 May 2015

SAMANTHA N. EMERSON ,
ŞEYDA ÖZÇALIŞKAN  and
GWEN A. FRISHKOFF
SAMANTHA N. EMERSON*
Affiliation:
Georgia State University
ŞEYDA ÖZÇALIŞKAN
Affiliation:
Georgia State University
GWEN A. FRISHKOFF
Affiliation:
Georgia State University
*
ADDRESS FOR CORRESPONDENCE Samantha N. Emerson, Department of Psychology, Georgia State University, P.O. Box 5010, Atlanta, GA 30302-5010. E-mail: semerson2@gsu.edu
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Languages show typological variation in the expression of manner versus path of motion. However, studies examining the effects of these differences on cognitive representations of motion have led to inconclusive results. To elucidate this prior work, the present study examines word-learning outcomes for adult English speakers who were exposed to new motion words paired with animations that depict either different manners or different paths of motion. The results indicate better learning of words that represent path rather than manner of motion. The outcomes were similar for training with and without accompanying gestures. These findings support the centrality of path in the cognitive representation of motion events and may have important implications for language typology and understanding interactions between language and cognition.

Type
Articles
Information
Applied Psycholinguistics , Volume 37 , Issue 3 , May 2016 , pp. 643 - 671
Check for updates
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2015 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Alibali, M. W., & Goldin-Meadow, S. (1993). Gesture-speech mismatch and mechanisms of learning: What the hands reveal about a child's state of mind. Cognitive Psychology, 25, 468–523. doi:10.1006/cogp.1993.1012CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Baayen, R. H., Davidson, D. J., & Bates, D. M. (2008). Mixed-effects modeling with crossed random effects for subjects and items. Journal of Memory and Language, 59, 390–412. doi:10.1016/j.jml.2007.12.005Google Scholar
Barr, D. J., Levy, R., Scheepers, C., & Tily, H. J. (2013). Random effects structure for confirmatory hypothesis testing: Keep it maximal. Journal of Memory and Language, 68, 255–278. doi:10.1016/j.jml.2012.11.001Google Scholar
Bates, D., Maechler, M., Bolker, B., & Walker, S. (2014). lme4: Linear mixed-effects models using Eigen and S4. R package version 1.1–7 [Computer software]. Retrieved from http://CRAN.R-project.org/package=lme4Google Scholar
Cardini, F. E. (2010). Evidence against Whorfian effets in motion conceptualisation. Journal of Pragmatics, 42, 1442–1459. doi:10.1016/j.pragma.2009.09.017Google Scholar
Church, R. B., & Goldin-Meadow, S. (1986). The mismatch between gesture and speech as an index of transitional knowledge. Cognition, 23, 43–71. doi:10.1016/0010-0277(86)90053-3CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Cook, S. W., & Goldin-Meadow, S. (2006). The role of gesture in learning: Do children use their hands to change their minds? Journal of Cognition and Development, 7, 211–232. doi:10.1207/s15327647jcd0702_4Google Scholar
Ellis, N. C., & Beaton, A. (1993). Psycholinguistic determinants of foreign language vocabulary learning. Langauge Learning, 43, 559–617. doi:10.1111/j.1467-1770.1993.tb00627.xGoogle Scholar
Emerson, S. N., Çörekli, D., & Özçalışkan, Ş. (2013). Ways of moving across spaces in a first and second language. Paper presented at the 59th Annual Meeting of the Southeastern Psychological Association, Atlanta, GA.Google Scholar
Engelkamp, J., & Dehn, D. M. (2000). Item and order information in subject-performed tasks and experimenter-performed tasks. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 26, 671–682. doi:10.1037//0278-7393.26.3.671Google Scholar
Feist, M. I. (2010). Motion through syntactic frames. Cognition, 115, 192–196. doi:10.1016/j.cognition.2009.11.011Google Scholar
Gennari, S. P., Sloman, S. A., Malt, B. C., & Fitch, W. T. (2002). Motion events in language and cognition. Cognition, 83, 49–79. doi:10.1016/S0010-0277(01)00166-4Google Scholar
Gerson, S. A., & Woodward, A. L. (2014). Learning from their own actions: The unique effect of producing action on infants’ action understanding. Child Development, 85, 264–277. doi:10.1111/cdev.12115Google Scholar
Givón, T. (1989). Mind, code and context: Essays in pragmatics. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Givón, T. (2001). Toward a neuro-cognitive interpretation of “context.” Pragmatics & Cognition, 9, 175–201. doi:10.1075/pc.9.2.02givGoogle Scholar
Goldin-Meadow, S., Levine, S. C., Zinchenko, E., Yip, T. J., Hemani, N., & Factor, L. (2012). Doing gesture promotes learning a mental transformation task better than seeing gesture. Developmental Science, 15, 876–884. doi:10.1111/j.1467-7687.2012.01185.xGoogle Scholar
Gullberg, M., Hendriks, H., & Hickmann, M. (2008). Learning to talk and gesture about motion in French. First Language, 28, 200–236. doi:10.1177/0142723707088074CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hohenstein, J. M. (2005). Language-related motion event similarities in English- and Spanish-speaking children. Journal of Cognition and Development, 6, 403–425. doi:10.1207/s15327647jcd0603_5CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jaeger, T. F. (2008). Categorical data analysis: Away from ANOVAs (transformation or not) and toward logit mixed models. Journal of Memory and Language, 59, 434–446. doi:10.1016/j.jml.2007.11.007Google Scholar
Kelly, S. D., McDevitt, T., & Esch, M. (2009). Brief training with co-speech gesture lends a hand to word learning in a foreign language. Language and Cognitive Processes, 24, 313–334. doi:10.1080/01690960802365567Google Scholar
Kersten, A. W. (1998). A division of labor between nouns and verbs in the representation of motion. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 127, 34–54. doi:10.1037/0096-3445.127.1.34CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kersten, A. W., Meissner, C. A., Lechuga, J., Schwartz, B. L., Albrechtsen, J. S., & Iglesias, A. (2010). English speakers attend more strongly than Spanish speakers to manner of motion when classifying novel objects and events. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 139, 638–653. doi:10.1037/a0020507Google Scholar
Keuleers, E., & Brysbaert, M. (2010). Wuggy: A multilingual pseudoword generator. Behavior Research Methods, 42, 627–633. doi:10.3758/BRM.42.3.627CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kita, S., & Özyürek, A. (2003). What does cross-linguistic variation in semantic coordination of speech and gesture reveal? Evidence for an interface representation of spatial thinking and speaking. Journal of Memory and Language, 48, 16–32. doi:10.1016/S0749-596X(02)00505-3CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kita, S., Özyürek, A., Allen, S., Brown, A., Furman, R., & Ishizuka, T. (2007). Relations between syntactic encoding and co-speech gestures: Implications for a model of speech and gesture production. Language and Cognitive Processes, 22, 1212–1236. doi:10.1080/01690960701461426Google Scholar
Macedonia, M., Müller, K., & Friederici, A. D. (2011). The impact of iconic gestures on foreign language word learning and its neural substate. Human Brain Mapping, 32, 982–998. doi:10.1002/hbm.21084Google Scholar
McNeill, D. (2000). Analogic/analytic representations and cross-linguistic differences in thinking for speaking. Cognitive Linguistics, 11, 43–60. doi:10.1515/cogl.2001.010Google Scholar
McNeill, D., & Duncan, S. D. (2000). Growth points in thinking-for-speaking. In McNeill, D. (Ed.), Language and gesture (pp. 141–161). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Mueller, S. T., Seymour, T. L., Kieras, D. E., & Meyer, D. E. (2003). Theoretical implications of articulatory duration, phonological similarity, and phonological complexity in verbal working memory. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 29, 1353–1380. doi:10.1037/0278-7393.29.6.1353Google Scholar
Naigles, L. R., Eisenberg, A. R., Kako, E. T., Highter, M., & McGraw, N. (1998). Speaking of motion: Verb use in English and Spanish. Language and Cognitive Processes, 13, 521–549. doi:10.1080/016909698386429CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Naigles, L. R., & Terrazas, P. (1998). Motion-verb generalizations in English and Spanish: Influences of language and syntax. Psychological Science, 9, 363–369. doi:10.1111/1467-9280.00069Google Scholar
Özçalışkan, Ş. (2004). Typological variation in encoding the manner, path, and ground components of a metaphorical motion event. Annual Review of Cognitive Linguistics, 2, 73–102. doi:10.1075/arcl.2.03ozcCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Özçalışkan, Ş. (2005). Metaphor meets typology: Ways of moving metaphorically in English and Turkish. Cognitive Linguistics, 16, 207–246. doi:10.1515/cogl.2005.16.1.207CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Özçalışkan, Ş. (2012). When gesture does and does not follow speech in describing motion. Paper presented at the 36th Boston University Conference on Language Development. Retrieved from http://www.bu.edu/bucld/files/2012/07/ozcaliskan-36.pdfGoogle Scholar
Özçalışkan, Ş., & Slobin, D. I. (1999). Learning how to search for the frog: Expression of manner of motion in English, Spanish, and Turkish. In Greenhill, A., Littlefield, H., & Tano, C. (Eds.), Proceedings of the 23rd Annual Boston University Conference on Language Development (Vol. 2, pp. 163–174). Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Press.Google Scholar
Özçalışkan, Ş., & Slobin, D. I. (2003). Codability effects on the expression of manner of motion in English and Turkish. In Özsoy, A. S., Nakipoglu-Demiralp, M., Erguvanlı-Taylan, E., & Aksu-Koç, A. (Eds.), Studies in Turkish linguistics (pp. 259–270). Istanbul: Bogaziçi University Press.Google Scholar
Özyürek, A., & Kita, S. (1999). Expressing manner and path in English and Turkish: Differences in speech, gesture, and conceptualization. In Hahn, M. & Stoness, S. (Eds.), The 21st Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society (pp. 507–512). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Özyürek, A., Kita, S., Allen, S., Brown, A., Furman, R., & Ishizuka, T. (2008). Development of cross-linguistic variation in speech and gesture: Motion events in English and Turkish. Developmental Psychology, 44, 1040–1054. doi:10.1037/0012-1649.44.4.1040Google Scholar
Özyürek, A., Kita, S., Allen, S., Furman, R., & Brown, A. (2005). How does linguistic framing of events influence co-speech gestures? Insights from crosslinguistic variations and similarities. Gesture, 5, 219–240. doi:10.1075/gest.5.1.15ozyGoogle Scholar
Papafragou, A., Massey, C., & Gleitman, L. (2002). Shake, rattle, ’n’ roll: The representation of motion in language and cognition. Cognition, 84, 189–219. doi:10.1016/S0010-0277(02)00046-XCrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Papagno, C., Valentine, T., & Baddeley, A. (1991). Phonological short-term memory and foreign-language vocabulary learning. Journal of Memory and Language, 30, 331–347. doi:10.1016/0749-596X(91)90040-QCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Perry, M., & Elder, A. D. (1997). Knowledge in transition: Adults’ developing understanding of a principle of physical causality. Cognitive Development, 12, 131–157. doi:10.1016/s0885-2014(97)90033-2Google Scholar
Pulverman, R., Golinkoff, R. M., Hirsh-Pasek, K., & Buresh, J. S. (2008). Infants discriminate manners and paths in non-linguistic dynamic events. Cognition, 108, 825–830. doi:10.1016/j.cognition.2008.04.009Google Scholar
R Development Core Team. (2010). R: A language and environment for statistical computing [Computer software]. Vienna: R Foundation for Statistical Computing. Retrieved from http://www.R-project.orgGoogle Scholar
Rugg, M. D., & Curran, T. (2007). Event-related potentials and recognition memory. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 11, 251–257. doi:10.1016/j.tics.2007.04.004Google Scholar
Service, E., & Craik, F. I. (1993). Differences between young and older adults in learning a foreign vocabulary. Journal of Memory and Language, 32, 608–623. doi:10.1006/jmla.1993.1031Google Scholar
Slobin, D. I. (1996). From “thought and language” to “thinking for speaking.” In Gumperz, J. & Levinson, S. (Eds.), Rethinking linguistic relativity (pp. 70–96). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Slobin, D. I. (2004). The many ways to search for a frog: Linguistic typology and the expression of motion events. In Strömqvist, S. & Verhoeven, L. (Eds.), Relating events in narrative: Vol. 2. Typological contextual perspectives (pp. 219–257). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Talmy, L. (1985). Lexicalization patterns: Semantic structure in lexical forms. In Shopen, T. (Ed.), Language typology and lexical description: Vol. 3. Grammatical categories and the lexicon (pp. 57–149). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Talmy, L. (2000). Toward a cognitive semantics: Vol. 2. Typology and process in concept structuring. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Tellier, M. (2008). The effect of gestures on second language memorisation by young children. Gesture, 8, 219–235. doi:10.1075/gest.8.2.06telGoogle Scholar