Search results for "Semantic"

Age and Semantic Inhibition Measured by the Hayling Task: A Meta-Analysis.

2016

Objective Cognitive aging is commonly associated with a decrease in executive functioning (EF). A specific component of EF, semantic inhibition, is addressed in the present study, which presents a meta-analytic review of the literature that has evaluated the performance on the Hayling Sentence Completion test in young and older groups of individuals in order to assess the magnitude of the age effect. Method A systematic search involving Web of Science, PsyINFO, PsychARTICLE, and MedLine databases and Google Scholar was performed. A total of 11 studies were included in this meta-analysis, encompassing a total of 887 participants; 440 young and 447 older adults. The effect sizes for group dif…

Gestural Attributions as Semantics in User Interface Sound Design

2010

This paper proposes a gesture-based approach to user interface sound design, which utilises projections of body movements in sounds as meaningful attributions. The approach is founded on embodied conceptualisation of human cognition and it is justified through a literature review on the subject of interpersonal action understanding. According to the resulting hypothesis, stereotypical gestural cues, which correlate with, e.g., a certain communicative intention, represent specific non-linguistic meanings. Based on this theoretical framework, a model of a process is also outlined where stereotypical gestural cues are implemented in sound design.

An alternative perspective on “semantic P600” effects in language comprehension

2008

Abstract The literature on the electrophysiology of language comprehension has recently seen a very prominent discussion of “semantic P600” effects, which have been observed, for example, in sentences involving an implausible thematic role assignment to an argument that would be a highly plausible filler for a different thematic role of the same verb. These findings have sparked a discussion about underlying properties of the language comprehension architecture, as they have generally been viewed as a challenge to established models of language processing and specifically to the notion that syntax precedes semantics in the comprehension process. In this paper, we review the literature on se…

A Formalism Supplementing Cognitive Semantics Based on Mereology

2007

ABSTRACT This paper is motivated by and aims to supplement Cognitive Semantics. Details of this latter prominent approach within contemporary linguistic research will not be discussed here. Rather, we focus on a formalization of the concept of Gestalt and provide a formal semantics that can be used to interpret a certain formal language (LM 0) with respect to a universe of structured wholes (Gestalts). Since a great deal of the analyses of linguistic organization that has been provided by Cognitive Semantics since the mid-1970s is based on the concept of Gestalt, the semantics unfolded in the following may be viewed as an attempt to provide a starting point for supplementing the yet informa…

On Referring to Gestalts

2010

This paper discusses a fresh approach to formal semantics based on mereology and Gestalt Theory. While Wiegand (2007, Spacial Cognition & Computation, Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum) unfolds the technical details of this new approach, the following paper aims to discuss the philosophical motivation an implications of what I have called mereological semantics. Particular attention will be given to an ongoing debate on the nature of relations.

Notes on the Success of Speech Acts and Negotiating Commitments

1996

Technologies that support communication and models used in the development of communications need good underlying theories. One theory suggested as a base for design is speech act theory. Both communication support tools and modelling notations informed by speech act theory have been proposed. Speech act theory forms no unified, single theory, but actually houses several variants for dealing with semantics, pragmatics, and social context of communications. They all have one common feature: they assume that language is not merely a means of describing but also a means for doing things. In this paper we present an overview of speech act theories and their uses in information systems research.…

The evolution of evolvability

2005

Ever since Ruth Garrett Millikan burst on the scene with her famous 1984 book Language, Thought, and Other Biological Categories [1] she has continued to make substantial contributions, in a remarkably sustained effort that significantly shaped the theoretical landscape in a number of fast-moving fields, from cognitive science to the philosophies of mind, language and biology [1–3]. One of her many achievements lies in the development of a new theoretical approach to cognitive semantics, which philosophers know under the heading of ‘teleofunctionalism’.

Default semantics. Foundations of a compositional theory of acts of communication

2009

Between Composition and Emergentness: A Cognitive Semantics Re-Reading of the Way-Construction

2016

This study re-analyzes the English way-construction by having recourse to diverse concepts and tools of Talmy’s cognitive semantics. Drawing on his theory of recombinance and its relevance for conceptualizing the construction, the article implements Talmy’s theory of event integration, categorizes the way-construction as an instantiation of the open path event frame, considers link-ups of the schematic systems of force dynamics and attention as they become instantiated in the construction, and probes into its motion-aspect patterning, grounded in a conformation of space and time and resulting in a strategy that is called de-conflation. Further, it will recruit Talmy’s types of semantic conf…

On how to legitimately constrain a semantic theory

2021

Abstract Semanticists often restrict their theories by imposing constraints on the parameters that can be employed for interpreting the expressions of a language. Such constraints are based on non-logical features of actual contexts of utterance, but they often have important effects on issues that do pertain to logic, like analyticity or entailment. For example, Kaplan’s restriction to so-called “proper contexts” was required in order to count “I am here now” as valid. In this paper I argue that constraints of this kind are often posited in an arbitrary and non-consistent way, and that they yield the intended results only at the price of imposing ad hoc principles whose justification could…