TY - JOUR
T1 - Agentive versus non-agentive motions immediately influence event apprehension and description
T2 - an eye-tracking study in a VOS language
AU - Sato, Manami
AU - Niikuni, Keiyu
AU - Schafer, Amy J.
AU - Koizumi, Masatoshi
N1 - Funding Information:
We would like to thank three anonymous JEAL reviewers as well as James Huang, whose comments have led to substantial improvements in the work presented here. We would also like to thank the audience at the 40th Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society (CogSci 2018) as well as the International Workshop on Seediq and Related Languages: Grammar, Processing, and Revitalization at the Harvard-Yenching Institute, Harvard University, in May 2018, where an earlier version of this paper was presented. We are indebted to the villagers who participated in our experiment and to Apay Ai-yu Tang, Yudaw Pisaw, Kimi Yudaw, Yuki Kumus, Reykong Yudaw, Muhung Yuki, and Ubing Yuki, for professional as well as heartwarming support. This research was supported by a Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (A) (PI: Masatoshi Koizumi, # JP15H02603), a Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (S) (PI: Masatoshi Koizumi, # JP19H05589), a Grant-in-Aid for Young Scientists (A) (PI: Manami Sato, #JP16H05939), and a Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (B) (PI: Manami Sato, # 19H01263).
Funding Information:
We would like to thank three anonymous JEAL reviewers as well as James Huang, whose comments have led to substantial improvements in the work presented here. We would also like to thank the audience at the 40th Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society (CogSci 2018) as well as the International Workshop on Seediq and Related Languages: Grammar, Processing, and Revitalization at the Harvard-Yenching Institute, Harvard University, in May 2018, where an earlier version of this paper was presented. We are indebted to the villagers who participated in our experiment and to Apay Ai-yu Tang, Yudaw Pisaw, Kimi Yudaw, Yuki Kumus, Reykong Yudaw, Muhung Yuki, and Ubing Yuki, for professional as well as heartwarming support. This research was supported by a Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (A) (PI: Masatoshi Koizumi, # JP15H02603), a Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (S) (PI: Masatoshi Koizumi, # JP19H05589), a Grant-in-Aid for Young Scientists (A) (PI: Manami Sato, #JP16H05939), and a Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (B) (PI: Manami Sato, # 19H01263).
Publisher Copyright:
© 2020, The Author(s).
PY - 2020/5/1
Y1 - 2020/5/1
N2 - The embodied cognition hypothesis postulates that human cognition is fundamentally grounded in our experience of interacting with the physical world (Barsalou in Behav Brain Sci 22:577–609, 1999). Research has shown bi-directional associations between physical action and the processes of understanding language: language comprehension seems to activate implied visual and motor components (Zwaan and Taylor in J Exp Psychol Gen 135(1):1–11, 2006), and action behavior seems to facilitate the comprehension of associated action-language (Beilock et al. in Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 105:13269–13273, 2008). Although numerous research studies have reported a link between action and language comprehension, the exact nature of their association remains subject to debate (Chatterjee in Lang Cognit 2:79–116, 2010). Moreover, the role of action in the production of language is under-explored, as are general language production processes in Austronesian languages. The endangered Austronesian language Truku provides typological patterns that are both under-examined in psycholinguistic research and informative for questions of language production. Truku allows flexibility in the relative location of verbs versus arguments in sentence production, and uses a symmetrical voice system that marks the prominence of different participants in an event. Working with native speakers of Truku, we tested whether performing physical motions immediately affects the conceptual saliency of the components represented in a to-be-described event in ways that guide speakers’ visual attention and shape their utterance formulation. More specifically, we investigated whether speakers’ engagement as an agent or patient in a non-speech physical action affects initial eye-fixations on agent versus patient participants in a visual scene, as well as word order and grammatical voice choices in the speakers’ descriptions of simple transitive events. The results revealed significant effects of physical action on the relative location and prominence of agents in subsequent sentence formulation, and on online patterns of eye fixations. These results provide further support for language-action connections in cognitive processing, and shed light on the cross-linguistic patterns of sentence production.
AB - The embodied cognition hypothesis postulates that human cognition is fundamentally grounded in our experience of interacting with the physical world (Barsalou in Behav Brain Sci 22:577–609, 1999). Research has shown bi-directional associations between physical action and the processes of understanding language: language comprehension seems to activate implied visual and motor components (Zwaan and Taylor in J Exp Psychol Gen 135(1):1–11, 2006), and action behavior seems to facilitate the comprehension of associated action-language (Beilock et al. in Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 105:13269–13273, 2008). Although numerous research studies have reported a link between action and language comprehension, the exact nature of their association remains subject to debate (Chatterjee in Lang Cognit 2:79–116, 2010). Moreover, the role of action in the production of language is under-explored, as are general language production processes in Austronesian languages. The endangered Austronesian language Truku provides typological patterns that are both under-examined in psycholinguistic research and informative for questions of language production. Truku allows flexibility in the relative location of verbs versus arguments in sentence production, and uses a symmetrical voice system that marks the prominence of different participants in an event. Working with native speakers of Truku, we tested whether performing physical motions immediately affects the conceptual saliency of the components represented in a to-be-described event in ways that guide speakers’ visual attention and shape their utterance formulation. More specifically, we investigated whether speakers’ engagement as an agent or patient in a non-speech physical action affects initial eye-fixations on agent versus patient participants in a visual scene, as well as word order and grammatical voice choices in the speakers’ descriptions of simple transitive events. The results revealed significant effects of physical action on the relative location and prominence of agents in subsequent sentence formulation, and on online patterns of eye fixations. These results provide further support for language-action connections in cognitive processing, and shed light on the cross-linguistic patterns of sentence production.
KW - Conceptual saliency
KW - Embodiment
KW - Endangered language
KW - Motion
KW - Sentence production
KW - Verb-initial language
KW - Visual world paradigm
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U2 - 10.1007/s10831-020-09205-9
DO - 10.1007/s10831-020-09205-9
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85081903949
VL - 29
SP - 211
EP - 236
JO - Journal of East Asian Linguistics
JF - Journal of East Asian Linguistics
SN - 0925-8558
IS - 2
ER -