INSPIRE: The underpinnings of Semantic change: A Linguistic, Cognitive, and Information-Theoretic Investigation

INSPIRE奖部分由计算机与信息科学与工程理事会计算与通信基础部门的通信与信息基础项目（CISE/CCF）和社会、行为与经济科学理事会行为与认知科学部门的语言学项目（SBE/BCS）资助。一个公认的事实是，与语言表达相关的意义随着时间的推移以系统的方式演变。但我们对这种系统性变化的认知和交际基础却知之甚少。该研究的核心是两个问题：a)语义变化的约束性和轨迹性是否源于神经认知系统的组织特性？b)这种变化实例的驱动和实施根植于理性沟通的动态中，其精确程度如何？通过从语言结构、概念结构、脑功能结构和交流结构的角度同时解决这些问题，研究人员希望建立一个认知基础、实验可行和数学知识丰富的语义变化理论。在探索语言、认知和交流之间的潜在联系时，已经确定了两种经过充分证明的跨语言变化路径，它们特别相关：(a)位置表达历时演变为表达占有的路径，最终演变为与格标记；(b)连词或连系动词从姿势动词（例如，sit, stand）产生的路径，以编码属性的偶然/临时和基本/永久属性之间的区别，并在后期推广到编码这两种类型的属性。一方面，通过实验研究这些语义概念的处理和神经学方面，该团队将探索语言和认知之间的接口-特别是概念系统中基于感知和非基于感知的维度的联系。这些结果将有助于更好地理解组织概念系统基础设施的认知途径，特别是前额皮质。另一方面，从形式语言模型、语义变化现象和认知心理学中获得的见解将与工程学和统计学的思想相结合，至少形成语义信息的概率论的开端，该理论模拟了信息在语言话语中的交换方式。正如设想的那样，这个项目有望在两个层面上产生更广泛的影响：首先，它将解放传统上局限于语言学一个小分支领域的现象，并将它们转化为研究它们产生的基本机制的工具，使它们与认知科学、神经科学和信息论相关。它还将为丰富的（但相对混乱的）真实语言的经验事实和抽象的交流理论之间的可能综合开辟直接渠道，为语义信息论铺平道路。其次，它将提供一个更清晰的理解认知途径如何指导语言的进化在语言典型（即，神经认知健康）人群。反过来，这对语言非典型人群的研究有直接的影响。通过这两种方式，该项目将重新定义语言学、信息论、认知科学和神经科学之间的界限，并为研究语义、认知和信息带来新的方法。这项研究也将导致一种新的教育和研究方法的创造：从信息理论和神经认知的角度研究语言变化。

This INSPIRE award is partially funded by the Communication and Information Foundations Program of the Computing and Communications Foundations Division in the Directorate for Computer & Information Science & Engineering (CISE/CCF) and the Linguistics Program of the Behavioral and Cognitive Sciences Division in the Directorate for Social, Behavioral & Economic Sciences (SBE/BCS).It is a well-established fact that meanings associated with linguistic expressions evolve in systematic ways across time. But we have little concrete understanding of the cognitive and communicative basis of such systematic change. Central to the proposed research are two questions: a) Does the constrained and trajectorial nature of semantic change derive from the organizational properties of the neurocognitive system? b) How precisely is the actuation and the implementation of instances of such changes rooted in the dynamics of rational communication? By simultaneously addressing these questions from the perspectives of linguistic structure, conceptual structure, brain-functional structure, and communication structure, the investigators hope to develop a cognitively grounded, experimentally viable, and mathematically informed theory of semantic change.Two cross-linguistically well-attested paths of change have been identified as being especially relevant in probing the potential connections between language, cognition and communication: (a) the path whereby locative expressions diachronically evolve to express possession, ultimately evolving into dative case markers; (b) the path whereby copulas or linking verbs arise from posture verbs (e.g., sit, stand) to encode the distinction between incidental/temporary and essential/permanent attribution of properties, generalizing at a later stage to encode both types of attribution. On the one hand, by experimentally studying the processing and neurological aspects of these semantic notions, the team will probe the interface between language and cognition -- specifically the connection to percept-based and non-percept-based dimensions of the conceptual system. These results will facilitate a better understanding of the cognitive pathways that organize the infrastructure of the conceptual system, particularly the prefrontal cortex. On the other hand, insights obtained from formal linguistic models, semantic change phenomena, and cognitive psychology, will be combined with ideas from engineering and statistics to formulate at least the beginnings of a probabilistic theory of semantic information, which models how information is exchanged in linguistic discourse.As envisaged, this project promises to have broader impact at two levels: First, it will liberate phenomena conventionally restricted to one small subfield in Linguistics and transform them into tools for investigating the fundamental mechanisms from which they emerge, making them relevant for Cognitive Science, Neuroscience, and Information Theory. It will also open up direct channels for a possible synthesis between the rich (but relatively messy) empirical facts of real language and abstract theories of communication, paving a path towards a Semantic Information Theory. Second, it will afford a cleaner understanding of how cognitive pathways guide the evolution of language in the linguistically typical (i.e., neurocognitively healthy) population. This, in turn, has direct implications for research on linguistically atypical populations. In both these ways, the project will redefine the boundaries between linguistics, information theory, cognitive science, and neuroscience and lead to new methodologies for studying semantics, cognition and information. The proposed research will also lead to the creation of a novel educational and research approach: the study of language change from an information-theoretic and neurocognitive perspective.