Compound word processing: Orthographic, Morphological, Semantic, and Conceptual Effects

复合文字处理：拼写、形态、语义和概念效果

• 批准号: RGPIN-2020-04456
• 负责人: Spalding, Thomas
• 金额: $ 2.04万
• 依托单位: University of Alberta
• 依托单位国家: 加拿大
• 项目类别: Discovery Grants Program - Individual
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 加拿大
• 起止时间: 2020-01-01 至 2021-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/ase-oro/Details-Detailles_eng.asp?id=717016
• 关键词: Compound; word; processing; Orthographic; Morphological

Cognitive productivity, the ability to combine known concepts and words into new meanings and linguistic constructions, is one of the most important human abilities. The ultimate goal of my research is to better understand the conceptual and language systems, and how these systems lead to human productivity. My focus has been on compound words (e.g., snowball, hogwash) and modifier-noun phrases (e.g., snow bucket, hog barn). These small linguistic constructions provide an important test case for understanding processes and sources of information from the language and conceptual systems because they involve the construction of new meanings from the constituent morphemes/words. My work has examined how compound word processing relates to modifier-noun phrase processing, and has demonstrated that compound word processing, like modifier-noun phrase processing, involves an obligatory attempt at creating a productive meaning based on the constituents of the compound word, even when it is not appropriate and has a processing cost. Critically, compound word meanings are not simply activated or retrieved by the lexical system. Attempts at meaning construction require that the constituents be identified in the compound word and therefore it is critical to know how morphological and semantic information interact with orthographic (e.g., letter identification) sources of information in compound word processing. Similarly, meaning creation involves coordinating different conceptual representations, so the role of conceptual processes is critical, and rarely studied in compound word research, outside my research program. The proposed research program builds on my previous research investigating how morphological and semantic information impact compound word processing and allow meaning construction attempts. I will investigate the roles of orthography and conceptual information, and their relation to semantic and morphological information, in compound word processing. The general approach is to compare compound words with different semantic or conceptual characteristics, or to compare compound words with non-compounds, such as pseudo-compounds (words that only look like compounds, e.g., carpet), which allows me to investigate the information sources and their interactions. These comparisons will be examined across various tasks that focus on word access, word production, or orthographic judgments, allowing me to investigate different aspects of processing. This work will ultimately lead to a full theory of compound word processing, incorporating sources of information from orthographic processes, through morphology and semantics, to conceptual processes. Understanding productivity, even in these smallest linguistic constructions, is dauntingly complex and difficult. However, this work will greatly extend what is known about productive meaning construction, and about how such constructions continue to influence the language and conceptual systems.

认知生产力，即将已知的概念和单词组合成新的含义和语言结构的能力，是人类最重要的能力之一。我研究的最终目标是更好地理解概念和语言系统，以及这些系统是如何导致人类生产力的。我的重点是复合词(例如，Snowball，Hogwash)和修饰语-名词短语(例如，Snow Bucket，Heg Barn)。这些小的语言结构为从语言和概念系统中理解信息的过程和来源提供了一个重要的测试案例，因为它们涉及到从组成语素/单词构建新的意义。 我的工作研究了复合词处理与修饰语-名词短语处理之间的关系，并证明了复合词处理，就像修饰语-名词短语处理一样，涉及到基于复合词的成分创造产出性意义的强制性尝试，即使它是不合适的，并且有处理成本。重要的是，复合词的意义并不是简单地被词汇系统激活或提取的。构建意义的尝试需要在复合词中识别成分，因此在复合词处理中知道形态和语义信息如何与拼写(例如，字母识别)信息源相互作用是至关重要的。同样，意义创造涉及协调不同的概念表征，因此概念过程的作用是至关重要的，在我的研究项目之外的复合词研究中很少有人研究。 拟议的研究计划建立在我之前的研究基础上，该研究调查了形态和语义信息如何影响复合词的加工，并允许进行意义构建尝试。我将研究正字法和概念信息在复合词处理中的作用，以及它们与语义和形态信息的关系。一般的方法是比较具有不同语义或概念特征的复合词，或者比较复合词和非复合词，如伪复合词(只看起来像复合词的词，如地毯)，这使我能够调查信息来源及其相互作用。这些比较将在各种任务中进行，这些任务集中在单词获取、单词产生或拼写判断上，使我能够研究处理的不同方面。这项工作最终将导致复合词处理的完整理论，纳入从正字法加工，通过词法和语义，到概念加工的信息来源。 理解生产力，即使在这些最小的语言结构中，也是令人望而生畏的复杂和困难。然而，这项工作将极大地扩展关于产出性意义构建的已知内容，以及此类结构如何继续影响语言和概念系统。