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，即将已知概念和词语结合成新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，以及这些系统如何提高人类生产力。我的重点是复合词（例如，snowball、hogwash）和修饰名词短语（例如，snow bucket、hog barn）。这些小的语言结构为理解语言和概念系统的信息过程和来源提供了重要的测试用例，因为它们涉及从构成语素/单词构建新的含义。 我的工作研究了复合词处理与修饰语-名词短语处理的关系，并证明复合词处理，就像修饰语-名词短语处理一样，涉及基于复合词的成分创建富有成效的含义的强制性尝试，甚至当它不合适并且有处理成本时。至关重要的是，复合词的含义并不是简单地由词汇系统激活或检索的。意义构建的尝试要求识别复合词中的成分，因此了解复合词处理中形态和语义信息如何与正字法（例如字母识别）信息源相互作用至关重要。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至关重要，并且在我的研究计划之外的复合词研究中很少进行研究。 拟议的研究计划建立在我之前的研究基础上，调查形态和语义信息如何影响复合词处理并允许意义构建尝试。我将研究拼字法和概念信息的作用，以及它们在复合词处理中与语义和形态信息的关系。一般方法是比较具有不同语义或概念特征的复合词，或者将复合词与非复合词进行比较，例如伪复合词（看起来像复合词的词，例如地毯），这使我能够调查信息来源及其相互作用。这些比较将在侧重于单词访问、单词产生或拼写判断的各种任务中进行检查，使我能够研究处理的不同方面。这项工作最终将形成一个完整的复合文字处理理论，将来自拼写过程、形态学和语义学、概念过程的信息源纳入其中。 即使在这些最小的语言结构中，理解生产力也是极其复杂和困难的。然而，这项工作将极大地扩展人们对生产性意义建构以及此类建构如何继续影响语言和概念系统的了解。