What is a word association experiment?. ● What's the first word to come into your head when you...

What is a word association experiment?


● What's the first word to come into your head when you see:



cracker



Roger



Piruet



filthy



flaming



staunch



Molly


● What does this say about the mental lexicon?


● What does this say about the mental lexicon?

– Words have connections with other words– The connections are based on belonging to a similar

semantic field


● What are the limitations of this experiment?



– only one connected words identified– people communicate with more than one word




• context influences it




• context influences ittire, jack, and ________




• context influences itqueen, jack, and ________




• context influences itJack and the ________




• context influences itVery handy, a jack ________




• context influences itVery stupid, a jack ________

Answers in word association involve:

● Coordination

– Words on the same level• red, green, blue• flounder, herring, guppy• January, February• sun, moon, stars

– Opposites• high, low• dark, light• round, flat


● Collocation

– Words that appear together frequently• rock, roll• filthy lucre• surf, sand• hoity toidy• razor blade• hot, sweat


● Collocation

– Words that appear together frequently• flaming liberal/conservative• staunch Catholic/Muslim• active Baptist/Mormon


● Superordinate (hypernyms)

– Name of category the word falls under• sandwich > food• soccer > sport• nurse > profession


● Synonymy

– Word with same meaning• eat > ingest• fall > trip• fall > autumn• angry > mad

What kinds of associations are there?

● Type of semantic relationships

– Coordination (things at same level)– Superordination (hypernyms) (Things at higher

level)– Hyponyms (things at a lower level)– Meronyms (parts of the thing)


● Example: Chair

– dresser and table are coordinates (things at same level)

– furniture is a superordinate (hypernyms) (Things at higher level)

– rocker is a hyponym (things at a lower level)– leg and cushion are meronyms (parts of the thing)


● Visuwords

– train, evil, crack, jack● WordNet

– tree, Mormon

http://www.visuwords.com/

http://wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn

Evidence that words in same semantic field stored together

● Similar places in brain light up when people activate

– tools– fruit– animals

Evidence that words in same semantic field stored together

● Similar places in brain light up when people activate

– tools– fruit– animals

● Aphasics have trouble with certain semantic fields, but not others

– clothes– kitchen utensils

No such thing as synonymy

● COCA● small tiny● boy kid● steal rob

http://corpus.byu.edu/coca

Collocations

● Search for surrounding words● go + adjective● come + adjective● liberal conservative

http://corpus.byu.edu/coca/

Construction Grammar

● Instead of building sentences with words we have prefabs we use

– Where's _________– VERB one's way through _______

• She's working her way through school• Bob made his way through the crowd• I painted my way through college



– X causes Y to receive Z• Bob gave Carol a ring• Cindy gave him a bad time

– X intends Y to receive Z• Bob gave a ring to Carol



– X causes Y to receive Z• Bob gave Carol a ring• Cindy gave him a bad time

– X intends Y to receive Z• Bob gave a ring to Carol• *Cindy gave a bad time to him

– 9Z must be concrete not abstract)


● Certain words mean motion

– expel, push, drag, haul• The principal expelled them from school• They pushed the chair off the balcony• They hauled the gear up the mountain

– Construction: X VERB Y (locative expression)


● Construction: X VERB Y (locative expression)

– This gets extended to verbs without a movement meaning: laugh, smoke, sneeze

• Bob laughed Sally out of the room• He sneezed the paper off the table• He smoked them out of the meeting


● Construction: to VERB out of house and home

– implies expulsion by some kind of excess• We'll all be taxed out of house and home• His son ate them out of house and home• She smoked him out of house and home


● Construction: VERB X adjective

– He smashed the box flat– The sergeant marched the recruits sick– He drives me mad


● Set constructions become idioms

– to drive one crazy– sick in the head– safe and sound– larger than life– scratch the surface– get the hang of it– eat like a pig

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