The organization of words and environmental sounds in the second year: Behavioral and electrophysiological evidence

The majority of research examining early auditory‐semantic processing and organization is based on studies of meaningful relations between words and referents. However, a thorough investigation into the fundamental relation between acoustic signals and meaning requires an understanding of how meaning is associated with both lexical and non‐lexical sounds. Indeed, it is unknown how meaningful auditory information that is not lexical (e.g., environmental sounds) is processed and organized in the young brain. To capture the structure of semantic organization for words and environmental sounds, we record event‐related potentials as 20‐month‐olds view images of common nouns (e.g., dog) while hearing words or environmental sounds that match the picture (e.g., “dog” or barking), that are within‐category violations (e.g., “cat” or meowing), or that are between‐category violations (e.g., “pen” or scribbling). Results show both words and environmental sounds exhibit larger negative amplitudes to between‐category violations relative to matches. Unlike words, which show a greater negative response early and consistently to within‐category violations, such an effect for environmental sounds occurs late in semantic processing. Thus, as in adults, the young brain represents semantic relations between words and between environmental sounds, though it more readily differentiates semantically similar words compared to environmental sounds.     

前后语境在汉语成语义识别中的作用

通过自定步速阅读实验研究发现,语境前后位置对成语义识别有显著性影响,且影响方式和程度存在差异,符合多义词重组通达模型。根据动态自组织模式,句子中的成语义识别至少包括多种潜在词义启动和与语境倾向义匹配两个过程。前置语境对成语比喻义通达具有预设作用,加速或抑制成语比喻义通达;而后置语境则在句子语义整合过程中对成语比喻义起到返查纠偏的作用。     

二、三和五年级儿童对形旁语义的加工

结合启动范式和汉字判断任务,通过操纵目标字语义透明度,在汉字阅读过程探查了二、三、五年级儿童对形旁语义的加工。采用 3×2×2 混合实验设计,自变量为被试类型（小学二、三、五年级儿童）、启动字类型（字形相关 vs. 无关）和目标字类型（透明字 vs. 模糊字）。结果发现启动字类型、目标字类型和年级三者交互作用显著。随后分析在三五年级儿童中发现了显著的独立于字形的形旁语义启动效应,启动字中的共享形旁对模糊字的识别产生了更大的抑制作用,而在二年级儿童中并没有发现这种效应。说明形旁语义在儿童的心理词典中存在独立表征,可以被激活并促进儿童对汉字的识别,但是需要儿童的阅读理解能力发展到一定程度。     

Event-related potential (ERP) evidence for the differential cognitive processing of semantic jokes and pun jokes

Brain-imaging studies report that separate neural correlates are associated with processing of different types of humorous materials. However, such evidence lacks temporal information. In this study, we examined the temporal dynamics of humour comprehension between two types of jokes: semantic (SEMs) and pun (PUNs) jokes, using electroencephalographic (EEG) techniques. Thirty SEMs and 30 PUNs were presented to 16 healthy subjects, and their EEG data were concurrently recorded. PUNs consequently showed a larger N400 amplitude than did SEMs, without a specified scalp site, which implies that PUNs induce greater surprise and semantic violation. Meanwhile, SEMs induced a larger P600-like amplitude at the posterior site, which implies that, in order to understand SEMs, higher working memory loads are needed to form novel associations and successfully frame-shift. A possible explanation is the differing logical mechanisms used to understand SEMs and PUNs: the former builds on semantic relationships, the latter on phonological causality.     

When senses meet functions: an amodal stage in conceptual processing

Research has shown that concepts are associated with modality-specific features widely distributed in the brain and that semantic hubs or convergence zones may exist to mediate or integrate distributed representations. Although much neuropsychological and neuroimaging literature has provided support for the existence of hubs/convergence zones from the spatial perspective, opinions differ as to whether the representations in the hubs/convergence zones are modality-specific or amodal. The current ERP study aimed to explore whether there is an amodal stage in conceptual processing from the temporal perspective. Participants were presented with prime-target pairs and were asked to judge whether the prime (a sensory or functional feature) could be an attribute of the target (a noun in a natural or artifactual category). The results revealed that a semantic hub or convergence zone may be reached no later than 350–450?ms in conceptual processing and that the representations in the hub may be amodal.     

言语工作记忆内容在语义水平的注意捕获

采用工作记忆−视觉搜索双任务范式, 探讨不同呈现方式下与言语工作记忆内容语义水平匹配的刺激的注意捕获效应。结果发现：(1)视觉呈现下, 与言语工作记忆内容知觉和语义匹配的刺激均能捕获注意, 且在视觉搜索快速反应的阶段仍能捕获注意; (2)听觉呈现下, 与言语工作记忆内容语义匹配的刺激不能捕获注意, 反而被抑制, 但在视觉搜索快速反应的早期阶段却能捕获注意。研究表明, 基于视听呈现的言语工作记忆内容在语义水平对注意的引导作用可发生在注意搜索过程快速反应的早期阶段。而晚期阶段由于受到跨通道注意选择的抑制, 听觉呈现下的语义表征不能捕获注意, 而视觉呈现下的语义表征仍能捕获注意。     

A Discourse on Educational Leadership: Global Themes,Postmodern Perspectives

Epistemology mirrors reality but notperfectly, and in the process molds reality butnot exactly as intended or anticipated. Horizontal interconnections also exist betweenand among epistemology, ideology, theory andpraxiology. However, these relations areneither deductive nor deterministic in naturebut are merely resonant, and then unclear,ambiguous and confounded. In this paper, thepoint is made that we need a grand reflectionon both our paradigms of reality and ourpredicaments of life as lived, to deal with thediscontent of humanity at this moment of thehistory of our civilization, and to engage inpraxis ``to act on our world and to reconstructit' to make it moral, just and more humane. Toundertake such a grand reflection, we need apractical philosophy of knowledge – that is, apractical epistemology – to bridge across themultiple epistemological approaches nowcrowding our discussions. An epistemictriangle formed by systems thinking,constructivist thinking, and dialecticalthinking is offered to serve as the startingpoint of crystallization for building a commonground for epistemologies. It is shown how suchan epistemological diagram could be first usedto develop a minimum ideological consensus andthen to bring orderliness to the chaos ofcontemporary themes of our civilization andissues of education and culture within andacross nations. Finally, an agenda foreducational leadership for educational practiceis offered to fit the needs of the globalcommunity of nations as we enter thetwenty-first century.     

语义范畴特异性损伤的理论研究进展

在对人类认知机制的研究中,以患者为研究对象是最近兴起的一种重要的认知神经科学手段.期间,人们发现有些脑损伤患者具有语义范畴特异性损伤现象,即表现出对个别语义范畴的认知能力相对较弱.这一奇特现象的发现,为研究人类的语义记忆系统的结构和功能开辟了一个全新的领域.该文着重介绍了这一现象及其引发的4种新的语义记忆理论,从而对人类的语义记忆作出重新审视.     

人如其食：食物性别刻板印象及对人物评价的影响

食物在社会生活中发挥着重要作用, 具有性别文化意义。两个研究分别探索了外显与内隐食物性别刻板印象的存在及其对人物评价的影响。研究1采用提名法、自我报告法和语义启动范式检验外显和内隐食物性别刻板印象的存在, 结果表明被试均持“男性偏好男性化食物, 女性偏好女性化食物”的外显食物性别刻板印象, 女性被试持有内隐食物性别刻板印象。研究2采用情境实验法和内隐关系评估程序进一步测量被试对食物性别刻板不一致目标人物在热情和能力维度上的评价, 结果发现人们对食物性别刻板不一致男性在热情维度的内隐评价更加积极。     

Semantic Memory Search and Retrieval in a Novel Cooperative Word Game: A Comparison of Associative and Distributional Semantic Models

Considerable work during the past two decades has focused on modeling the structure of semantic memory, although the performance of these models in complex and unconstrained semantic tasks remains relatively understudied. We introduce a two-player cooperative word game, Connector (based on the boardgame Codenames), and investigate whether similarity metrics derived from two large databases of human free association norms, the University of South Florida norms and the Small World of Words norms, and two distributional semantic models based on large language corpora (word2vec and GloVe) predict performance in this game. Participant dyads were presented with 20-item word boards with word pairs of varying relatedness. The speaker received a word pair from the board (e.g., exam-algebra) and generated a one-word semantic clue (e.g., math), which was used by the guesser to identify the word pair on the board across three attempts. Response times to generate the clue, as well as accuracy and latencies for the guessed word pair, were strongly predicted by the cosine similarity between word pairs and clues in random walk-based associative models, and to a lesser degree by the distributional models, suggesting that conceptual representations activated during free association were better able to capture search and retrieval processes in the game. Further, the speaker adjusted subsequent clues based on the first attempt by the guesser, who in turn benefited from the adjustment in clues, suggesting a cooperative influence in the game that was effectively captured by both associative and distributional models. These results indicate that both associative and distributional models can capture relatively unconstrained search processes in a cooperative game setting, and Connector is particularly suited to examine communication and semantic search processes.