Odors, words and objects

The paper focuses on concepts and words referring to odors and to objects that have an odor. We argue that odors are an interesting object of study since they are evanescent, and since odor words do not refer to concrete and manipulable objects, but to scents evoked by objects. A second reason why odors are interesting is that some languages, as the Western ones, lack a specific odor lexicon, comparable in richness and variety to the color lexicon, and that performance on odors naming is typically worse than performance in color naming. In this work we discuss three main issues. First, we illustrate literature showing that, even if odor words do not have concrete referents, many languages encode them quite easily: the case of odors suggests that word meaning cannot be exhausted by the relationship with a referent, and highlights the importance of the social sharing of meaning. Second, we have discussed the peculiar status of odor concepts and words. Given their ambiguous status, their simple existence poses problems both to theories according to which concrete and abstract concepts do not differ, and to theories according to which they represent a dichotomy. Finally, we present an experiment in which we show that names of objects evoke their smell, and that these smells evoke approach and avoidance movements, in line with theories according to which words are grounded in both sensorial and motor systems

Cognition in context: Evidence on affordances and verbal language

This thesis investigated affordances and verbal language to demonstrate the flexibility of embodied simulation processes. Starting from the assumption that both object/action understanding and language comprehension are tied to the context in which they take place, six studies clarified the factors that modulate simulation. The studies in chapter 4 and 5 investigated affordance activation in complex scenes, revealing the strong influence of the visual context, which included either objects and actions, on compatibility effects. The study in chapter 6 compared the simulation triggered by visual objects and objects names, showing differences depending on the kind of materials processed. The study in chapter 7 tested the predictions of the WAT theory, confirming that the different contexts in which words are acquired lead to the difference typically observed in the literature between concrete and abstract words. The study in chapter 8 on the grounding of abstract concepts tested the mapping of temporal contents on the spatial frame of reference of the mental timeline, showing that metaphoric congruency effects are not automatic, but flexibly mediated by the context determined by the goals of different tasks. The study in chapter 9 investigated the role of iconicity in verbal language, showing sound-to-shape correspondences when every-day object figures, result that validated the reality of sound-symbolism in ecological contexts. On the whole, this evidence favors embodied views of cognition, and supports the hypothesis of a high flexibility of simulation processes. The reported conceptual effects confirm that the context plays a crucial role in affordances emergence, metaphoric mappings activation and language grounding. In conclusion, this thesis highlights that in an embodied perspective cognition is necessarily situated and anchored to a specific context, as it is sustained by the existence of a specific body immersed in a specific environment

How do you hold your mouse? Tracking the compatibility effect between hand posture and stimulus size

Abstract In keeping with the idea that observing objects activates possible motor responses, several experiments revealed compatibility effects between the hand postures used to report a choice and some characteristics of the stimuli. The real-time dynamics of such compatibility effects are currently unknown. We tracked the time course of a categorization experiment requiring subjects to categorize as natural or artifact figures of big and small objects. Participants reported their choice using either a big mouse (requiring a power grip: a hand posture compatible with the grasping of big objects) or a small mouse (requiring a precision grip: a hand posture compatible with the grasping of small objects). We found a compatibility effect between the grip required by the mouse and the grip elicited by objects, even if it was irrelevant to the task. In a following 1,* 2 1,2 2 1 2 experiment with the same paradigm, lexical stimuli failed to reproduce the same effect. Nevertheless, a compatibility effect mediated by the target-word category (artificial vs. natural) was observed. We discuss the results in the context of affordance effects literature and grounded theories of cognition

Nomina sunt consequentia rerum -Sound-shape correspondences with every-day objects figures

a b s t r a c t Prior research on sound-symbolism has demonstrated the existence of sound-shape correspondences using ad hoc figures in double forced-choice paradigms. This led sound-symbolic skeptics to affirm that the reported effects were due to the properties of the figures shown or to the structure of the task used. In the present study, we hypothesized that the sound-shape correspondence effect would be observed when participants were required to choose which of two invented words would better suit an image representing a common object/entity. In addition, we hypothesized that the effect would be modulated by the object/entity category, and that natural objects would be represented with smoother shapes compared to artifacts. Results confirmed the ''classic'' takete-maluma effect both when participants chose a name for figures of natural objects (e.g., leaf) and artifacts (e.g., fork), and when they chose a name for figures of natural (e.g., animals) and artificial agents (e.g., robots). Moreover, when participants had to name agents, a modulation of the category (artificial vs. natural) emerged: sound-shape correspondence was not observed with robots, which were associated more often with jagged responses despite their actual shape. Results are discussed in the framework of embodied cognition theories

Nomina sunt consequentia rerum - Sound-shape correspondences with every-day objects figures

Prior research on sound-symbolism has demonstrated the existence of sound-shape correspondences using ad hoc figures in double forced-choice paradigms. This led sound-symbolic skeptics to affirm that the reported effects were due to the properties of the figures shown or to the structure of the task used. In the present study, we hypothesized that the sound-shape correspondence effect would be observed when participants were required to choose which of two invented words would better suit an image representing a common object/entity. In addition, we hypothesized that the effect would be modulated by the object/entity category, and that natural objects would be represented with smoother shapes compared to artifacts. Results confirmed the "classic" takete-maluma effect both when participants chose a name for figures of natural objects (e.g. leaf) and artifacts (e.g. fork), and when they chose a name for figures of natural (e.g. animals) and artificial agents (e.g. robots). Moreover, when participants had to name agents, a modulation of the category (artificial vs. natural) emerged: sound-shape correspondence was not observed with robots, which were associated more often with jagged responses despite their actual shape. Results are discussed in the framework of embodied cognition theories. © 2014 Elsevier Inc.SCOPUS: ar.jinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishe