Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-r5fsc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-24T03:39:02.906Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Do classifiers predict differences in cognitive processing? A study of nominal classification in Mandarin Chinese

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 March 2014

Mahesh Srinivasan
Mahesh Srinivasan*
Affiliation:
Harvard University
*
Correspondence addresses: Mahesh Srinivasan, Department of Psychology, Harvard University, William James Hall, 1118, 33 Kirkland Street, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA. E-mail: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

In English, numerals modify nouns directly (two tables), but in Mandarin Chinese, they modify numeral classifiers that are associated with nouns (two flat-thing table). Classifiers define a system of categories based on dimensions such as animacy, shape, and function (Adams and Conklin 1973; Dixon 1986), but do these categories predict differences in cognitive processing? The present study explored possible effects of classifier categories in a speeded task preventing significant deliberation and strategic responding. Participants counted objects in a visual display that were intermixed with distractor objects that had either the same Mandarin classifier or a different one. Classifier categories predicted Mandarin speakers' search performance, as Mandarin speakers showed greater interference from distractors with the same classifier than did Russian or English speakers. This result suggests that classifier categories may affect cognitive processing, and may have the potential to influence how speakers of classifier languages perform cognitive tasks in everyday situations. Two theoretical accounts of the results are discussed.

Keywords

nominal classificationcognitive processingvisual search
Type
Research Article
Information
Language and Cognition , Volume 2 , Issue 2 , June 2010 , pp. 177 - 190
Copyright
Copyright © UK Cognitive Linguistics Association 2010

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Adams, K. & Conklin, N. F.. 1973. Toward a theory of natural classification. Papers from the 9th regional meeting of the Chicago Linguistics Society. 1–10.Google Scholar
Aikhenvald, A. I. U. 2000. Classifiers: A typology of noun categorization devices. Oxford & New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Allan, K. 1977. Classifiers. Language 53. 285–311.Google Scholar
Allan, K. 1980. Nouns and countability. Language 56(3). 541–567.Google Scholar
Boroditsky, L. 2001. Does language shape thought? Mandarin and English speakers' conceptions of time. Cognitive Psychology 43(1). 1–22.Google Scholar
Chao, Y. 1968. A grammar of spoken Mandarin. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Chen, B., Che, G., Chen, H. & Zhang, Z.. 1988. Hanyu liangci cidian [A dictionary of Chinese numeral classifiers]. Fuzhou, Fujian Province: Fujian People's Publishing House.Google Scholar
Clark, H. H. 1973. The language-as-fixed-effect fallacy: A critique of language statistics in psychological research. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior 12. 335–359.Google Scholar
Cohen, J. D., MacWhinney, B., Flatt, M. & Provost, J.. 1993. PsyScope: A new graphic interactive environment for designing psychology experiments. Behavioral Research Methods, Instruments, and Computers 25(2). 257–271.Google Scholar
Comrie, B. 1981. Language universals and linguistic typology: Syntax and morphology. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Corcoran, D. W. J. & Jackson, A.. 1977. Basic processes and strategies in visual search. In Dornic, S. (ed.), Attention and performance VI, 387–411. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Croft, W. A. 1990. Typology and universals. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Dahan, D. & Tanenhaus, M. K.. 2005. Looking at the rope when looking for the snake: Conceptually mediated eye movements during spoken-word recognition. Psychonomic Bulletin and Review 12. 453–459.Google Scholar
Denny, J. P. 1976. What are noun classifiers good for?Papers from the twelfth regional meeting of the Chicago Linguistics Society. 122–132.Google Scholar
Desimone, R. & Duncan, J.. 1995. Neural mechanisms of selective visual attention. Annual Review of Neuroscience 18. 193–222.Google Scholar
Dixon, R. M. W. 1986. Noun classes and noun classification in typological perspective. In Craig, C. G. (ed.), Noun classes and categorization, 105–112. Amsterdam & Philadelphia: J. Benjamins.Google Scholar
Duncan, J. & Humphreys, G. W.. 1989. Visual search and stimulus similarity. Psychological Review 96. 433–458.Google Scholar
Erbaugh, M. 1986. Taking stock: The development of Mandarin noun classifiers historically and in young children. In Craig, C. G. (ed.), Noun classes and categorization, 399–438. Amsterdam & Philadelphia: J. Benjamins.Google Scholar
Gao, M. Y. & Malt, B. C.. 2009. Mental representation and cognitive consequences of Chinese individual classifiers. Language and Cognitive Processes 24(7). 1124–1179.Google Scholar
Gleitman, L. & Papafragou, A.. 2005. Language and thought. In Holyoak, K. & Morrison, R. (eds.), Cambridge handbook of thinking and reasoning, 633–661. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Greenberg, J. H. 1972. Numeral classifiers and substantival number: Problems in the genesis of a linguistic type. Stanford University Working Papers on Language Universals 9. 1–39.Google Scholar
Huettig, F. & Altmann, G. T. M.. 2005. Word meaning and the control of eye fixation: semantic competitor effects and the visual world paradigm. Cognition 96(1). B23–B32.Google Scholar
Lakoff, G. 1987. Women, fire, and dangerous things: What categories reveal about the mind. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Lin, E. L. & Murphy, G. L.. 2001. Thematic relations in adults' concepts. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General 130(1). 3–28.Google Scholar
Mandler, G. & Shebo, B. J.. 1982. Subitizing: an analysis of its component processes. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General 111(1). 1–22.Google Scholar
Markman, E. M. 1989. Categorization and naming in children: Problems of induction. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.Google Scholar
Meyer, A. S., Belke, E., Telling, A. L. & Humphreys, G. W.. 2007. Early activation of object names in visual search. Psychonomic Bulletin and Review 14(4). 710–716.Google Scholar
Moores, E., Laiti, L. & Chelazzi, L.. 2003. Associative knowledge controls deployment of visual selective attention. Nature Neuroscience 6. 182–189.Google Scholar
Neisser, U. 1963. Decision-time without reaction-time. Experiments in visual scanning. The American Journal of Psychology 76(3). 376–385.Google Scholar
Norman, J. 1988. Mandarin. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Osherson, D. N., Smith, E. E., Wilkie, O., López, A. & Shafir, E.. 1990. Category-based induction. Psychological Review 97(2). 185–200.Google Scholar
Saalbach, H. & Imai, M.. 2007. The scope of linguistic influence: Does a classifier system alter object concepts? Journal of Experimental Psychology: General 136(3). 485–501.Google Scholar
Schmitt, B. H. & Zhang, S.. 1998. Language structure and categorization: A study of classifiers in consumer cognition, judgment, and choice. Journal of Consumer Research 25(2). 108–122.Google Scholar
Senft, G. 2000. Systems of nominal classification. Cambridge & New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Treisman, A. & Gormican, S.. 1988. Feature analysis in early vision: Evidence from search asymmetries. Psychological Review 95. 15–48.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Zelinsky, G. J. & Murphy, G. L.. 2000. Synchronizing visual and language processing: An effect of object name length on eye movements. Psychological Science 11. 125–131.Google Scholar