Grounding Cognition: The Role of Perception and Action in Memory, Language, and Thinking

by Edited by Diane Pecher , Rolf A. Zwaan

• ISBN13: 9780521834643
• ISBN10: 0521834643
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2005-01-10
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• More Book Details

Summary

One of the key questions in cognitive psychology is how people represent knowledge about concepts such as football or love. Some researchers have proposed that concepts are represented in human memory by the sensorimotor systems that underlie interaction with the outside world. These theories represent developments in cognitive science to view cognition no longer in terms of abstract information processing, but in terms of perception and action. In other words, cognition is grounded in embodied experiences. Studies show that sensory perception and motor actions support understanding of words and object concepts. Moreover, even understanding of abstract and emotion concepts can be shown to rely on more concrete, embodied experiences. Finally, language itself can be shown to be grounded in sensorimotor processes. This book brings together theoretical arguments and empirical evidence from several key researchers in this field to support this framework.

Table of Contents

List of Contributors	vii
Introduction to Grounding Cognition: The Role of Perception and Action in Memory, Language, and Thinking	1	(7)
Diane Pecher
Rolf A. Zwaan
Object Concepts and Action	8	(27)
Anna M. Borghi
Constraints on Spatial Language Comprehension: Function and Geometry	35	(30)
Laura A. Carlson
Ryan Kenny
Embodiment in Metaphorical Imagination	65	(28)
Raymond W. Gibbs, Jr.
Passionate Thoughts: The Emotional Embodiment of Moral Concepts	93	(22)
Jesse J. Prinz
Grounding Language in Bodily States: The Case for Emotion	115	(14)
Arthur M. Glenberg
David Havas
Raymond Becker
Mike Rinck
Situating Abstract Concepts	129	(35)
Lawrence W. Barsalou
Katja Wiemer-Hastings
Dynamicity, Fictivity, and Scanning: The Imaginative Basis of Logic and Linguistic Meaning	164	(34)
Ronald W. Langacker
The Emergence of Grammar from Perspective	198	(26)
Brian MacWhinney
Embodied Sentence Comprehension	224	(22)
Rolf A. Zwaan
Carol J. Madden
On the Perceptual-Motor and Image-Schematic Infrastructure of Language	246	(36)
Michael J. Spivey
Daniel C. Richardson
Monica Gonzalez-Marquez
Connecting Concepts to Each Other and the World	282	(33)
Robert L. Goldstone
Ying Feng
Brian J. Rogosky
Author Index	315	(7)
Subject Index	322