Conceptualising voluntary motion events beyond language use: A comparison of English and Chinese speakers’ similarity judgments

Abstract

This study explores the relationship between language and cognition by testing how monolingual speakers (3-year-olds, 8-year-olds and adults) who speak languages with partial typological differences in motion description (English and Chinese) respond to visual motion event stimuli in a triads matching task. The results suggest, first of all, that the two groups of 3-year-olds are predominantly path-oriented, as evidenced by their significantly longer fixation on path-match videos rather than manner-match videos in a preferential-looking scheme. Using categorical measurement of overt choices, the older children and adults showed no particular preference for either manner- or path-similarity criteria. However, the analysis using continuous measurement of reaction time revealed that adults were significantly quicker in responding to voluntary motion stimuli than the older children of 8 years due to their cognitive maturity; manner-matched choices were decided in a significantly shorter time than path-matched choices, and Chinese participants were found to be significantly faster than their English peers in response. Overall, our results indicate that children's non-linguistic thought is similar prior to the internalisation of the lexicalisation patterns of motion events in their native languages, but it does not show language-specific divergences after such habitual use.