The Interference of Linguistic Symbols on Categorization

Abstract

Categorization, as a fundamental concept that assists people in daily perceiving and estimating, influences the approach to how individuals classify objects, events, and ideas through its language-based presentation. The adaptations of language in science and tradition will inevitably result in paradoxical classifications. To explore to what extent linguistic symbols can interfere in or even determine categorization, this study experimentally tested the ratio of how linguistic interference affects the perceptions of textual, colorific, and melodic information, respectively. Forty-one examinees participated in the experiments, and thirty-two multiple-choice questions were set to quantify the extent of linguistic interference in categorization, as well as trace how linguistic symbols perceived as textual, colorific, and melodic stimuli affect categorization, respectively. The control experiments indicated that linguistic interference, in limited grammatical and verbal forms, could not wholly determine but highly affect categorization, with kappa coefficients of 0.33 for textual, 0.27 for colorific, and 0.24 for melodic (p<0.05). In addition, as shown in the data, linguistic interference had slightly higher effects on the perceptions of untextual information such as colors and melodies.