Psycholinguistic Methods Research Articles

Потенциальные риски полного перехода на онлайн-обучение. Психолингвистический анализ

The advantages of psycholinguistic methods when analyzing the situation in education are described in the article. A relevant issue concerning the importance of getting education in the traditional “live” environment is raised. The total reality digitalization hazards are discussed from several points of view. The differences between information perception during online and offline education are analyzed. The idea that distant learning is the same as traditional learning when it comes to information presentation ways and the degree of information comprehension is refuted. The evidence of the twenty-year-long gradual shift to consciousness digitalization is given. According to the achieved results digital modality engagement in perception process will increase, while that of kinesthetic one will decrease, which will lead to exacerbation of the problem of modern people consciousness digitalization. Prerequisites to cultural and ethnic identity loss and national languages degradation within the societies in case of continuing americanization are studied. The outcome of school and university influence weakening, being replaced by advertising and mass media, is described. Hazards of mental and physiological disorders emerging and evolution due to the fully digitalized education are forecasted. Some of the possible solutions to prevent risks are given.

Processing Turkish case markers: Implications for the case containment hypothesis

We investigate the processing of accusative-marked NPs in Turkish, compared to genitive- and locative-marked NPs. We use psycholinguistic methods (a lexical decision task) to test competing predictions derived from frequency effects in lexical processing on the one hand, and morphosyntactic theories of case containment on the other hand. Our experimental outcomes support a case containment approach to Turkish morphology.

Лингвоаксиология эмоций: лингвокультурная ценность злости в русском языковом сознании

The article explores the linguocultural value of ZLOST’ in the Russian linguistic consciousness. It is based on the notion that the value of an emotion is culturally specific, not fully accessible to direct observation, yet can be discovered and measured using psycholinguistic methods. An experiment was conducted to identify the linguocultural value of the emotion ZLOST’ in the Russian linguistic consciousness. The scaling method was used for the experiment: in the first phase, seven-point bipolar scales were compiled based on the characteristics of the emotion ZLOST’ provided by the respondents. In the second phase, the participants rated the emotion ZLOST’ on these scales, and the results were processed and interpreted. It was found that ZLOST’ is most often rated as emotional and anxious, as well as strong, angry, stirring, and destructive (these scales showed the fewest zero ratings). The image of ZLOST’ as anxious, angry, destructive, and fast is almost unambiguously formed in the collective consciousness (these scales showed the least variance in ratings). The characteristics of the emotion ZLOST’ were arranged in descending order of the intensity of quality (characterized by the absolute value of the rating), and the numerical indicators were verbally interpreted: ZLOST’ is very emotional, very angry, very destructive, very anxious, dangerous, terrible, vivid, sad, impulsive, bad, quite sincere, quite stirring, quite fast, quite absorbing, quite large, quite strong, quite unconscious, quite hot, quite loud. The obtained results demonstrate the feasibility of using the applied methodology for studying the linguocultural value of emotions in the Russian linguistic consciousness, as well as in comparative studies.

Psycholinguistics, Corpus Linguistics, and Text Analytics: Potential for Interaction

This article explores the possibilities of interaction between psycholinguistics, corpus linguistics, and text mining. When it comes to big data processing, the recent advances in psycholinguistics must be taken into account. In our digital reality, we should no longer view text as a mere sum of individual language units that are assembled based on their similarities in meaning. The insights of psycholinguistics into text have been revised, as in-depth text analysis unravels the new roles of the sender and the recipient, bringing to the fore qualitative methods for processing large data arrays. Without studying the mechanisms of speech generation and perception, it is impossible to improve language neural networks and machine translation engines. Here, the potential of psycholinguistics for training specialists in text analytics is discussed. As an example, the advantages of integrating the disciplines “Psycholinguistics” and “Psycholinguistic Methods for Studying Language and Text” into the psychological and linguistic module of the Master’s program “Text Analytics in Education and Science”, which has been launched at Kazan Federal University (Russia), are shown. The psycholinguistic component of the discipline “Corpus Linguistics” for Master’s students is described.

Issues of understanding a literary text from a psycholinguistic perspective

The article describes psycholinguistic methods used to model the processes of modern schoolchildren’s perception and comprehension of the text of A. P. Chekhov’s short story "The Death of a Government Clerk". We postulate that the processes of perceiving and understanding fictional texts are conditioned by several factors. These include the quality of the text itself, its size, the closeness of the work to recipients, recipients’ gender- and age-specific qualities, and the peculiarities of their conceptual systems. The research data are the results of two-stage psycholinguistic experiments conducted with the participation of Omsk secondary and vocational school students. The first stage was performed according to the method of semantic differential. It aimed to diagnose the process of emotional perception in the experimental subjects. In the second stage, the students had to answer questions concerning the basic semantic lines of the text. The first stage revealed an emotional attitude to the text and the influence of the gender factor. The former was manifested in different intensities of the evaluation parameters concentrated in the area of negative coefficients. The second stage showed the results of the comprehension process as the totality of gender-, socially, and psychologically determined interpretations of the semantic content of the text. The comprehension process is associated with choosing certain supports such as particular textual signs, the socio-psychological model of the author, the plot, and others.

Семантическая структура лексемы «Толерантность» в современной русской языковой картине мира

This article is aimed to analyze a semantic structure of the lexeme ‘tolerantnost’’ [tolerance] that functions in the Russian linguistic world-image. The material was collected from the Russian National Corpus, associative dictionaries, texts of the modern Internet discourse: posts from social networks and forums with such requests as ‘Kak vy ponimayete tolerantnost’? [What do you understand under tolerance?], ‘Kak Vy ob”yasnyayete detyam, chto takoye tolerantnost’?’ [How do you explain to children what tolerance is?], ‘Kak vesti sebya tolerantno’ [How to behave tolerantly], etc. The choice of the material is conditioned by the research agenda to identify interpretation patterns of this unit given by modern native bearers of the simple Russian linguistic consciousness. The following approaches have been applied within the framework of this research work: semantic analysis of texts, a psycholinguistic method, the method of interpretation of semantic dominants, and a contextual method. The following results have been obtained during the course of the analysis. The obtained associate show that the unit ‘tolerantnost’’ [tolerance] is interpreted through ‘terpimost’’ [lenience], ‘delikatnost’’ [delicacy], ‘sderzhannost’’ [restraint]; native speakers of Russian associate tolerance with the processes of globalization, democratization of the society, and humanism. However, the analysis of the modern Internet users’ texts allows for the conclusion that the concept under investigation has a more complicated structure. Tolerance in these texts is characterized both as an attitude with a strong axiological component and as a behavior, an external manifestation. Tolerance as an attitude is divided by the authors into positive (‘terpimoye’ [tolerable] in relation to other people) and negative one (‘molchalivoye’ [silent] behaviour towards negative socially significant phenomena). Tolerant behavior manifests itself as complete indifference to what is happening. The analysis of the texts of the last two years indicates transformation of the original meaning of the unit ‘tolerantnost’’ [tolerance] due to the currently changing ideology in the Russian society: a negative connotation has been recorded with the predominant components of the meaning ‘ravnodushiye’ [indifference], ‘drugoy’ [other], ‘chuzhdyy’ [alien], ‘zapret/ tabu’ [prohibition/ taboo], ‘privnesennyi’ [foreign], ‘Zapad’ [West], ‘bolezn’’ [disease], etc.

Ergonomic learning of the language of the urban environment

The proposed article contains the materials of the currently ongoing ergonomic research focused on the development of the problem of ergodesign design related to the study of the phenomenon of human visual comfort when perceiving fragments of the urban environment. The terminological meaning of the word "ergonym" was found from the very beginning of the 20th century when there was no fixed concept yet. For this reason, the semantic meaning was inaccurate due to the greater flow of linguists and their opinion. But through the practical part, the authors managed to exclude similar onyms, thereby expanding the onomastic field. The practical part of the article consisted in the study of local ergonyms of the urban center of Western Kazakhstan, denoting objects serving motor vehicles.
 To collect onomastic research material, the following methods and techniques were used: sociolinguistic and psycholinguistic methods, level analysis when studying the linguistic characteristics of onyms; as well as general scientific methods, primarily modeling and experiment. The results of the study confirm the hypothesis that the language situation has a huge impact on the processes of formation of ergonymic space and, as a sociolinguistic phenomenon, reflects the level of the ethnic and cultural component of society

Transformer-Based Language Models as Psycholinguistic Subjects: Focusing on Understanding Metaphor

Metaphor is a fundamental aspect of human language and cognition, playing a crucial role in communication, comprehension, and creative expression. In light of the recent advancements demonstrated by prominent language models, a pivotal question arises: Can these expansive language models effectively discern metaphorical knowledge? The primary objective involves comparing the surprisal values estimated from neural network language models like autoregressive and bidirectional language models to the reaction times of human when exposed to both metaphorical and literal sentences. Our secondary objective involves assessing the AI's comprehension of metaphors by utilizing the sensicality ratings generated by sophisticated ChatGPT. To achieve this, we used psycholinguistic methods, and adopted the experimental materials from Lai, Currana, and Menna (2009). We found the surprisal values estimated from the autoregressive language model demonstrate metaphor processing that closely resembles that of native speakers. Furthermore, ChatGPT's processing of conventional metaphorical sentences closely resembles its approach to literal sentences, mirroring the convergence observed in native speakers' ERP response to conventional metaphorical sentences and their alignment with that of literal sentences.

CONCEPT IVANUSHKA-DURACHOK: VALUE AND DYNAMIC ASPECT

In the article, the concept Ivanushka-durachok is considered as a national precedent name. The national-cultural significance of the concept is proved based on the opinion of predecessors. The deformations of the axiological paradigm of young Russian speakers are exemplified by this concept, modifications in its existence are fixed overtime. It is argued that the change in the semantics of the concept Ivanushka-durachok is explained by the development of the linguistic consciousness of native speakers over the past 40 years. In the course of the research, the psycholinguistic methods and the methods of corpus linguistics were used. The dynamics of the evaluative value of the precedent concept Ivanushka-durachok is indicated. It is concluded that the axiological and semantic potential of the concept Ivanushka-durachok and its name has been deformed. Its assessment vector in the linguistic consciousness of the student changed from positive to slightly negative. It was found that most of the preschoolers and some schoolchildren do not know the hero at all, do not have any associations with him, poorly represent his character traits, do not remember the fairy tales in which the character participates, do not reproduce the plot collisions associated with the hero, do not have a complete (and some even partial) understanding of the actions and characteristics of the hero and his antipodes, his environment. This is evidenced by the results of an associative experiment, according to which the hero is still recognizable as a fairy tale and folklore character inscribed in the schoolchild’s world picture. However, he is not attributed as invincible, disinterested, kind, trusting in the will of God, savvy, fearless, generous, highly moral. The hero is perceived primarily as intellectually limited, unkempt and unengaging. According to schoolchildren, the character is not suitable for personal friendship. The author considers the simplification and transformation of Ivanushka-durachok’s assessment to be a mutation of the cultural code. The change of axiological emphasis exemplified by Ivanushka-durachok is assessed as a diffusion of national-cultural idiosyncrasy, its unjustified debasement. The results of the analysis can help to correct the work with fairy-tale and folklore texts in kindergartens and elementary schools, be used in the teaching methods of literary reading.

Congruence of Psycholinguistic Sagacity in Human Language (English) Learning and Teaching

Several concepts have occurred in the field of psycholinguistics to elucidate in what way a person absorbs, creates, and observes both spoken and written language. The theories in language studies have been used in psycholinguistic instruction. Approximately experts apply them as the footing for building language instruction theories and approaches. Learning is seen as a development process in the psycholinguistic method. Distinct cognitive processes take place within the individual before entering the social dimension. By means of a technique, numerous approaches based on psycholinguistic thoughts have been formed. Natural approaches, total physical retort approaches, and suggestopedia approaches are some instances. These methods use psycholinguistic notions to clarify how an individual learns his or her mother tongue (Acquisition of First Language), second or third language (Learning of Second Language), observes a language (Perception of a Language), and generates language (Production of Language). Listening (hearing) and reading are instances of language perception, however speaking and writing are instances of language creation. Psycholinguistics, in specific, supports the understanding of both intrinsic and extrinsic challenges in these four skills. Psycholinguistics might as well be used towards clearing up why pupils make mistakes or errors when learning a language.

Morphological and conceptual influences on the real-time comprehension of optional plural marked sentences in Yucatec Maya.

Psycholinguistic research often focuses on Indo-European and other commonly studied major languages, while typologically diverse languages remain understudied. In this paper, we examine the morphological and conceptual influences on the real-time comprehension of optional plural-marked sentences in Yucatec Maya, an indigenous language of Mexico with a less commonly studied optional plural marking system. Fifty-one speakers of Yucatec Maya participated in a picture-sentence matching experiment carried out in the Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico. Pictures of one, two, or seven humans or animals depicting an intransitive action (conceptual number) were paired with auditorily presented sentences that had no plural marking, one plural, or two plurals (morphological number). Participants indicated by key press whether the picture and the sentence were an acceptable match, and decision time was recorded. In the analysis of decision (yes versus no) and accuracy, morphological and conceptual factors interacted. In the analysis of decision time, however, morphological plural marking, but not conceptual number, led to faster decisions. In light of previous work on the role of conceptual factors in the computation of number agreement, the interaction between conceptual and morphological factors suggests that a language with optional plural marking (or low "morphological richness") is associated with high conceptual influence on sentence comprehension. Importantly, the results of this study expand the empirical base of language types that have been investigated using psycholinguistic methods.

Psycholinguistic Approach: In the Case of Foreign Language Teaching

The article provides information about the fact that learning a foreign language with a set of methods of various disciplines is an urgent task of scientific knowledge. The study of the ability to learn foreign languages is carried out using psycholinguistic methods based on contractual forms of communication, taking into account the individual characteristics of speakers, as well as the level of their language culture, semantics and elements of speech.

Concepts of “Counsel” and “Prosecutor” as Perceived by Native Russian Speakers

The relevance of the article is determined by the deep interest of contemporary linguistics in studying language units from an anthropological perspective. Psycholinguistics, being one of such study areas, provides some tools to reveal the process of modern humans thinking and following some thought patterns. We assume that the judicial employees' professional worldview, shaped by a specific field of judiciary, and ordinary consciousness, formed under the influence of everyday life, reflects various linguistic world pictures of Russian speakers, which manifest through the images created while perceiving the same language units. Thus, the psycholinguistic method of free association seems to be the most relevant technique that makes it possible to study how the lexemes counsel and prosecutor find their expression in the linguistic consciousness of native Russian speakers. The article highlights the results of free association that represent the peculiarities of associative perception in professional, judicial and ordinary consciousness for the concepts mentioned above. The participants of the experiment were persons both with a law degree and not. The results of the experiment have shown that the lawyers professional worldview, when digesting the concepts proposed, shifts the focus to the subject area, in the images of a counsel and a prosecutor a lawyer sees their professional activity and competence. For ordinary consciousness, however, these images are connected to respondents' expectations and emotional attitude towards them, which enables to assess the connotations of these lexemes, being formed by ordinary consciousness.

Adaptation at the Syntax-Semantics Interface: Evidence From a Vernacular Structure.

Expanding on psycholinguistic research on linguistic adaptation, the phenomenon whereby speakers change how they comprehend or produce structures as a result of cumulative exposure to less frequent or unfamiliar linguistic structures, this study asked whether speakers can learn semantic and syntactic properties of the American English vernacular negative auxiliary inversion (NAI) structure (e.g., didn't everybody eat, meaning "not everybody ate") during the course of an experiment. Formal theoretical analyses of NAI informed the design of a task in which American English-speaking participants unfamiliar with this structure were exposed to NAI sentences in either semantically ambiguous or unambiguous contexts. Participants rapidly adapted to the interpretive properties of NAI, selecting responses similar to what would be expected of a native speaker after only limited exposure to semantically ambiguous input. On a separate ratings task, participants displayed knowledge of syntactic restrictions on NAI subject type, despite having no previous exposure. We discuss the results in the context of other experimental studies of adaptation and suggest the implementation of top-down strategies via analogy to other familiar structure types as possible explanations for the behaviors observed in this study. The study illustrates the value of integrating insights from formal theoretical research and psycholinguistic methods in research on adaptation and highlights the need for more interdisciplinary and cross-disciplinary work in both experimental and naturalistic contexts to understand this phenomenon.

STUDY OF THE RELIGIOUS COMPONENT OF LINGUISTIC CONSCIOUSNESS: THE PSYCHOLINGUISTIC ASPECT

The article notes the previously used directions in the study of religious consciousness, and also evaluates the effectiveness of psycholinguistic methods for studying the religious component of everyday linguistic consciousness (namely, an associative experiment) in comparison with sociological methods. The results of a pilot experiment are presented, in which representatives of two nationalities take part as subjects: Russians and Chinese - carriers of fundamentally different cultural and religious traditions. The recognition and perception of Christian images by representatives of two cultures are compared. The influence of the age factor on the content of the religious component of the linguistic consciousness of Russians is also analyzed.Finally, conclusions are drawn about the greater involvement of elder people in the Christian religious context and about the greater pagan affiliation of the young consciousness and the bearers of Chinese culture. The applicability of the associative experiment in the study of age and ethno-cultural characteristics of the content of linguistic consciousness is positively assessed. The results of the experiment may be relevant for researchers, translators, teachers of foreign languages, as well as theologians, specialists in religion studies and missionary catechists.

Associative-verbal network of thymological assessment in the Russian language

The article is devoted to the analysis of reactions to the important in three associative dictionaries: "SEABASS – Russian regional associative database (Siberia and the Far East)", "Russian regional associative dictionary-thesaurus EVRAS" and "Russian associative Dictionary". The research material is valid, since the associative experiment is one of the reliable methods of psycholinguistics. Reactions explicitly expressing the idea of a person are excluded from consideration in connection with their consideration in the author's previous work. The relevance of the research is connected with insufficient development of scientific ideas about the category of ‘important’ in modern Russian linguistics. The description is based on the semantic gestalt method. The author identifies and describes the semantic groups formed by the reactions under consideration. Their analysis demonstrates the structure of the world, which is built by the category of importance. This world is not elementary and simple, it is multicomponent and complex. In it, a person is a subject with the ability to actively think and create abstract objects and names for them. A thinking subject uses an evaluation scale and can choose what is important to him (T-rank) and what is not (t-rank). This is one of the tools that a person uses to control their activities. Based on these conclusions, the author comes to the conclusion about the "human dimension" of the category "important" in the Russian language.

Феномен вишиванка в мовній свідомості індійських здобувачів освіти в Україні (на матеріалі вільного асоціативного експерименту)

On the materials of the associative experiment, the linguistic consciousness of Indian students living and studying in Ukraine has been examined in the article on the example of the word vyshyvanka as a vital element of traditional national Ukrainian costume and a key symbol for Ukrainian culture and mentality. The main aim of the given research is the construction and detailed analysis of the associative field of the word vyshyvanka. The perception and interpretation of the chosen stimulus word as a phenomenon of Ukrainian culture have been investigated and described. Results of the associative experiment were given considering individual and subjective worldview of the respondents. Attention was also focused on the manifestation of individual/universal and national-cultural elements in the associative semantic structure of the chosen stimulus word. Except this, the ideas and common thoughts about the expediency and effectiveness of attempts to find out and characterize the ontological essence of how culture, i.e. extra-ordinary reality is reflected in the linguistic consciousness of representatives of a certain ethnic group were also proved, and reasoned with the help of experiments involving psycholinguistic methods of processing various fragments of linguistic pictures of the world. The need to build associative fields of the various fragments of the linguistic picture of the world not only of Ukrainians but also of representatives of other national communities that relate to Ukraine and its culture was reasoned. The close contact of Indian education seekers with national history and cultural and mental stereotypes is described as a way to contribute to the understanding of the essence and features of extra lingual cultural and historical markers of the Ukrainian nation in general. It was found that the Ukrainian world is perceived by Indian students in the form of basic concepts of the Ukrainian mentality. It is noted that lexical associations are verbal fixations of primary intentional reactions of respondents; behind them, one can see the “associative profile” of images of consciousness, which contains cognitive, axiological, and sensory knowledge of a specific ethnic group. The paper proved that the associative meaning of the vyshyvanka stimulus formed in the minds of Indian students does not contradict its lexicographic definition. It was shown that vyshyvanka is perceived as an essential attribute of traditional Ukrainian clothing and a symbol of well-being, peace, and purity.

ASSOCIATIVE EXPERIMENT AS AN EMPIRICAL METHOD OF LINGUOCOGNITIVE CONCEPTS RESEARCH

The article substantiates the expediency of using an associative experiment during the study of linguistic-cognitive concepts. It is proven that when researching concepts, one should take into account language stereotypes, features of the national mentality, which is revealed with the help of such a psycholinguistic method as an associative experiment. It is analyzed how the word-stimulus-reaction chain can determine the organization of the concept in the mind of the individual, summarize the respondents’ data and build an image of the general speaker, draw a conclusion about the place of the concept in the national mentality, compare the obtained data with the theoretical-linguistic research of the concept. Such tangential notions as word-stimulus, associations, linguistic consciousness, linguistic picture of the world, associative field, validity of the experiment are considered. The procedure of the research is systematized, which takes place with the help of statistically processed results of a mass experiment on free verbal associations, when the content and forms of the reaction to the word-stimulus are interpreted. The purpose of the associative experiment is outlined as to investigate the mental lexicon of native speakers. The types of associations were analyzed and it has been concluded that the association provides an opportunity to develop issues related to the means of knowledge storage, the processes of generation and understanding of speech, the organization of the internal lexicon and the individual’s genetic memory. Attention is focused on the shortcomings of the associative experiment, such as the formation of a list of stimulus words, their number and the number of respondents, taking into account their sociometric data, so that the associative experiment is unbiased and valid; display of associations relevant only at the time of the experiment, and as a result, representation of only a certain stage of language development of speakers of a certain territorial language variety. The importance of the associative experiment for the study of the inner mental world of a person is confirmed; to construct a network of associations in the mind of the individual and national consciousness.

On Some of Unsolved Modern Punctuation Issues

This article discusses the cases of punctuation in introductory words, adverbs and conjunctions that have not previously been described in the scientific and reference literature. Thepurpose of the study is to identify some actual problems of punctuation. We used a descriptive method, part of which is observation, and a psycholinguistic method, which includes an experiment (survey) to identify the established norm. The paper analyzes the rules contained in the most authoritative modern punctuation guides and gives recommendations to supplement them with relevant examples. The analysis of the survey results showed that difficulties in punctuation in the cases under consideration stem from an incomplete understanding of the principles of Russian punctuation among native speakers due to the lack of relevant information in the reference literature. Another conclusion we can draw as a result of the research is that the identification of new punctuation variants is associated with real speech practice. The paper concludes that the constructions that have been analyzed are used when writing texts of different styles, and therefore should be taken into account when codifying Russian punctuation and included in handbooks.

ТЕОРІЯ ПРОВОКАЦІЇ ЗА МИРОСЛАВОМ КАРВАТОМ

The article is dedicated to the contemporary problem of provocation as a popular kind of manipulating, fundamentally developed by the Polish doctor of political sciences Miroslaw Karwat in his book “Theory of provocation. In Light of Political Science". This book contains the typology of the forms and methods of provocations and their functioning in communication. The linguistic, sociolinguistic and psycholinguistic methods of analysis are used. Positive provocation is constructive, determined as challenge and is applied in flirting, games, pedagogy, family conflicts, etc. Negative provocation is destructive, targeted at forcing something out of someone. The rude forms of the verbal provocation include strong emotional expressions and may be explained after M. Karwat by the intellectual helplessness or narrow mind. Provocation influence evokes illusions, hopes, changes behavior, to unusual, e. g., brutal, accumulates crisis tendencies. Positive and negative provocations are classified into active and passive, emotional and verbal, intentional and unintentional, planned and unplanned, etc. Provocation is the kind of manipulation and when positive it can develop thinking. Deceitful manipulations may be aimed at conflict, antagonism, shocking, destroying mind, triggering emotions, etc. Constructive provocation stimulates mentality, awakens thinking and conscience of society, and reveals the provocateurs’ intentions.