The role of semantic transparency in the processing and representation of Dutch compounds

Zwitserlood, Pienie

doi:10.1080/01690969408402123

Cited by 240 publications

(218 citation statements)

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“…Zwitserlood (1994) was able to rule out an orthographic explanation, as she failed to find a priming effect for a letter string that was not a compound word constituent (in her orthographic prime condition of Experiment 1, the prime was a compound and the target was a word or a pseudoword; kerstfeest kers). The masked priming study of Longtin, Segui, and Hallé (2003) observed a priming effect of similar magnitude for semantically transparent, opaque and pseudo-derived words (not compounds), whereas no priming was obtained for orthographic controls.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…He observed a reliable priming effect in Dutch for transparent compounds (e.g., koe melkfles ¼ cow milkbottle) but not for opaque compounds (e.g., koe melkweg ¼ cow milky way). Zwitserlood (1994) used transparent and opaque Dutch compounds as primes and semantic associates of either the first or second constituent as targets (e.g., transparent: kerkorgel priester ¼ church organ priest; opaque: drankorgel bier ¼ drunkard beer). She found a semantic priming effect for transparent and partly opaque compounds but not for completely opaque compounds.…”

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confidence: 99%

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The role of semantic transparency in the processing of Finnish compound words

Pollatsek

Hyönä

2005

Language and Cognitive Processes

114

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Three experiments examined whether the semantic transparency of a long Finnish compound word has any influence on how the compound word is encoded in reading. The frequency of the first constituent (as a separate word) was manipulated, while matching for the frequencies of the compound word and of the second constituent. The effect of this frequency manipulation on encoding time served as a 'marker' that the compound word was processed, at least in part, componentially. In Experiment 1, each high-frequency transparent compound was paired with a low-frequency transparent compound, and each high-frequency opaque compound was paired with a low-frequency opaque compound. A sentence frame was created for each pair that was identical up to the word following the target word. In Experiments 2 and 3, the matching was done between transparent and opaque word pairs. In addition, Experiment 3 had a display change manipulation in which most of the second constituent was not visible until it was fixated. Readers' eye fixation patterns on and immediately after the target word were examined. Reliable first constituent frequency effects were observed in the fixation duration measures on the target word, but there were no effects of transparency. In addition, a comparison of the display change condition to the standard condition indicated that the constituents of the compound word were processed sequentially. It thus appears that the Correspondence should be addressed to:

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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confidence: 99%

The role of semantic transparency in the processing of Finnish compound words

Pollatsek

Hyönä

2005

Language and Cognitive Processes

114

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“…One might instead expand compound-processing theories that include decomposition of the compound into its constituents (e.g., Libben, 1998;Libben, Gibson, Yoon, & Sandra 2003;Zwitserlood, 1994) by assuming that compounds are stored in the mental lexicon in such a way that compounds that share first constituents and relations are more likely to benefit from the spread of activation from the prime (see Gagné & Spalding, 2006, for a brief discussion). For example, processing the prime snowfort might activate other compounds that include snow as a modifier and that use the MADE OF relation, as compared to those that use the FOR relation.…”

Section: Processing Established Compoundsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Relation priming in established compounds: facilitation?

Spalding

Gagné

2011

Mem Cogn

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Gagné and Spalding (Brain and Language, 90, 478-486, 2004, Journal of Memory and Language, 60, 20-35, 2009) have shown that the difficulty of interpreting an established compound (e.g., snowball) can be influenced by recent exposure to a compound with the same modifier and that this influence depends on the relation linking the constituents of the compound. For example, snowball (a ball made of snow) was processed more quickly following snowfort (a fort made of snow; same relation) than following snowshovel (a shovel for snow; different relation). In three experiments, we investigated the basis of this relation-priming effect. The results indicated that the relation-priming effect in established compounds is due to slower processing in the different-relation condition rather than to faster processing in the same-relation condition. These results pose a challenge for most models of compound-word processing. Keywords Compounds . Complex words . Conceptual combination . Noun-noun phrasesConsider an established (familiar) compound such as teacup. A speaker using the compound before it became a word in the language would have needed to combine the concepts tea and cup to express the meaning a cup for tea. Furthermore, people hearing teacup for the first time are likely to be able to understand it if they know the concepts corresponding to the words tea and cup. In either case, the speaker or hearer must combine the constituent concepts in order to create a meaning for the compound. For this reason, the conceptual combination process is important in the initial development of compound words and continues to be important for the understanding of compounds that are new to the hearer.During the conceptual combination process, the interpretation often makes use of a relation to link the concepts, such as noun-FOR-modifier in the example of teacup above. The relation, though not overtly expressed in the compound, has important implications for the meaning of the phrase: a cup for tea is quite different from a cup made of tea or a cup that causes tea or a cup that is caused by tea, and so on. Thus, the interpretation of the compound includes the relation as well as the meanings of the constituent words (see Pelletier, 2003, for a related philosophical argument). Linguists interested in how compounds are interpreted have developed several similar classification schemes for the relations that link the constituents of compounds (e.g., Downing, 1977;Levi, 1978;Warren, 1978).A number of studies have shown that such relations influence the processing of novel compounds (Devereux, Maguire, Costello, & Cater 2006;Estes & Jones, 2006;Gagné, 2001Gagné, , 2002Gagné & Shoben, 1997Gagné & Spalding, 2006;Gagné, Spalding, Figueredo, & Mullaly 2009;Gagné, Spalding, & Ji 2005b;Jones, Estes, & Marsh 2008;Maguire & Cater, 2004;Maguire, Devereux, Costello, & Cater 2007;Ramey, 2005;, 2008Spalding, Gagné, Mullaly, & Ji 2010;Storms & Wisniewski, 2005). For example, effects of such relations were demonstrated in a relation-priming paradi...

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“…Semantically transparent compounds such as snowball fight are usually distinguished from semantically opaque compounds, which are not related to the meaning of their constituting morphemes (e.g. deadline keeping : Sandra 1990;Zwitserlood 1994). …”

Section: Accessing Morphologically Complex Formsmentioning

confidence: 99%