The mutual roles of action representations and spatial deictics in French language

Abstract

Many aspects of language associated with an object's noun inform about the location of the object the noun refers to, in relation to the action system. In the present study, we tested whether the determiners la (the) and cette (that) in French language carry embodied spatial information. In Experiment 1, participants performed a reachability judgement task after having evaluated the correct spelling of both a determiner (la or cette) and an object-noun (balle–ball, tasse–cup, or pomme–apple). We found that response time for judging reachability was shorter when the determiner la rather than cette was previously presented. The opposite pattern of results was observed with unreachable objects. Furthermore, the boundary of reachable space was perceived further away when the determiner la rather than cette was previously presented. In Experiment 2, we evaluated whether watching a reachable or unreachable object influenced the subsequent spelling judgement task of a determiner (la or cette) and a noun (balle, tasse, or pomme). Results showed that reachable space was wider, and reachability estimates were faster, when judging reachability than when judging unreachability. Moreover, spelling judgements were faster when the stimulus was the determiner la rather than cette, whatever the reachability of the object presented before. Considered together, these data stress the close connection between the spatial content of determiners and the representation of action possibilities, giving some evidence for embodied language processing. By contrast, presenting an object at a reachable or an unreachable location does not seem sufficient to activate the related linguistic descriptors.

Keywords:

• Perception
• Language
• Reachability
• Spatial deictics
• Embodied cognition

Notes

¹ We have asked 53 naive participants (mean age: 22.7 years, SD = 7.4 years) to evaluate whether the determiners la and cette would, according to them, be naturally associated to the description of a near or far location of an object in space. A drawing of a table with an image of a cup at a near and far location according to the observer was presented to the participants, and they had to indicate which of the near or far cup they would consider as being related to the instruction: “prenez la tasse” (take the cup) versus “prenez cette tasse” (take that cup). Results showed that 66% of the participants chose the near cup in association to the instruction “prenez la tasse” (take the cup) and the far cup in association to the instruction “prenez cette tasse” (take that cup). This double association differed significantly from chance level (50%, p = .007).