Presentations

Abstract

Introduction:
Underlying spatial memory and talking about spatial layouts are common cognitive processes (Haun et al. 2005). For example, to locate an object in space it is obligatory to choose a coordinate system called frame of reference in cognition as well as in its verbal expression. Coding space within different frames of reference requires different cognitive processes (e.g. Neggers et al. 2005). In relative frames of reference the origin of the coordinate system is the viewpoint of a person. In intrinsic frames of reference an object is located in relation to another object (Levinson 2003). FMRI data have suggested that different frames of reference show different patterns of neural activation (Burgess et al. 2002; Committeri et al. 2004). However, the number of existing frames of reference and their neural correlates remain controversial. In an event-related fMRI study we investigated whether differential neural networks for relative and intrinsic frames of reference can be isolated.
Methods:
In the present study an implicit sentence picture matching task was used to investigate differential neural correlates for relative and intrinsic frames of reference. Twenty-eight healthy human adults (16 women, 12 men) read a sentence describing a spatial scene followed by a picture, and decided whether the sentence matches the picture or not. Feedback was given either supporting a relative or an intrinsic frame of reference. After half of the trails the feedback switched from one reference frame to the respective other reference frame (Fig.1). Participants were instructed to respond as accurately and as quickly as possible. They responded with their right hand by pressing a key with the index finger for a correct decision and a second key with the middle finger for an incorrect judgment. Two baseline tasks were included (Fig.1): a high level baseline (c5) and a low level baseline (c6).
A 3 Tesla MRI system (Siemens TRIO, Erlangen, Germany) was used to acquire functional images of the whole brain. Using a gradient-echo echo planar scanning sequence 36 axial slices were obtained for each participant (voxel-size 3 x 3 x 3 mm, TR = 2310 ms, field of view = 192, TE = 30 ms, flip angle = 75). All functional images were acquired in one run that lasted for 50 minutes. Following the acquisition of functional images a high-resolution anatomical scan (T1-weighted MP-RAGE, 176 slices) was acquired. FMRI data were analyzed using BrainVoyager QX (Brain Innovation, Maastricht, The Netherlands). Random-effects whole brain group analyses were performed. The statistical threshold at the voxel level was set at p < 0.001, uncorrected for multiple comparisons.
Results:
Intrinsic trials as compared to baseline trials revealed increased activity in the parietal lobe and in the parahippocampal gyrus. Relative as compared to baseline trails revealed a widespread network of activity. Increased activity was observed in occipitotemporal cortices, in the parietal lobe, and in frontal areas.
We focused on the direct comparison between relative and intrinsic trials. Results showed increased activity in the left parahippocampal gyrus only for intrinsic trials as compared to relative trails. An ANOVA of the averaged beta-weights with the within factors Reference frame and Condition and the between factor Block order (relative-intrinsic and intrinsic-relative), obtained for all voxels in the parahippocampal gyrus, showed no main effect of Reference frames and Condition. A significant interaction between the factors Reference frame and Condition was observed (p < 0.05). T-contrasts showed a significant effect for intrinsic (c4) as compared to relative trials (c3; p < 0.001).
Conversely, relative as compared to intrinsic trials showed strong increased activity in the left medial frontal gyrus. An ANOVA of the beta-weights in the brain area showed no main effects. A significant interaction between the factors Reference frame and Condition was observed (p < 0.05). T-contrasts showed a significant effect for intrinsic (c4) as compared to relative trials (c3, p < 0.01).
When comparing all intrinsic and relative conditions together to the baseline we observed increased activity in the right and left frontal eye fields (Fig. 2). An ANOVA of the averaged beta-weights with the within factors Reference frame and the between factor Block order obtained for all voxels in the left frontal eye fields showed a main effect of Block order (p < 0.001) and an trend effect of Reference frame (p = 0.08). An ANOVA of the averaged beta-weights for all voxels in the right frontal eye fields showed a main effect of Block order (p < 0.05) only.
Conclusions:
Using a sentence-picture matching task, we investigated whether differential neural correlates for intrinsic and relative frames of reference can be isolated. Intrinsic trials compared to relative trials showed increased activity in the parahippocampal gyrus whereas relative trails compared to intrinsic trials revealed increased neural activity in the frontal and parietal lobe. Both frames of reference together compared to a baseline show increased activity in the frontal eye fields which was stronger for the second block. This could be related to switching of reference frames (Wallentin et al. 2008). The present results confirm studies which report the parietal lobe to be involved in relative coding (Cohen & Andersen 2002). The neural correlates of intrinsic frames of reference were previously less well investigated. The present results show differential neural networks for both frames of reference that are crucial to spatial language.
References:
Burgess, N. (2002), 'The human hippocampus and spatial and episodic memory', Neuron, vol. 36, pp. 625-641.
Cohen, Y. (2002), 'A common reference frame for movement plans in the posterior parietal cortex', Nature Reviews Neuroscience, vol. 3, pp. 553-562.
Committeri, G. (2004), 'Reference frames for spatial cognition: Different brain areas are involved in viewer-, object-, and landmark centered judgments about object location', Cognitive Neuroscience, vol. 16, pp. 1517-1535.
Haun, D. (2005), 'Bias in spatial memory: a categorical endorsement', Acta Psychologia, vol. 118, pp. 149-170.
Levinson, S. (2003), 'Space in language and cognition: Explorations in cognitive diversity', Cambridge: CUP.
Neggers, S. (2005), 'Quantifing the interactions between allo- and egocentric representation of space', Acta Psychologia, vol. 118, pp. 25-45.
Wallentin, M. (2008), 'Frontal eye fields involved in shifting frames of reference within working memory for scenes', Neuropsychologia, vol. 46, pp. 399-408.

Abstract

Action in interaction Since the core matrix for language use is interaction, the main job of language is not to express propositions or abstract meanings, but to deliver actions. For in order to respond in interaction we have to ascribe to the prior turn a primary ‘action’ – variously thought of as an ‘illocution’, ‘speech act’, ‘move’, etc. – to which we then respond. The analysis of interaction also relies heavily on attributing actions to turns, so that, e.g., sequences can be characterized in terms of actions and responses. Yet the process of action ascription remains way understudied. We don’t know much about how it is done, when it is done, nor even what kind of inventory of possible actions might exist, or the degree to which they are culturally variable. The study of action ascription remains perhaps the primary unfulfilled task in the study of language use, and it needs to be tackled from conversationanalytic,psycholinguistic, cross-linguistic and anthropological perspectives. In this talk I try to take stock of what we know, and derive a set of goals for and constraints on an adequate theory. Such a theory is likely to employ, I will suggest, a top-down plus bottom-up account of action perception, and a multi-level notion of action which may resolve some of the puzzles that have repeatedly arisen.

Abstract

Linguistic diversity and the 'interaction engine'. In this lecture I argue that our new insights into linguistic diversity require a rethink about the foundations of language. In the first part of the lecture, I outline why strong theories of language universals now look untenable. Combining typological and phylogenetic data suggests that languages are largely structured by cultural evolution, rather than a specific ‘language instinct’. In the second part, I turn to the implications: What then is the nature of the human endowment for language? I argue that there is a substantial infrastructure for language, which is distinct from language itself, and strongly universal, the ‘interaction engine’ of the title. The infrastructure involves speech capacities of course (vocal learning, vocal apparatus), intention-recognition systems (the pragmatics of Gricean meaningnn), and ethological properties of communicative interaction (turn-taking, structured interaction sequences, multimodal signals, etc.). A working hypothesis is that this base, together with general (non-language-specialized) properties of human cognition, provides enough foundation for infants to bootstrap into their local cultural linguistic tradition.

Abstract

The language sciences are about to undergo dramatic changes. The cognitive sciences have taken their object of enquiry to be the characterization of The Human Mind, and the language sciences have focused on the characterization of The Language Instinct, or Universal Grammar. This abstraction away from variation and diversity is now significantly inhibiting research – after all, diversity at all levels is a unique feature of our communication system compared to all other species. Further, the universals which have been the goal of linguistic research have evaporated in the face of increasing information about linguistic diversity and language change. The alternative Darwinian paradigm embraces the new facts about cognitive and linguistic diversity, viewing variation as the fuel for evolution, and adopts a diachronic perspective in which we can ask about the relative roles of biological and cultural evolution and their interaction. New findings suggest that language diversity is largely a product of cultural evolution under the constraints of general cognitive capacities rather than being tightly constrained by either Universal Grammar or Greenbergian universals.

Abstract

How are the senses structured by the languages we speak, the cultures we inhabit? To what extent is the encoding of perceptual experiences in languages a matter of how the mind/brain is “wired-up” and to what extent is it a question of local cultural preoccupation? The “Language of Perception” project tests the hypothesis that some perceptual domains may be more “ineffable” – i.e. difficult or impossible to put into words – than others. While cognitive scientists have assumed that proximate senses (olfaction, taste, touch) are more ineffable than distal senses (vision, hearing), anthropologists have illustrated the exquisite variation and elaboration the senses achieve in different cultural milieus. The project is designed to test whether the proximate senses are universally ineffable – suggesting an architectural constraint on cognition – or whether they are just accidentally so in Indo-European languages, so expanding the role of cultural interests and preoccupations. To address this question, a standardized set of stimuli of color patches, geometric shapes, simple sounds, tactile textures, smells and tastes have been used to elicit descriptions from speakers of more than twenty languages—including three sign languages. The languages are typologically, genetically and geographically diverse, representing a wide-range of cultures. The communities sampled vary in subsistence modes (hunter-gatherer to industrial), ecological zones (rainforest jungle to desert), dwelling types (rural and urban), and various other parameters. We examine how codable the different sensory modalities are by comparing how consistent speakers are in how they describe the materials in each modality. Our current analyses suggest that taste may, in fact, be the most codable sensorial domain across languages, followed closely by visual phenomena, such as colour and shape. Olfaction appears to be the least codable across cultures. Nevertheless, we have identified exquisite elaboration in the olfactory domains in some cultural settings, contrary to some contemporary predictions within the cognitive sciences. These results suggest that differential codability may be at least partly the result of cultural preoccupation. This shows that the senses are not just physiological phenomena but are constructed through linguistic, cultural and social practices.

Abstract

How are the senses structured by the languages we speak, the cultures we inhabit? To what extent is the encoding of perceptual experiences in languages a matter of how the mind/brain is ―wired-up‖ and to what extent is it a question of local cultural preoccupation? The ―Language of Perception‖ project tests the hypothesis that some perceptual domains may be more ―ineffable‖ – i.e. difficult or impossible to put into words – than others. While cognitive scientists have assumed that proximate senses (olfaction, taste, touch) are more ineffable than distal senses (vision, hearing), anthropologists have illustrated the exquisite variation and elaboration the senses achieve in different cultural milieus. The project is designed to test whether the proximate senses are universally ineffable – suggesting an architectural constraint on cognition – or whether they are just accidentally so in Indo-European languages, so expanding the role of cultural interests and preoccupations. To address this question, a standardized set of stimuli of color patches, geometric shapes, simple sounds, tactile textures, smells and tastes have been used to elicit descriptions from speakers of more than twenty languages—including three sign languages. The languages are typologically, genetically and geographically diverse, representing a wide-range of cultures. The communities sampled vary in subsistence modes (hunter-gatherer to industrial), ecological zones (rainforest jungle to desert), dwelling types (rural and urban), and various other parameters. We examine how codable the different sensory modalities are by comparing how consistent speakers are in how they describe the materials in each modality. Our current analyses suggest that taste may, in fact, be the most codable sensorial domain across languages. Moreover, we have identified exquisite elaboration in the olfactory domains in some cultural settings, contrary to some contemporary predictions within the cognitive sciences. These results suggest that differential codability may be at least partly the result of cultural preoccupation. This shows that the senses are not just physiological phenomena but are constructed through linguistic, cultural and social practices.