Semantics

Question 1

Knowledge of meanings of words, phrases, and sentences

Answer 1

Semantics

Question 2

Most English words have multiple meanings - it’s hard because many meanings seem unrelated
In our everyday lives, we continuously (and quickly)….

Answer 2

…activate correct meanings

…suppress wrong meanings

Question 3

How is our mental lexicon organized?

Answer 3

Mental lexical - “mental dictionary,” our knowledge of words/morphemes
Our mental lexicon is organized by semantics (semantic relatedness) and not by phonology or orthography

Question 4

Spreading activation model (Collins & Loftus, 1975)

Answer 4

Nodes - concepts
Links - length represents relatedness (nodes are linked together) - the longer the length, the less related they are - closer = more related
Assumptions:
1. When a concept is processed, activation spreads to connected nodes
2. Activation gets weaker over distance
Evidence
Evidence
1. Semantic priming - seeing/hearing a related item helps access (Prime –> Target - people took longer to identify target with an unrelated primer; effects are very robust)