The role of affordances in visually situated language comprehension
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Craig Chambers
Abstract
Affordances are potentiations for bodily action that are routinely evaluated in the course of perception. For example, the physical features of bricks, lamps, and pillows provide salient cues about the actions a perceiver could likely perform with those objects. In visually situated contexts, affordances can provide a potentially useful source of information for aspects of language comprehension. This chapter begins by reviewing various perspectives on affordances as well as issues regarding their computation. Of particular relevance is how the information provided by affordances differs from linguistically- or conceptually-encoded links between objects and actions, such as selectional restrictions or semantic associations. The chapter then describes various ways in which affordances influence visually situated language comprehension, using examples from different levels of linguistic processing. The remainder of the chapter considers whether language comprehension reflects the influence of “genuine” affordances or instead a system in which information about the idiosyncratic features of perceptible objects is combined with (and often controlled by) linguistic and cognitive constraints.
Abstract
Affordances are potentiations for bodily action that are routinely evaluated in the course of perception. For example, the physical features of bricks, lamps, and pillows provide salient cues about the actions a perceiver could likely perform with those objects. In visually situated contexts, affordances can provide a potentially useful source of information for aspects of language comprehension. This chapter begins by reviewing various perspectives on affordances as well as issues regarding their computation. Of particular relevance is how the information provided by affordances differs from linguistically- or conceptually-encoded links between objects and actions, such as selectional restrictions or semantic associations. The chapter then describes various ways in which affordances influence visually situated language comprehension, using examples from different levels of linguistic processing. The remainder of the chapter considers whether language comprehension reflects the influence of “genuine” affordances or instead a system in which information about the idiosyncratic features of perceptible objects is combined with (and often controlled by) linguistic and cognitive constraints.
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Preface vii
- Towards a situated view of language 1
- Perception of the visual environment 31
- Attention and eye movement metrics in visual world eye tracking 67
- The role of syntax in sentence and referential processing 83
- Reaching sentence and reference meaning 127
- Discourse level processing 151
- Figurative language processing 185
- The role of affordances in visually situated language comprehension 205
- Characterising visual context effects 227
- Visual world studies of conversational perspective taking 261
- Visual environment and interlocutors in situated dialogue 291
- Coordinating action and language 323
- Index 357
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Preface vii
- Towards a situated view of language 1
- Perception of the visual environment 31
- Attention and eye movement metrics in visual world eye tracking 67
- The role of syntax in sentence and referential processing 83
- Reaching sentence and reference meaning 127
- Discourse level processing 151
- Figurative language processing 185
- The role of affordances in visually situated language comprehension 205
- Characterising visual context effects 227
- Visual world studies of conversational perspective taking 261
- Visual environment and interlocutors in situated dialogue 291
- Coordinating action and language 323
- Index 357
