Perspective adoption in language comprehension: Developmental, cross-cultural, and cross-language aspects

2023 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 21K12989
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Early-Career Scientists
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Review Section: Basic Section 02060:Linguistics-related
• Research Institution: Niigata Seiryou University
• Principal Investigator: Niikuni Keiyu 新潟青陵大学, 福祉心理子ども学部, 准教授 (60770500)
• Project Period (FY): 2021-04-01 – 2024-03-31
• Keywords: 言語理解 / メンタルシミュレーション / 視点取得 / 個人差 / 発達段階

Outline of Final Research Achievements

Previous psycholinguistic studies have shown that, in comprehending language, readers and listeners mentally simulate the action event described in a sentence from a particular perspective, such as an agent or observer. This study explored whether and how inter-individual factors, such as developmental stage, native language, and relevant psychological traits, are associated with preferences for perspective adoption in language comprehension. The main contribution of this study is the revelation that individual differences in the sense of agency and cognitive empathy predict preferences in perspective adoption. Moreover, it was revealed that, unlike adults, children prefer an agent perspective to an observer perspective and are unlikely to use contextual information for perspective selection. A future direction is to clarify the developmental changes in perspective preferences and other aspects of mental simulation in language comprehension in detail.

Free Research Field

心理言語学、認知心理学

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

本研究においてとりわけ意義の大きかった成果としては、言語理解中のメンタルシミュレーションにおける視点取得の選好性が、発達段階によって異なっていることを明らかにできたことを挙げたい。この成果から、視点取得の様式は言語理解能力の発達と関連して変化している可能性を指摘することができ、今後本成果を発展させ言語理解に際するメンタルシミュレーションの発達変化の全体像を明らかにできれば、これまでにない新たなアプローチによる言語発達支援方法の開発につなげることができると考えている。