•Journal•ISSN: 1598-2327
The Journal of Cognitive Science
Institute for Cognitive Science
About: The Journal of Cognitive Science is an academic journal. The journal publishes majorly in the area(s): Cognitive science of religion & Cognition. Over the lifetime, 582 publications have been published receiving 2570 citations.
Papers published on a yearly basis
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TL;DR: The findings-that average dependency distance has a tendency to be minimized in human language and that there is a threshold of less than 3 words in average dependencydistance and grammar plays an important role in constraining distance-support all three hypotheses, although some questions are still open for further research.
Abstract: Linguistic complexity is a measure of the cognitive difficulty of human language processing. The present paper proposes dependency distance, in the framework of dependency grammar, as an insightful metric of complexity. Three hypotheses are formulated: (1) The human language parser prefers linear orders that minimize the average dependency distance of the recognized sentence (2) There is a threshold that the average dependency distance of most sentences or texts of human languages does not exceed (3) Grammar and cognition combine to keep dependency distance within the threshold. Twenty corpora from different languages with dependency syntactic annotation are used to test these hypotheses. The paper reports the average dependency distance in these corpora and analyzes the factors which influence dependency distance. The findings-that average dependency distance has a tendency to be minimized in human language and that there is a threshold of less than 3 words in average dependency distance and grammar plays an important role in constraining distance-support all three hypotheses, although some questions are still open for further research.
229 citations
TL;DR: A systematic framework is developed that addresses questions about computation, and advocates a kind of minimal computationalism, compatible with a very wide variety of empirical approaches to the mind, which allows computation to serve as a true foundation for cognitive science.
Abstract: Computation is central to the foundations of modern cognitive science, but its role is controversial. Questions about computation abound: What is it for a physical system to implement a computation? Is computation sufficient for thought? What is the role of computation in a theory of cognition? What is the relation between different sorts of computational theory, such as connectionism and symbolic computation? In this paper I develop a systematic framework that addresses all of these questions. Justifying the role of computation requires analysis of implementation, the nexus between abstract computations and concrete physical systems. I give such an analysis, based on the idea that a system implements a computation if the causal structure of the system mirrors the formal structure of the computation. This account can be used to justify the central commitments of artificial intelligence and computational cognitive science: the thesis of computational sufficiency, which holds that the right kind of computational structure suffices for the possession of a mind, and the thesis of computational explanation, which holds that computation provides a general framework for the explanation of cognitive processes. The theses are consequences of the facts that (a) computation can specify general patterns of causal organization, and (b) mentality is an organizational invariant, rooted in such patterns. Along the way I answer various challenges to the computationalist position, such as those put forward by Searle. I close by advocating a kind of minimal computationalism, compatible with a very wide variety of empirical approaches to the mind. This allows computation to serve as a true foundation for cognitive science.
197 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the relation between methods of lexical representation involving decomposition and the theory of types as used in linguistics and programming semantics is explored, and two major approaches to lexical decomposition in grammar, what they call parametric and predicative strategies, are identified.
Abstract: In this chapter, I explore the relation between methods of lexical representation involving decomposition and the theory of types as used in linguistics and programming semantics. I identify two major approaches to lexical decomposition in grammar, what I call parametric and predicative strategies. I demonstrate how expressions formed with one technique can be translated into expressions of the other. I then discuss argument selection within a type theoretic approach to semantics, and show how the predicative approach to decomposition can be modeled within a type theory with richer selectional mechanisms. In particular, I show how classic Generative Lexicon representations and operations can be viewed in terms of types and selection.
102 citations
Journal Article•
TL;DR: In two studies, it is demonstrated that people draw analogical correspondences based on matches in conceptual relations, rather than on purely structural graph matches; and, second, that peopleDraw analogical inferences between passages that have matching conceptual Relations, but not between passages with purely structuralgraph matches.
Abstract: There is general agreement that structural similarity — a match in relational structure — is crucial in analogical processing. However, theories differ in their definitions of structural similarity: in particular, in whether there must be conceptual similarity between the relations in the two domains or whether parallel graph structure is sufficient. In two studies, we demonstrate, first, that people draw analogical correspondences based on matches in conceptual relations, rather than on purely structural graph matches; and, second, that people draw analogical inferences between passages that have matching conceptual relations, but not between passages with purely structural graph matches.
74 citations
TL;DR: The Assessment Battery for Communication (ABaCo) as discussed by the authors is a clinical instrument for the evaluation of communicative abilities in patients with neuropsychological and psychiatric disorders, such as aphasia, right hemispheric damage, closed head injury, autism and schizophrenia.
Abstract: The Assessment Battery for Communication (ABaCo) is a new clinical instrument for the evaluation of communicative abilities in patients with neuropsychological and psychiatric disorders, such as aphasia, right hemispheric damage, closed head injury, autism and schizophrenia. ABaCo consists of 5 scales, investigating comprehension and production of linguistic and extralinguistic acts, paralinguistic expressions, appropriateness with respect to discourse and social norms, and management of conversation. Validity measures (content and construct validity) and reliability measures (inter-rater reliability and internal consistency) were computed. The experts’ content validity evaluations indicate an excellent match between test items and the measurement of pragmatic abilities, as well as the suitability of the battery for both children and adults. Regarding the other psychometric measures, computed on 390 normal children in different age groups, factor analysis shows the validity of the underlying theoretical construct. Reliability analyses show a high inter-rater agreement, suggesting that the battery can be administered and scored by any trained judge, and a good internal consistency, suggesting that the various items that make up each scale are coherent and contribute to the measurement of communicative abilities.
64 citations