What Affects the Processing of Abstract and Concrete Words?
Open Access
- Author:
- Schaub, Krisanne
- Area of Honors:
- Communication Sciences and Disorders
- Degree:
- Bachelor of Science
- Document Type:
- Thesis
- Thesis Supervisors:
- Dr. Chaleece Wyatt Sandberg, Thesis Supervisor
Dr. Carol Anne Miller, Thesis Honors Advisor - Keywords:
- Semantic Processing
abstract words
concrete words
demographic variables
EEG - Abstract:
- Researchers have found that there is a difference in semantic processing of concrete and abstract words, which has helped to create therapy techniques for individuals who have difficulty with word retrieval. However, individual differences, such as demographic variables, may be important to understand when examining different aspects of language processing. This study examined the demographic variables of participants in relation to the event related potentials (ERPs) in response to abstract and concrete words during a lexical decision task. The demographic variables analyzed were: age, education, and the five domains of the Cognitive Linguistic Quick Test (CLQT). Overall, the regressions were not significant, therefore the demographic variables of the individuals were not predictive of abstract and concrete word processing. However, there were interesting trends. When age is plotted against the difference in latency between abstract and concrete words, as age increases the latency difference in the Pz electrode increases. However, this trend is only seen up to 50 years in age. A significant correlation between age and education were found indicating that the older individuals in the study are well educated. The regression coefficients suggest that independent variables such as language ability, level of education, and attention may play a role in the N400 peaks. Further research needs to be conducted to make any conclusions about the effect of demographic variables on abstract and concrete word processing. More sophisticated statistical models could reveal significant patterns that cannot be captured by the simple regression models used in this study.