Skip to content Skip to navigation
University of Warwick
  • Study
  • |
  • Research
  • |
  • Business
  • |
  • Alumni
  • |
  • News
  • |
  • About

University of Warwick
Publications service & WRAP

Highlight your research

  • WRAP
    • Home
    • Search WRAP
    • Browse by Warwick Author
    • Browse WRAP by Year
    • Browse WRAP by Subject
    • Browse WRAP by Department
    • Browse WRAP by Funder
    • Browse Theses by Department
  • Publications Service
    • Home
    • Search Publications Service
    • Browse by Warwick Author
    • Browse Publications service by Year
    • Browse Publications service by Subject
    • Browse Publications service by Department
    • Browse Publications service by Funder
  • Help & Advice
University of Warwick

The Library

  • Login
  • Admin

Recent evolution of learnability in American English from 1800 to 2000

Tools
- Tools
+ Tools

Hills, Thomas Trenholm and Adelman, James S. (2015) Recent evolution of learnability in American English from 1800 to 2000. Cognition, 143 . pp. 87-92. doi:10.1016/j.cognition.2015.06.009

Research output not available from this repository, contact author.
Official URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2015.06.009

Request Changes to record.

Abstract

Concreteness—the psycholinguistic property of referring to a perceptible entity—enhances processing speed, comprehension, and memory. These represent selective filters for cognition likely to influence language evolution in competitive language environments. Taking a culturomics approach, we use multiple language corpora representing more than 350 billion words combined with concreteness norms for over 40,000 English words and demonstrate a systematic rise in concrete language in American English over the last 200 years, both within and across word classes (nouns, verbs, and prepositions). Comparisons between new and old concreteness norms indicate this is not explained by semantic bleaching, but we find some evidence that the rise is related to changes in population demographics and may be associated with increasing numbers of second language learners or attention economics in response to crowding in the language market. We also examine the influence of gender and literacy. In sum, we demonstrate evolution in the psycholinguistic structure of American English, with a well-established impact on cognitive processing, which is likely to permeate modern language use.

Item Type: Journal Article
Subjects: P Language and Literature > P Philology. Linguistics
Divisions: Faculty of Science > Psychology
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH): Historical linguistics, English language -- United States
Journal or Publication Title: Cognition
Publisher: Elsevier
ISSN: 0010-0277
Official Date: 15 October 2015
Dates:
DateEvent
15 October 2015Published
24 June 2015Available
19 June 2015Accepted
23 February 2015Submitted
Volume: 143
Page Range: pp. 87-92
DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2015.06.009
Status: Peer Reviewed
Publication Status: Published
Access rights to Published version: Restricted or Subscription Access

Request changes or add full text files to a record

Repository staff actions (login required)

View Item View Item
twitter

Email us: wrap@warwick.ac.uk
Contact Details
About Us