Talking About the Absent and the Abstract: Referential Communication in Language and Gesture.

IF 10.5 1区心理学 Q1 PSYCHOLOGY, MULTIDISCIPLINARY Perspectives on Psychological Science Pub Date : 2024-11-01 Epub Date: 2023-08-21 DOI:10.1177/17456916231180589

Elena Luchkina, Sandra Waxman

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Abstract

Human language permits us to call to mind objects, events, and ideas that we cannot witness directly, either because they are absent or because they have no physical form (e.g., people we have not met, concepts like justice). What enables language to transmit such knowledge? We propose that a referential link between words, referents, and mental representations of those referents is key. This link enables us to form, access, and modify mental representations even when the referents themselves are absent ("absent reference"). In this review we consider the developmental and evolutionary origins of absent reference, integrating previously disparate literatures on absent reference in language and gesture in very young humans and gesture in nonhuman primates. We first evaluate when and how infants acquire absent reference during the process of language acquisition. With this as a foundation, we consider the evidence for absent reference in gesture in infants and in nonhuman primates. Finally, having woven these literatures together, we highlight new lines of research that promise to sharpen our understanding of the development of reference and its role in learning about the absent and the abstract.

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谈论缺席者和摘要：语言和手势中的参照交流。

人类语言使我们能够唤起那些我们无法直接目睹的对象、事件和观念，或者因为它们不存在，或者因为它们没有物理形式（例如，我们没有见过的人、像正义这样的概念）。是什么让语言能够传递这些知识呢？我们认为，词语、参照物和这些参照物的心理表征之间的参照联系是关键所在。这种联系使我们能够形成、访问和修改心理表征，即使参照物本身并不存在（"缺失参照"）。在这篇综述中，我们考虑了缺失参照的发展和进化起源，整合了以前关于幼年人类语言和手势中的缺失参照以及非人灵长类动物手势中的缺失参照的不同文献。我们首先评估了婴儿在语言习得过程中何时以及如何获得缺失参照。在此基础上，我们考虑了婴儿和非人灵长类动物手势中缺失参照的证据。最后，在将这些文献交织在一起后，我们强调了新的研究方向，这些方向有望加深我们对参照的发展及其在学习无参照和抽象概念中的作用的理解。

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来源期刊

Perspectives on Psychological Science PSYCHOLOGY, MULTIDISCIPLINARY-

CiteScore

22.70

自引率

4.00%

发文量

111

期刊介绍： Perspectives on Psychological Science is a journal that publishes a diverse range of articles and reports in the field of psychology. The journal includes broad integrative reviews, overviews of research programs, meta-analyses, theoretical statements, book reviews, and articles on various topics such as the philosophy of science and opinion pieces about major issues in the field. It also features autobiographical reflections of senior members of the field, occasional humorous essays and sketches, and even has a section for invited and submitted articles. The impact of the journal can be seen through the reverberation of a 2009 article on correlative analyses commonly used in neuroimaging studies, which still influences the field. Additionally, a recent special issue of Perspectives, featuring prominent researchers discussing the "Next Big Questions in Psychology," is shaping the future trajectory of the discipline. Perspectives on Psychological Science provides metrics that showcase the performance of the journal. However, the Association for Psychological Science, of which the journal is a signatory of DORA, recommends against using journal-based metrics for assessing individual scientist contributions, such as for hiring, promotion, or funding decisions. Therefore, the metrics provided by Perspectives on Psychological Science should only be used by those interested in evaluating the journal itself.