Using Network Science to Understand the Mental Lexicon
Network science approaches are increasingly used in the study of human cognition. Depicting cognitive systems, such as semantic memory or the mental lexicon, as a cognitive network consisting of nodes and edges permits the application of a suite of computational and quantitative tools that allows the cognitive scientist to explicitly examine the structural properties of cognitive systems and the processes that occur in those systems. In this talk, I discuss how network science approaches can address questions related to the representation of cognitive systems and the cognitive and language-related processes that necessarily occur within those systems, with a specific focus on the structure of mental lexicon, the part of long-term memory where phonological and orthographic representations are stored, and the processes related to lexical retrieval, production, and language acquisition. Using a network science framework we will examine how process and structure interact to produce observable behavioural patterns in psycholinguistic studies, and how the structure of the mental lexicon changes over time as new lexical representations are acquired.
Date: 6 November 2018, 15:00 (Tuesday, 5th week, Michaelmas 2018)
Venue: New Radcliffe House, Walton Street OX2 6NW
Venue Details: Meeting Room 20.05
Speaker: Dr Cynthia Siew (University of Warwick)
Organising department: Department of Experimental Psychology
Host: Dr Janette Chow (University of Oxford)
Part of: Department of Experimental Psychology - Language & Development Seminars
Booking required?: Not required
Audience: Members of the University only
Editor: Janice Young