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Key research themes
1. How is grammatical number represented and processed in the mental lexicon?
This theme focuses on understanding the representation of grammatical number (singular, plural) within the mental lexicon’s syntactic and morphological architecture, especially as it relates to lemma selection and speech production processes. It probes how number agreement is encoded and retrieved during language use, including the storage and processing of regular and irregular plural forms.
Key finding: This work synthesizes contemporary psycholinguistic findings supporting the theory that grammatical number is stored as a syntactic feature with lemmas in the mental lexicon, activated competitively during speech production.... Read more
2. What role does executive function and cognitive control play in lexical selection and access within the mental lexicon?
Research under this theme investigates how higher-order cognitive control processes, including executive functions like working memory, cognitive flexibility, and inhibition, modulate lexical access and selection in the mental lexicon. It explores how task complexity influences naming accuracy and retrieval, providing insights into the interplay between semantic activation and controlled processing during lexical retrieval.
Key finding: This study empirically demonstrates that lexical retrieval tasks with increasing cognitive control demands (e.g., naming category coordinates, derivatives, superordinates) exhibit differential error rates, indicating that... Read more
3. How can graph theory and network science advance our understanding of morphological representation and processing of complex words in the mental lexicon?
This theme evaluates computational approaches that reconceptualize morphological structure as emergent from network relations among lexical items. By applying shortest path analyses in graph-based lexical networks, this research aims at explaining how complex words are segmented, learned, stored, and processed, moving beyond morpheme-based and rule-based approaches to a usage-based, connectionist view of morphology.
Key finding: The paper introduces a computational model that represents complex words as shortest paths within a morphological network, demonstrating that attested English complex words tend to align with these shortest paths.... Read more
4. What is the role of orthographic representation within the mental lexicon and its implications for second language acquisition?
This research area targets the orthographic subcomponent of the mental lexicon, focusing on how written word forms are structured, stored, and accessed. It investigates the relationship between orthography and other linguistic dimensions like phonology and semantics, and considers how orthographic knowledge develops in both first and second language contexts. The theme also discusses pedagogical strategies for leveraging orthographic awareness to enhance literacy and vocabulary acquisition in L2 learners.
Key finding: The review synthesizes evidence that orthographic representations form an integral but understudied component of the mental lexicon alongside phonological and morphological aspects. It finds that orthographic knowledge... Read more
5. How do lexical priming and polyvalence influence the structuring and activation of words in the mental lexicon?
This theme addresses the usage-based mechanisms underlying lexical representation by examining how words are primed through collocations, colligations, and semantic associations. It explores how polysemy and contextual variability shape unique priming patterns that affect word sense disambiguation and linguistic creativity, suggesting that lexical knowledge is dynamic and highly context-sensitive rather than fixed within static entries.
Key finding: The research articulates a new theoretical framework positing that the mental lexicon is organized via lexical primings derived from real-world usage rather than abstract dictionary definitions. Specific findings include that... Read more