ArticleJournal of memory and language2021
Sensorimotor and interoceptive dimensions in concrete and abstract concepts.
Article in Journal of memory and language, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 37 papers.
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Who cites it
37 citing papers in PubMed.
- Embodied Effects in Verb Processing and Learning: A Three-Level Meta-Analysis.Behavioral sciences (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Review
- Embodied grounding of abstract concepts: an image-based comparative analysis of sensorimotor and emotional experiences in Chinese.Cognitive processing · 2026Article
- Specificity effect in concrete/abstract semantic categorization task.Cognitive processing · 2026Article
- Sense and Mind method: an innovative methodological approach to embodied rehabilitation.Cognitive processing · 2026Review
- Emotional and Social Dimension of Abstract Concepts Meet with Interoception in Right Anterior Insula.The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience · 2026Article
- Interoceptive grounding of conceptual knowledge: new insight from an interoceptive-exteroceptive categorization task of concepts.Psychological research · 2026Article
- Validation and psychometric analysis of the Italian version of the Behavior Identification Form (BIF) in healthy adults.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Evidence of Embodiment-based changes in older Adult Language.Psychological research · 2025Review
- Abstract word dropout and cross-speaker misalignment of word concreteness are features of conversation in aging.Cortex; a journal devoted to the study of the nervous system and behavior · 2025Article
- Contrasting the organization of concrete and abstract word meanings.Psychonomic bulletin & review · 2025Article
- Digital connection, real bonding: Brief online chats boost interpersonal closeness regardless of the conversational topic.Heliyon · 2025Article
- Grounded cognition and the representation of momentum: abstract concepts modulate mislocalization.Psychological research · 2025Article
- Abstractness and social interaction through a new lens: the potentialities of hyperscanning in naturalistic settings.Frontiers in neuroscience · 2025Article
- Article
- Embodiment and gestural realization of ergative verbs.Psychological research · 2024Article
- Abstract concepts and simulated competition.Psychological research · 2024Article
- The Italian Sensorimotor Norms: Perception and action strength measures for 959 words.Behavior research methods · 2023Article
- Concrete and Abstract Concepts in Primary Progressive Aphasia and Alzheimer's Disease: A Scoping Review.Brain sciences · 2023Article
- Editorial concepts in interaction: social engagement and inner experiences.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2023Article
- Concepts, abstractness and inner speech.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2023Review
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Recent theories propose that abstract concepts, compared to concrete ones, might activate to a larger extent interoceptive, social and linguistic experiences. At the same time, recent research has underlined the importance of investigating how different sub-kinds of abstract concepts are represented. We report a pre-registered experiment, preceded by a pilot study, in which we asked participants to evaluate the difficulty of 3 kinds of concrete concepts (natural objects, tools, and food concepts) and abstract concepts (Philosophical and Spiritual concepts, PS, Physical Space Time and Quantity concepts, PSTQ, and Emotional, Mental State and Social concepts, EMSS). While rating the words, participants were assigned to different conditions designed to interfere with conceptual processing: they were required to squeeze a ball (hand motor system activation), to chew gum (mouth motor system activation), to self-estimate their heartbeats (interoception), and to perform a motor articulatory task (inner speech involvement). In a control condition they simply rated the difficulty of words. A possible interference should result in the increase of the difficulty ratings. Bayesian analyses reveal that, compared to concrete ones, abstract concepts are more grounded in interoceptive experience and concrete concepts less in linguistic experience (mouth motor system involvement), and that the experience on which different kinds of abstract and concrete concepts differs widely. For example, within abstract concepts interoception plays a major role for EMSS and PS concepts, while the ball squeezing condition interferes more for PSTQ concepts, confirming that PSTQ are the most concrete among abstract concepts, and tap into sensorimotor manual experience. Implications of the results for current theories of conceptual representation are discussed.
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