Evidence map›Paper›PMID 33822802›Full record

ArticlePloS one2021

Analysis of English free association network reveals mechanisms of efficient solution of Remote Association Tests.

Olga Valba, Alexander Gorsky, Sergei Nechaev, Mikhail Tamm

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in PloS one, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
3citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

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2 · The registry

The trial behind it

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3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

3 citing papers in PubMed.

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4 · The record

Corrections and comments

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5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

4 authors.

Olga ValbaDepartment of Applied Mathematics, MIEM, National Research University Higher School of Economics, Moscow, Russia.ORCID 0000-0003-0830-0166
Alexander GorskyKharkevich Institute for Information Transmission Problems RAS, Moscow, Russia.
Sergei NechaevInterdisciplinary Scientific Center Poncelet (IRL 2615, CNRS), Moscow, Russia.
Mikhail TammDepartment of Applied Mathematics, MIEM, National Research University Higher School of Economics, Moscow, Russia.

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

We study correlations between the structure and properties of a free association network of the English language, and solutions of psycholinguistic Remote Association Tests (RATs). We show that average hardness of individual RATs is largely determined by relative positions of test words (stimuli and response) on the free association network. We argue that the solution of RATs can be interpreted as a first passage search problem on a network whose vertices are words and links are associations between words. We propose different heuristic search algorithms and demonstrate that in "easily-solving" RATs (those that are solved in 15 seconds by more than 64% subjects) the solution is governed by "strong" network links (i.e. strong associations) directly connecting stimuli and response, and thus the efficient strategy consist in activating such strong links. In turn, the most efficient mechanism of solving medium and hard RATs consists of preferentially following sequence of "moderately weak" associations.

Indexed as

AlgorithmsHumansLanguageLanguage TestsPsycholinguisticsWord Association Tests

Identifiers

PMID33822802
PMCPMC8023469

What OpenQuestion holds

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LicenceCC BY
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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.