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Chapter Three - Experiential Foundations

Are Word Meanings Grounded in Modal Networks of Sensory and Motor Areas?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 February 2026

David Kemmerer
Affiliation:
Purdue University, Indiana
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Summary

Chapter 3 begins to elaborate a central theme of the book, which is that word meanings are not localized in just one part of the brain; instead, they have a widely distributed web-like layout that includes many different cortical areas and corresponding types of representation. This particular chapter focuses on the experiential (e.g., visual, auditory, and motor) features of word meanings. The key idea is that, in keeping with theories of grounded/embodied cognition, these concrete features are identical to some of the modality-specific representations that allow us to make sense of our nonlinguistic experiences involving the pertinent types of entities and events. For example, the word “scissors” denotes a kind of household tool with specifications for shape, motion, sound, and manipulation, and considerable research suggests that we store these features directly within some of the same cortical areas that are engaged when we see, hear, and use scissors. Such findings are exciting because they support the intuitive view that words are like instructions for neurally simulating experiences, albeit usually in an automatic, implicit manner. There’s still a great deal of debate, however, about the precise ways in which word meanings relate to perception and action.

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References

Further Reading

Barsalou, L. W. (2016). On staying grounded and avoiding Quixotic dead ends. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 23, 11221142.10.3758/s13423-016-1028-3CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Borghesani, V., & Piazza, M. (2017). The neuro-cognitive representations of symbols: The case of concrete words. Neuropsychologia, 105, 417.10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2017.06.026CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Calzavarini, F. (2024a). Rethinking modality-specificity in the cognitive neuroscience of concrete word meaning: A position paper. Language, Cognition, and Neuroscience, 39, 815837.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Calzavarini, F. (2024b). Rethinking modality-specificity in the cognitive neuroscience of concrete word meaning: Responses to commentators. Language, Cognition, and Neuroscience, 39, 878890.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hauk, O. (2016). What does it mean? A review of the neuroscientific evidence for embodied lexical semantics. In Hickok, G. & Small, S. (Eds.), Neurobiology of language (pp. 777788). New York, NY: Elsevier.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Meteyard, L., Cuadrado, S. R., Bahrami, B., & Vigliocco, G. (2012). Coming of age: A review of embodiment and the neuroscience of semantics. Cortex, 48, 788804.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pulvermüller, F. (2013). How neurons make meaning: Brain mechanisms for embodied and abstract-symbolic semantics. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 17, 458470.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Truman, A., & Kutas, M. (2024). Flexible conceptual representations. Cognitive Science, 48, e13475.10.1111/cogs.13475CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Yee, E., & Thompson-Schill, S. L. (2016). Putting concepts into context. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 23, 10151027.10.3758/s13423-015-0948-7CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed

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  • Experiential Foundations
  • David Kemmerer, Purdue University, Indiana
  • Book: The Neuroscience of Word Meaning
  • Online publication: 27 February 2026
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009436328.004
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  • Experiential Foundations
  • David Kemmerer, Purdue University, Indiana
  • Book: The Neuroscience of Word Meaning
  • Online publication: 27 February 2026
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009436328.004
Available formats
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Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Experiential Foundations
  • David Kemmerer, Purdue University, Indiana
  • Book: The Neuroscience of Word Meaning
  • Online publication: 27 February 2026
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009436328.004
Available formats
×