Dataset Information

Perceptual constraints on colours induce the universality of linguistic colour categorisation.

ABSTRACT: The universal linguistic colour categorisation pattern as evident in the World Colour Survey (WCS) has been a principal focus of investigations on the relationship between language and cognition, yet most existing studies have failed to clarify whether this universality resulted primarily from individual perceptual constraints and/or socio-cultural transmissions. This paper designed an agent-based, unsupervised learning model to address the relative importance of these two aspects to linguistic colour categorisation. By directly comparing with the empirical data in the WCS, our study demonstrated that: the physical colour stimuli that reflect human perceptual constraints on colours trigger a categorisation pattern quantitatively resembling the WCS data, the randomised stimuli that distort such constraints lead to distinct categorisation patterns, and the processes of linguistic categorisation in both cases follow similar dynamics. These results reveal how perceptual and socio-cultural factors interact with each other to trigger linguistic universality, and serve as decisive evidence that human perceptual constraints induce the universality in linguistic categorisation, yet socio-cultural transmissions, though imperative, play an auxiliary role of transcribing perceptual constraints into common linguistic categories with slight variations.

SUBMITTER: Gong T

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6531495 | biostudies-literature | 2019 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Perceptual constraints on colours induce the universality of linguistic colour categorisation.

Gong Tao T Gao Hangxian H Wang Zhen Z Shuai Lan L

Scientific reports 20190522 1

The universal linguistic colour categorisation pattern as evident in the World Colour Survey (WCS) has been a principal focus of investigations on the relationship between language and cognition, yet most existing studies have failed to clarify whether this universality resulted primarily from individual perceptual constraints and/or socio-cultural transmissions. This paper designed an agent-based, unsupervised learning model to address the relative importance of these two aspects to linguistic ...[more]

PMID: 31118469

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Project description:In the present study we broadly explored the perception of physical and animated motion in bouncing-like scenarios through four experiments. In the first experiment, participants were asked to categorize bouncing-like displays as physical bounce, animated motion, or other. Several parameters of the animations were manipulated, that is, the simulated coefficient of restitution, the value of simulated gravitational acceleration, the motion pattern (uniform acceleration/deceleration or constant speed) and the number of bouncing cycles. In the second experiment, a variable delay at the moment of the collision between the bouncing object and the bouncing surface was introduced. Main results show that, although observers appear to have realistic representations of physical constraints like energy conservation and gravitational acceleration/deceleration, the amount of visual information available in the scene has a strong modulation effect on the extent to which they rely on these representations. A coefficient of restitution >1 was a crucial cue to animacy in displays showing three bouncing cycles, but not in displays showing one bouncing cycle. Additionally, bouncing impressions appear to be driven by perceptual constraints that are unrelated to the physical realism of the scene, like preference for simulated gravitational attraction smaller than g and perceived temporal contiguity between the different phases of bouncing. In the third experiment, the visible opaque bouncing surface was removed from the scene, and the results showed that this did not have any substantial effect on the resulting impressions of physical bounce or animated motion, suggesting that the visual system can fill-in the scene with the missing element. The fourth experiment explored visual impressions of causality in bouncing scenarios. At odds with claims of current causal perception theories, results indicate that a passive object can be perceived as the direct cause of the motion behavior of an active object.

Dataset Information

Perceptual constraints on colours induce the universality of linguistic colour categorisation.

Publications

Perceptual constraints on colours induce the universality of linguistic colour categorisation.

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