Semantic frame activation and contextual aptness of metaphorical expressions
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The study aims to explore the possibility of semantic frame activation and interaction in metaphorical expressions, and the conditions of
contextual aptness of metaphorical expressions. To ensure the
appropriate level of ecological validity, experimental stimuli have been
selected from a corpus of newspaper articles, and included in the
norming procedures. The theoretical framework includes the
investigations into context and semantic frames, semantic priming,
discourse processing, conceptual metaphor theory, and
psycholinguistic approaches to metaphor. The first four experiments
were designed to test the activation and interaction of the organizing
frames of source and target inputs in metaphorical expressions from the
conceptual keys of CONFLICT and MOTION. This included an online
priming paradigm with a categorization task, and the main dependent
variable of interest was response time (RT). Stimuli were presented in
(1) congruent metaphorical (metaphorical sentences), (...2) congruent
literal (literal sentences), and (3) incongruent conditions (unrelated
sentences). Targets were individual words from the relevant frames.
The results showed higher degrees of activation of the organizing
frames of target inputs for both metaphor groups. There were no
significant differences between the two congruent conditions, while
RTs in the incongruent condition were significantly longer. The data
seem to offer support for the interaction view of metaphor processing.
The final two experiments tested the level of contextual aptness of
target metaphorical expressions from the same two conceptual keys, in
(1) congruent metaphorical (metaphor clusters), (2) congruent literal
(literal paragraphs), and (3) incongruent priming conditions (unrelated
paragraphs). Targets were metaphorical sentences from the two
conceptual keys. The obtained results did not reveal any differences
between the two congruent conditions, while the recorded RTs were
significantly shorter in the incongruent condition. Overall, the study
provides empirical insight into the phenomena of (metaphorical)
framing, frame activation and interaction, and contextualization, and
their import in online meaning construction.