| Cognitive Representation of Persian Semantic Categories: The Formation of Concrete and Abstract Prototypes |
| Paper ID : 1047-ICIL |
| Authors |
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Mohammad Hassan Torabi * No. 57, Jahanshiri Alley, Ghasroldasht St., Azarbayejan Ave., Tehran |
| Abstract |
| Different factors may influence the emergence of prototypes. For different experiences that students in different age groups may undergo, and also taking into account gender differences which, in turn, result in different social trends, as well as people’s different educational backgrounds, the formation of prototypes, accordingly, might vary for different ages, genders, and educational backgrounds for Persian-speaking subjects. The present work studies the prototypes of two abstract categories of flower and fruit, and also two concrete categories of disease and success in Persian; moreover, it studies the influence of age, gender, and educational background on the formation of these prototypes. Results indicated these three variables to influence the prototype formation in flower, fruit, disease, and success categories for the students. Also, in the first half of high school years, which co-occurs with puberty in boys, a mental and cognitive process may affect the formation of prototypes in this group, resulting in more consistent prototypes. Extremes of attribute dimensions and commonly encountered members may also form prototypes in the Persian language. The internal structure of Persian semantic categories varies for different groups of students, and the present work shows the flexibility and variance in various Persian prototypes in different groups of subjects. In addition, the prototypes of concrete concepts seem to be more influenced by environmental and physical factors, whereas prototypes of abstract categories are more influenced by the cognitive development, which is itself influenced by environmental and physical factors, among other things. |
| Keywords |
| Prototypes, Persian Language, Flower, Fruit, Success, Disease. |
| Status: Accepted |