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Content Differences for Abstract and Concrete Concepts
Author(s) -
Katja WiemerHastings Katja,
Xu Xu
Publication year - 2005
Publication title -
cognitive science
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.498
H-Index - 114
eISSN - 1551-6709
pISSN - 0364-0213
DOI - 10.1207/s15516709cog0000_33
Subject(s) - context (archaeology) , representation (politics) , task (project management) , feature (linguistics) , function (biology) , content (measure theory) , computer science , cognition , psychology , cognitive psychology , epistemology , mathematics , linguistics , engineering , geology , paleontology , mathematical analysis , philosophy , systems engineering , evolutionary biology , neuroscience , politics , political science , law , biology
Concept properties are an integral part of theories of conceptual representation and processing. To date, little is known about conceptual properties of abstract concepts, such as idea. This experiment systematically compared the content of 18 abstract and 18 concrete concepts, using a feature generation task. Thirty‐one participants listed characteristics of the concepts (i.e., item properties) or their relevant context (i.e., context properties). Abstract concepts had significantly fewer intrinsic item properties and more properties expressing subjective experiences than concrete concepts. Situation components generated for abstract and concrete concepts differed in kind, but not in number. Abstract concepts were predominantly related to social aspects of situations. Properties were significantly less specific for abstract than for concrete concepts. Thus, abstractness emerged as a function of several, both qualitative and quantitative, factors.