The Effects Of Perceptual Symbol Representation On Foreign Language Memory

Conceptual representation means the process of that people transform the information obtained from the sense experience into the form which can be processed and stored by the brain.For the process of conceptual representation,the propositional symbol thinks that conceptual meaning is formed by the amodal propositional symbols,and the perceptual symbol considers that the conceptual representation refers to the participation of multi-modal sensorimotor information.However,the representational theory of multiple symbols considers that from representation of symbol to acquisition of meaning,cognitive activity refers to the information in various encoding types.In studies of foreign language vocabulary,people often adopt the way of “mother tongue-foreign language” contrast to memorize through the link among the abstract propositional symbols,as the information of involved perceptual symbol in the lexical meaning is often neglected.In view of this,Both experiments are studied and designed to probe into influential effects and mechanism differences of representations of both propositional and perceptual symbols on foreign language vocabulary memorization by taking the nouns of locality in foreign language as an example,observe the influences of representations of multiple symbols on the memorization of nouns of locality in foreign language,and then provides the suggestions of representational perspectives of multiple symbols for the studies of foreign language vocabulary.The experiment was divided into two stages: the encoding stage and the recognition stage.The independent variable was the representation of words in the encoding stage.The dependent variable was the memory effect of foreign words(the subjective judgment of the memory effect(JOL judgment)and the correct rate of word recognition)and the EEG evoked by foreign words in the encoding stage and the recognition stage.The results of Experiment I show that:(1)The recognition accuracy under the condition of perceptual symbol representation is higher than the condition of propositional symbol representation.(2)In the early stage of lexical coding,propositional representation promotes the processing and integration of early semantics,and induces more P200 in the left brain;Perceptual representation will process lexical semantics in the middle and later stages of word coding,and induce greater LPC.(3)In the word recognition stage,perceptual representation produces more N400 and N400 related to perceptual simulation μ suppression,and more importantly,memory retrieval θ energy.The results of Experiment II show that:(1)The effects of direct perception and imagination on the recognition accuracy,JOL,P200,LPC,N400,μ suppression and θ.There was no significant difference between the two groups.(2)There was no significant difference in the amplitude of P200 and LPC between direct perception,imagination and propositional representation.(3)In the middle and later periods of lexical processing,there was no significant difference between direct perception and imagination in LPC amplitude;There is no significant difference in LPC amplitude between direct perception,imagination and propositional symbol representation.(4)In the word recognition stage,imagination induces a larger N400 amplitude than propositional representation;Direct perception and imagination have more obvious effects than propositional representation μ suppression and greater θenergy.Generally speaking,the influences of perceptual symbol representation on the process of vocabulary memorization are expressed in the elaborate processing towards vocabulary in the middle and later periods,and induce of perceptual simulation to improve the recognition accuracy,and the recognition accuracy of multiple symbol representation higher than the single propositional symbol representation.