The Mapping Of The Concept Of Power In The Understanding Of Vertical Spatial Metaphor

The concept of power plays an important role in the social interaction between people.Throughout the ages,the concept of power has been paid much attention to in political philosophy,and psychological research also pays much attention to the concept of power.The concept of power is an abstract concept closely related to each of us in our social life.We often use some simple and specific concept of origin domain to understand the abstract concept of power.The concept of vertical space is a common concept used to recognize and express power.For example,the idiom "high weight" is a typical use of the level of space to describe the level of power,so as to help us better understand the concept of power,which can not be directly perceived and understood and has abstract characteristics.However,different scholars have put forward different views on the mapping relationship between the concept of power and vertical space.Some people think that the mapping relationship is unidirectional,while others think that the mapping relationship is bidirectional.And in some studies of the latter,some researchers found that the source domain and the target domain can not only map to each other,but also the mapping strength can be different.Therefore,in view of the two different views of metaphorical one-way and two-way mapping,and the fact that the power of two-way mapping may not be equal to each other,this study will verify the one-way and two-way mapping relationship in the understanding of metaphors in the vertical space of power concept through two studies with a total of four experiments.Two experiments were conducted to verify the mapping from source domain to target domain under conscious and unconscious conditions.First,Experiment 1a of conscious condition was carried out to check whether the direction mapping exists.If there is a mapping,Experiment 1b of unconscious condition is carried out to further verify the strength of this direction mapping.In Experiment 1a,the subjects were asked to make a mandatory choice of the upper and lower spatial orientation after reading the power words consciously.The results show that when the subjects read high power words,the number of Moroccan non words in the upper part is significantly larger than that in the lower part;when the subjects read low power words,the number of Moroccan non words in the lower part is significantly larger than that in the upper part.In Experiment 1b,the spatial Stroop paradigm was used to test the mapping intensity of this direction under unconscious conditions.The results showed that the concept of power was activated first under unconscious conditions,and there was no phenomenon that could accelerate the processing of vertical spatial orientation information.Based on the results of two experiments in Study 1,it shows that although there is a mapping in this direction in the vertical spatial metaphor mapping of the concept of power,it is a weak mapping.In Study 2,there are two experiments,which verify the reverse of study 1,that is,to test the mapping from the target domain to the source domain.If we can find the existence of this kind of mapping,then the two cognitive domains can be mapped to each other.The experiment was also carried out under conscious and unconscious conditions,and the conscious condition experiment 2a was carried out to test whether the direction mapping exists.If there is a mapping,experiment 2b of unconscious condition is carried out to further verify the strength of the mapping.In experiment 2a,the spatial Stroop paradigm was also used.First,the concept of up-down orientation was activated.When the subjects started "up",the cognitive processing of the subsequent high power words was accelerated.When the subjects started "down",the cognitive processing of the subsequent low power words was accelerated.In experiment2 B,the mapping strength was further tested under the unconscious condition.The results showed that the concept of up-down orientation could also facilitate the processing of the corresponding power words.The results of the two experiments show that there is a strong mapping from the target domain to the source domain in the vertical spatial metaphor understanding of the concept of power.The results are as follows:(1)The mapping direction of the concept of power and the concept of up-down orientation can be mutual.It can not only map from the concrete directly perceptible vertical space concept to the abstract not directly perceptible power concept,but also be mapped back.Therefore,the bidirectional mapping hypothesis is supported in the mapping relationship.(2)At the same time,there are differences in the mapping strength between the two concepts.The mapping strength from the concept of power to the vertical spatial orientation is stronger than that from the vertical spatial orientation.