Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, Daegu Gyeongbuk Institute of Science and Technology (DGIST), Daegu, Korea.
Convergence Research Advance Center for Olfaction, Daegu Gyeongbuk Institute of Science and Technology (DGIST), Daegu, Korea.
Sci Rep. 2021 Sep 29;11(1):19292. doi: 10.1038/s41598-021-98351-8.
We address the question of, among several executive functions, which one has a strong influence on metaphor comprehension. To this end, participants took part in a metaphor comprehension task where metaphors had varying levels of familiarity (familiar vs. novel metaphors) with different conditions of context (supporting vs. opposing contexts). We scrutinized each participant's detailed executive functions using seven neuropsychological tests. More interestingly, we modelled their responses in metaphor comprehension using the drift-diffusion model, in an attempt to provide more systematic accounts of the processes underlying metaphor comprehension. Results showed that there were significant negative correlations between response times in metaphor comprehension and scores of the Controlled Oral Word Association Test (COWAT)-Semantic, suggesting that better performances in comprehending metaphors were strongly associated with better interference control. Using the drift-diffusion model, we found that the familiarity, compared to context, had greater leverage in the decision process for metaphor comprehension. Moreover, individuals with better performance in the COWAT-Semantic test demonstrated higher drift rates. In conclusion, with more fine-grained analysis of the decisions involved in metaphor comprehension using the drift-diffusion model, we argue that interference control plays an important role in processing metaphors.
我们探讨了在几种执行功能中，哪一种对隐喻理解有较强的影响。为此，参与者参与了一项隐喻理解任务，其中隐喻具有不同的熟悉程度（熟悉和新颖的隐喻）和不同的语境条件（支持和反对的语境）。我们使用七种神经心理学测试仔细研究了每个参与者的详细执行功能。更有趣的是，我们使用扩散模型来模拟他们在隐喻理解中的反应，试图为隐喻理解背后的过程提供更系统的解释。结果表明，隐喻理解中的反应时间与受控口头联想测试（COWAT）-语义分数之间存在显著的负相关，这表明更好地理解隐喻与更好的干扰控制密切相关。使用扩散模型，我们发现，与语境相比，熟悉度在隐喻理解的决策过程中具有更大的影响力。此外，在 COWAT-语义测试中表现更好的个体表现出更高的漂移率。总之，我们通过使用扩散模型对隐喻理解中涉及的决策进行更细致的分析，认为干扰控制在处理隐喻中起着重要作用。
