LINGUIST List 7.1213

Sun Sep 1 1996

Sum: Word association (2nd summary)

Editor for this issue: Ann Dizdar <dizdartam2000.tamu.edu>

Directory

1. "M. Lynne Murphy", word association: 2nd sum

hello linguists,

as seems to often happen, my summary of word association references
inspired more responses than the query did. there may be a social
psychology thesis there, but then again, maybe it's just the effect of
summer vacation (for the northerners). at any rate, i'm excited about
and grateful for these additions.

to recap: i wanted references to word association tests with non-
western subjects. my interest is in finding out whether the types of
associations elicited (e.g., paradigmatic, syntagmatic, phonological)
differ amongst cultures. if so, this has repercussions for some
network theories of semantic organization.

i'm grateful to the following people, listed here with their
contributions to the discussion. a few have really gone out of their
way for me, which makes me not only grateful to them personally, but
grateful to be part of such a generous community here on linguist
list.

the (edited for space) responses:

From: dicklinguistics.ucl.ac.uk (Dick Hudson)

Another relevant reference to work by Ervin Tripp: `Identification and
bilingualism', in A S Dil (ed.) Language Acquisition and Communication
Choice. Stanford Univ Press, 1-14. Dated 1954 - surely there must have
been more work since then on such things! She reports an experiment in
which Japanese women married to Americans, living in USA, completed
sentences and described picture-scenes in English and in Japenese; the
relevant variable is the content of what they said, which apparently
varied systematically with the language! Fascinating stuff.

[lynne adds: this book has several relevant chapters, including
another on navaho mentioned in the last summary]

- -----------

From: tsunekonttnly.isl.ntt.jp (Tsuneko NAKAZAWA)

[lynne's note: tsuneko shared part of the biblio of her m.a. thesis,
listed at the end here.]

Dalrymple-Alford, E. C. and Arwa Aamiry. 1970. 'Word Associations of
Bilinguals' Psychonomic Science XXI:319-320
***Arabic-English bilinguals

Deese, James. 1965. The Structure of Associations in Language and
Thought Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins Press

Kolers, Paul A. 1963. 'Interlingual Word Associations'
Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior 2:291-300
***bilinguals of (English and (German or Spanish or Thai))

Lambert, W. E., C. Crosby and J. Havelka. 1958. 'The Influence of
Language-Aquisition Contexts on Bilingualism' Journal of Abnormal and
Social Psychology 56:239-244 
*** English-French bilinguals

Szalay, L.B., A. Abu-Hilal, J.B. Strohl, Mason, and Goodison. 1978
U.S.-Arabic Communication lexicon of Cultural Meanings. Washington:
Institute of Comparative Studies Inc.

Szalay, Lorand B. and James Deese. 1978. Subjective Meaning and
Culture: An Assessment through Word Association. New Jersey: Laurence
Erlbaum Associates
***an excellent self-contained (methodology and results) book
 on cross-cultural word association

Szalay, Lorand B. and Glen H. Fisher. 1969. 'Communication Overseas'
in Elise C. Smith and Louis Fiber Luce (eds.) Toward Internationalism
Massachusetts: Newbury House Publishers, Inc.

Szalay, L. B. and C. Windle. 1968. 'Relative Influence of Linguistic
Versus Cultural Factors on Free Verbal Associations' Psychological
Reports 22:43-51
***Korean-English bilinguals + monolingual Korean and English speakers

Taylor, Insup. 1975. 'How are words from two languages organized in
bilinguals' memory?' Canadian Journal of Psychology 25:3:228-40
*** intra-language association vs. inter-language associations of
 English-French bilinguals

Nakazawa, Tsuneko. 1982. Associative Meanings of English Words: A
Study for Language Education MA Thesis, Tokyo:International Christian
University
*** English and Japanese association tests for Japanese students of
English compared with English association tests for Americans

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From: charleslhp.iis.sinica.edu.tw (Lin Chien-Jer)

Earlier this year, I've finished a paper with a title "A Study of
Chinese Word Association of Taiwanese College Students." In the
paper, I did a review of the western researches done on word
association. I compared the Chinese Word association test results
with the English, French and German norms (they could be found in a
book edited by Jenkins, with nine word association norms collected).
I compared the results also from a gender viewpoint. I also
explained some characteristics of Chinese word association
results on the basis of the characteristics of the Chinese language
itself.

- ------------
thanks to all,
lynne

- -------------------------------------------------------------------
M. Lynne Murphy 104lynmuse.arts.wits.ac.za
Department of Linguistics phone: +27(11)716-2340
University of the Witwatersrand fax: +27(11)716-4199
Johannesburg 2050
SOUTH AFRICA