Dr Marta Witkowska (Warsaw): Metasemantic functions of grammar in action and persuasiveness  School of Psychology and Neuroscience Friday seminar series

The School of Psychology and Neuroscience seminar series presents a talk by Dr Marta Witkowska titled “Metasemantic functions of grammar in action and persuasiveness “, which will be hosted by Dr Anna Stefaniak in person in Seminar Room 1 in the School of Psychology and Neuroscience, and online through MS Teams.

Abstract:
We usually learn in school that verbs are “doing words.” Despite its simplicity, this definition carries greater psychological validity than our elementary grammar lessons might have suggested. Contemporary research within cognitive science indicates that verbs are indeed linked to the tendency to take action, which is manifested in fundamental physiological and neural processes, as well as observable behaviour tendencies (e.g., Foroni & Semin, 2009; Foster-Hanson et al., 2020).

In my work, I deepen the understanding of the link between verbs and action, investigating how grammatical structures inform cognitive processing and social influence. In Study 1 (N₁ = 459), we tested whether exposure to verbs versus other grammatical forms would affect the time needed to complete a complex questionnaire. In Studies 2a and 2b (N₂ₐ = 92, N₂b = 95), participants completed a Lexical Decision Task using pseudowords that lacked semantic content but were clearly marked for grammatical class. Across all three studies, we consistently observed shorter reaction times for verbs compared to nouns, suggesting that verb–action links translate into an acceleration of behavioural responses. In Study 3 (N = 728), we turned to the social consequences of this phenomenon. Participants wrote leaflets either aimed at mobilising action or at expressing their thoughts about the action. Leaflets with a mobilising purpose contained more verbs, indicating that people intuitively draw on verbs when trying to prompt others to act. In Study 4 (N = 556), new participants read and evaluated these texts. The more verbs a leaflet contained, the more persuasive and action-motivating it was perceived to be. Together, obtained findings suggest that verbs exert meta-semantic effects on behaviour: they accelerate behavioural responses and amplify the social power of language to mobilise others.