Analyzing the Nominal Aphasia by Using the Basic Level Category and Prototype Theory

Abstract：This paper begins with a brief description of the theoretical framework for prototype categorization，in which there lie two axes of words attributions，a vertical axis and a horizontal one.Vertically，words differ in that we have the superordinate level categories，subordinate categories and the basic level categories.Horizontally，we have the prototypes and the non-prototypes in reality.Elaborated with the varying data from neurolinguistics，this paper analyzes the reasons that drive nominal aphasias’ impairment in non-prototypes and non-basic level categories.Cognitive perception is the main drive，and besides，frequency of exposure，principle of economy and position in mental lexicon are also the causalities of the patients’ impairment in word recognition.

Key words：prototype；basic level categories；nominal aphasia

Chapter One Introduction and Literature Review

There is nothing more basic than categorization to our thought，perception，action and speech（Lakoff，1987）.Syntagmatically，words differ in that some are the prototypes while others are non-prototypes.Paradigmatically，words can be classified into superordinate level，basic level category and subordinate level.Influenced by Aristotle，the classical category theory reigned for a quite long time.The classical held that；

（1）.Categories are defined in terms of a conjunction of necessary and sufficient features.

（2）.Features are binary，so an entity either belongs to a category or doesn’t.

（3）.Categories have clear boundaries.

（4）.All members of a category have equal status.

（Taylor 2003：21）

The classical category theory was challenged by Wittgenstein as the latter put forward the concept of “family resemblance”.Family resemblance can be defined like this：

Family resemblance is a set of items of the form AB—BC—CD—DE--EA.That is each item has at least one，and probably several，elements in common with one or more other items，but no，or few，are common to all items（Rosch Mevis1975：575）.

The concept of “Family resemblance” led to the coming out of the concept of prototype.Brown（1990）takes prototypes as the most typical category and believes that they have the most salient features to be the center of the category.And Rosch（1976）also argues in her work that the classical category should be represented by the prototype：a relatively abstract mental representation that assembles the key attributes or features that best represent instances of a given category.The prototype is therefore conceived as a schematic representation of the most salient or central characteristics associated with members of the category in question.But Langacker（1987：371）also stressed the difference between prototypes and schemas saying that prototype is a typical instance of category，and other elements are assimilated to the category on the basis of their perceived resemblance to the prototype.

With the development of cognitive linguistics，the studies on prototypes have also extended on other fields as well as words.Kovecses（2006）pointed that besides daily life，prototype theory also exists in language structures such as word meaning and semantic concept.Prototypes can be found in fields as phonetics，phonology，syntax，semantic and eve grammar.

Categorization systems，as Rosch（1978）put，have two dimensions：a horizontal and a vertical dimension.The vertical dimension relates to the level of inclusiveness of a particular category：the higher up the vertical axis of a particular category is，the more inclusive it is.The horizontal dimension relates to the category distinctions at the same level of inclusiveness.So paradigmaticly，words can be classified into superordinate level，basic level category and subordinate level.The term “basic level categories” can be traced back to Roger Brown，who first put forward in his paper “How Shall a Thing Be Called”.An entity has both the abstract and concrete features，and those abstract features need to be materialized by a concrete name，and it is the basic level category that we use to name the entity（Brown，1958）.

Rosch et al.（1976）found that there is a level of inclusiveness that is optimal for human beings in terms of providing optimum cognitive economy.This level of inclusiveness was found to be at the mid-level of detail，between the most inclusive and least inclusive levels：the level associated with categories like car，dog and chair.This level of inclusiveness is called the basic level，and categories at this level are called basic-level categories.It is at the basic level categories that people conceptualize things as perceptual and functional gestalts.And she also mentioned that it is the basic level categories that most fully exploit the real-world correlation of attributes.Basic level categories cut up reality into maximally informative categories.Most precisely，Rosch（1975）hypothesizes that basic level categories both：

（1）.Maximize the number of attributes shared by members of the category；and

（2）.Minimize the number of attributes shared with members of other categories.

The features basic level categories share can be summed up four points（Croft and Cruse，2004：83）：

（1）.the most inclusive level at which there is characteristics patterns of behavioral interaction；

（2）.the most inclusive level for which a clear visual image can be formed；

（3）.the most inclusive level at which part-whole information is represented

（4）.the level used for everyday reference.

According to Hu Zhuanglin（2006），the categories at the basic level categories are those that are most culturally salient and are required to fulfill our cognitive needs the most.This is the level where we perceive the most differences between “objects” in the world.All categories of dogs are different，but they still share enough to be distinguished from cats，birds，snakes，and so on.

The theory of basic level category also earned its attention in China.Lu Caihong（2004）analyzed the acquisition priority of basic level categories on the basis of a comparative study between English and Chinese in terms of the linguistic forms of different categories.Wu Fangfang（2012）analyzed the omnipresence of basic level categories and the fact that different persons in different fields may have different standards.Wang Xiaohong（2007）applied the theory in lexicon teaching.

Chapter Two The Different Behaviors In Object Recognition By Nominal Aphasia

Jonsdottir M.K. Martin R.C.（1996.）in one of their tests show that Nominal Aphasias patients recognize more basic level categories than either superordinate level categories or subordinate level categories，regardless of word recognition or abstract definition.For example，when understanding the sub- categories（such as car，train，bike，ship，bus and so on）of the word “vehicle”，patients show no difficulty while the concept itself was difficult for them to understand.Here，“vehicle” is a superordinate level category while its sub-categories are actually basic level categories.The fact obviously show that the privilege of basic level categories in patients’ impairment and provoke us to think about the inner drive of this surviving.

Chapter Three The Privilege of Basic Level Category

3.1.Basic level categories are learned much earlier than other categories

According to the Ribot’s law（Ribot 1883/1977），the order of language development is reversely mirrored by the order of language loss.The later a piece of linguistic knowledge is acquired，the more susceptible it will be lost in language impairment.Basic level categories are learned much earlier than the superordinate and subordinate categories.The basic level categories maximize the perceptual，functional and other attributes of the things which occur in the world，while superordinate level categories are those specified by a minimum number of features，which are usually at an abstract high level of concrete concepts.Being relatively abstract，superordinate level categories are not that easily to be mastered by young children who first contact with the world.As is known，superordinate level categories are those involving features that abstracted away from a range of diverse entities.Those abstract features are the features that all the similar entities have in common，which are so abstract that go beyond children’s cognitive ability.

This fact actually proves the theory put forwarded by Roman Jakobson.Roman Jakobson strongly believed the Regression Hypothesis.This hypothesis states that the order of language dissolution is identical，yet opposite in direction，to the order of language development.

3.2.Basic level categories are salient in our cognitive perception.

The reason why the basic level is the most salient level of categorization relates to the tension between similarity of members of a category and the principle of cognitive economy.As we have mentioned above the superordinate level categories actually have no real entities only the basic level categories and the subordinate level categories have real entities.However，entities at the subordinate level are most alike，At the basic level，on the other hand，while there are also similarities within particular categories，they are far fewer than differences between them.

3.3 Basic level categories are used more frequently in our life than the other two categories.

The language system itself also reveals the primacy of the basic level in a number of ways.Firstly，basic-level terms are typically monolexemic：comprised of a single word-like unit.This contrasts with terms for subordinate level categories which are often comprised of two or more lexemes（for example，dog with bulldog）.Secondly，basic-level terms appear to occur more frequently in language use than superordinate or subordinate level expressions.As Rosch（1978）has suggested basic level terms may have emerged more than superordinate and subordinate level terms no matter in our daily life or written works.

3.4 Basic level categories are stored in the center of our mental lexicon.

Psycholinguistic research on lexical meanings has been directed at the way lexical items are represented in the mental dictionary，and how this knowledge is utilized in verifying semantic relations.One hypothesis concerning this process is the network model discussed by Collins and Quillian（1969），who propose that lexical items are organized hierarchically by forming a network system in semantic memory.This hypothesis assumes that an instance（e.g.，bulldog）is directly connected to its immediate superordinate（dog）and is indirectly connected to a higher level superordinate（manimal）via an intermediate node（dog）.The example below can better explain it.

（Figure1.hierarchically mental lexicon：1）

huskymastiffpoodleSamoyedChihuahuapugbulldogMaltese

Thus，taking up a pair of sentences such as A bulldog is a dog vs.A bulldog is a mammal，for example，this model predicts that the former is verified faster than the latter，because the instance superordinate relation of the former is more direct than that of the latter one.According to this test，concepts are stored in our mental lexicon hierarchically with the basic level categories as the center.Superordinate level categories together with subordinate level categories are stored as the periphery while basic level categories lie in the center.

（Figure2：hierarchically mental lexicon：2）

Therefore，basic level categories stored in the center of a category in our mental lexicon are difficult to be impaired while superordinate and subordinate levels as are the peripheries easily get lost.Thus figure 1 can be replaced by table 2 after the impairment.

（Figure3：Hierarchically impairment in mental lexicon：3）

Chapter Four Studies Showing That Nominal

Aphasias Have Problems In Object Naming.

The object naming test or concept definitions deduced by Karalyn Patterson（2007）shows the evidence for Nominal Aphasias’ incapability in naming objects.Here is the result of the test.

Table1 illustrates picture naming test by a semantic dementia（SD for short，a kind of nominal aphasia）patient in response to 25 different animals.Among several different points of interest that one could extract from this simple data set are the facts：

（1）.that the patient's only correct responses occurs to the four most typical（also the most familiar）animals，which are the dog，the cat，the horse and the cow.

（2）that three of these typical animal names（Basically，the mammals that have typical animal features reasonably），were assigned incorrectly to a large number of other animals

Table 1Objects naming responses by Nominal Aphasias.

Stimulus

picturesNaming

responseStimulus

picturesNaming

responseStimulus

picturesNaming

response

dogdogGoatdogmonkeycat

catcatFoxdogLionHorse

HorseHorseLeoparddogZebraHorse

CowCowTigerdogRhinoHorse

PigdogSkunkdogBearHorse

SquirreldogRaccoondogSnakeLong thing

SheepdogMousecatSeahorseLittle thing

deerdograbbitcatfishDon’t know

frogDon’t know

（Karalyn Patterson，2007）

（3）.that，although all of the pictures as shown to the patient were approximately the same size，her 'choice' of a more typical incorrect label seemed somewhat appropriate to the size of the stimulus animal in real life，and，most importantly，

（4）.that pictures of the atypical animals（listed at the end）were not assigned his favored typical names，as is shown in a single example from the conceptdefinitions task：when SD patient was asked 'Can you tell me what a seahorse is? While，he replied 'I didn't know they had horses in the sea'.

How to explain the discrepancy that patients have correct responses to the typical animals and responses wrongly to the atypical ones? To answer this question we need first to have a look at how concepts are stored in our minds.One of the messages to be derived from these findings on SD is a debate about the relationship between perceptual and semantic processing.Using family resemblance the prototypes of “animal” are found，which are “dog”，“cat” and “horse”.Then we come to the question why prototypes are not impaired while other types are impaired easily.

Chapter Five The Privilege of Prototypes in Cognitive Perception

5.1.Selective conditions for being the prototype：

Prototype theory posits that principle of cognitive economy guides the formation of categories in the human mind.This principle states that an organism，like a human being，attempts to gain as much information as possible about its environment while minimizing cognitive effort and resources（Evans et al 2006）.This relates to a calculation of the balance of cost and bene#64257;t in language form construction.In other words，rather than storing separate information about every individual stimulus experienced，humans can group similar stimuli into categories，which maintains economy in cognitive representation.Prototype，as contains the most features of the similar categories is therefore lies in the center of the meaning chain.

5.2.The early memory of prototypes.

It has been known that superordinate categories have no concrete real entities，which will cause difficulty to children，so children tend to use a more concrete concept to refer to all the similar entities which actually need a more abstract concept.For example，when learning the concept of “dog”，children centered on one kind of dog，say the Chihuahua，as the prototype，and all animals that bear resemblance with Chihuahua he or she counters will be called “a dog”.Actually，the concept of “dog” is mistaken as the “animal”.No man will surprise that a child will use “doggies” to refer not only to dogs but all small four-legged animals.These are our early memories，which will be hard to lose even if when we have something wrong with our brain and by which course we lost our memory.We may say children have different prototypes with adults，for healthy adults would never call all the four-legged animals as “doggies”.This contradiction needs the fact that children actually are adjusting their cognitive dimension to adults’ standard gradually.However，the early memory that they incorrectly take one of the entities as the prototype will hardly be impaired.

5.3.Categories stored in our mental memory

Taylor（1995）in his meaning chain theory pointed out that different senses between entities cannot be unified on the basis of a common semantic denominator.Rather，the different meanings are related through meaning chains.Schematically，meaning A is related to meaning B in virtue of some shared attributes，or other kind of similarity.Meaning B in turn becomes the source for a further extension to meaning C，which is likewise chained to meanings D and E and so on.As the formula goes：AB—BC—CD—DE—EA.Similarly，we can say that concepts are stored in minds according to their categories.For example，the concept of “animal” includes kinds of animals as “dog” “sheep” “goat”“cow” “horse” “deer” “fox” “l(fā)eopard” “cat” “tiger” “l(fā)ion” “bear” “raccoon” and so on.All these living things are called “animals”，but they are different to a large degree.However，dog is related to cat，to pig，and to goat.And cat is related to tiger，to lion and so on.Goat is related to sheep，to cow and even to horse.So centered on the prototype “dog”，and combined by family resemblance，a meaning chain is formed in our mental lexicon.

（Figure 4：Family resemblance）

Therefore，according to the “family resemblance”，entities which lay in the periphery are easily lost in brain impairment.

Chapter Six Conclusion

Syntagmatically speaking，words differ because some are the prototypes that are salient to our cognitive needs while others are non-prototypes.Paradigmatically，words can be classified into superordinate level，basic level category and subordinate level.Prototypes are most culturally and practically salient to our cognitive perception and are stored in the center of our mental lexicon，thus keeping them survive the brain impairment，while non-prototypes are relatively less seen than prototypes therefore they are stored in the periphery of the mental lexicon.As a result，Nominal Aphasias have difficulties in recognizing non-prototypes while perform correctly with prototypes.As to the inclusiveness of categories，because of the fact that basic level categories are frequent in use，simple in form，salient in perception，they are stored in the center of our mental lexicon.Therefore，Nominal aphasias patients presented high scores in understanding basic level categories while low scores in understanding superordinate and subordinate level categories.

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