Animation: An experimental study on the role of actorhood and experiencerhood in animacy conceptualisations.
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2021-08-31
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en
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The (perceived) animacy of a referent plays a role in a number of linguistic phenomena. Research has for instance shown that animate referents are more often referred to by reduced referential expressions (such as pronouns), compared to inanimate referents. The perception of animacy may be driven by either the perception of experiencerhood (mind-model) or the perception of both experiencerhood and actorhood (agentivity model). An experiment was conducted to test the validity of these accounts. Participants were shown short animations of a target geometrical shape interacting with two competitor geometrical shapes. The hypothesized animacy features, actorhood and experiencerhood, were manipulated using visual cues. The proportion of reduced target referrals was used to gauge the targets’ conceptual animacy. Analyses revealed that perceived experiencerhood played a role in conceptual animacy. Analyses revealed perceived actorhood played no role in conceptual animacy. These findings are thus congruent with the mind-model of animacy.
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