Research
Metaphor Processing
In a series of studies, we demonstrated that the literal meaning of conventional metaphors such as early bird was available during metaphor comprehension. In a maze task, participants read two-word metaphors embedded in carrier sentences (e.g., John is an early bird so he can…). At the maze juncture, participants were slower and less accurate when the target word to continue the sentence (attend) was paired with a distractor related to the literal meaning of the metaphor (fly) compared to an unrelated one (cry). This effect, termed the metaphor awakening effect (MAE), shows the conflict between associated literal concepts accessed during the initial stages of metaphor comprehension and a subsequent literal cue. These findings support the minimalist model of metaphor processing, which posits that the literal meaning is available during metaphor comprehension.
Individual Differences in Pragmatic Processing
I investigate how individual factors such as linguistic experience (e.g., vocabulary size and print exposure), executive functioning (e.g.,working memory span and inhibitory control), general reasoning (e.g., abstract reasoning and cognitive reflection), and creativity (divergent and convergent) influence the comprehension and production of figurative language. I assess how these individual differences modulate the use of contextual information during slow- and fast-paced tasks. This research not only informs the mechanisms underlying pragmatic processing but also informs our understanding of how individual variability impacts language use across diverse populations.
I am interested in the differences and similarities in how humans and large language models (LLMs) process pragmatic information. Pragmatic processing involves interpreting language beyond its literal meaning, incorporating context, background knowledge, and social cues. While LLMs have demonstrated exceptional abilities in various language tasks, it remains uncertain whether their capabilities compare to human performance when it comes to more creative tasks, such as the interpretation and generation of novel metaphors, humour comprehension, or other complex aspects of language that may require additional cognitive abilities.In a series of projects, my colleagues and I compare the performance of LLMs (e.g., LLaMA, OLMo, DeepSeek) on various language tasks with human data.
We examined semantic and morphological deficits in patients with aphasia across several studies. Specifically, we explored how metaphorical comprehension varies based on the location of brain damage, identifying distinct patterns related to the type of metaphor or sentence. Our findings suggest that understanding metaphorical language heavily relies on semantic and pragmatic processes, particularly in the left hemisphere. Additionally, we investigated the comprehension of indeterminate sentences and implausible passive constructions, revealing insights into the underlying processes that contribute to language comprehension in individuals with aphasia.
Our research focused on how children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) integrate linguistic and visual information to construct coherent representations of dynamic scenes. Using a visual world paradigm, we compared the performance of children with ASD and typically developing children. While the ASD group showed quicker identification of target objects after hearing sentences with constraining verbs, they did not exhibit anticipatory eye movements. These findings suggest that the processing of verb-semantic information may differ for children with ASD and warrant further investigation.
We explored humor comprehension in the brain by examining two competing hypotheses: the direct-access view, which posits immediate understanding of jokes, and the indirect-access view, suggesting a slower re-analysis process. Using a cross-modal masked priming paradigm, our results indicated that humor processing may require pragmatic reanalysis, highlighting the time-sensitive nature of verbal jokes and the need for refined measurements in future studies.