Emory Department of Psychology | Cognition & Development

Lawrence W. Barsalou, Ph.D.

Online Papers

Papers relevant to multiple topics are listed more than once.

Grounding the Conceptual System in the Brain's Modal Systems

Theory

Barsalou, L.W. (1999). Perceptual symbol systems. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 22, 577-609.

Barsalou, L.W. (2003). Abstraction in perceptual symbol systems. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London: Biological Sciences, 358, 1177-1187.

Barsalou, L.W. (2005). Abstraction as dynamic interpretation in perceptual symbol systems. In L. Gershkoff-Stowe & D. Rakison (Eds.), Building object categories (389-431). Carnegie Symposium Series. Majwah, NJ: Erlbaum. [Note: this paper offers slightly more theoretical detail than the paper immediately above, and also applies the theory to a wider variety of phenomena at the end.]

Simmons, K., & Barsalou, L.W. (2003). The similarity-in-topography principle: Reconciling theories of conceptual deficits. Cognitive Neuropsychology, 20, 451-486. [Reprinted in A. Martin & A. Caramazza (Eds.), The organisation of conceptual knowledge in the brain: Neuropsychological and neuroimaging perspectives (pp. 451-486). East Sussex, UK: Psychology Press.].

Barsalou, L.W. (2005). Continuity of the conceptual system across species. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 9, 309-311 .

Prinz, J.J., & Barsalou, L.W. (2000). Steering a course for embodied representation. In E. Dietrich & A. Markman (Eds.), Cognitive dynamics: Conceptual change in humans and machines (51-77). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Barsalou, L.W., & Prinz, J.J. (1997). Mundane creativity in perceptual symbol systems. In T.B. Ward, S.M. Smith, & J. Vaid (Eds.), Creative thought: An investigation of conceptual structures and processes (pp. 267-307). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.

Barsalou, L.W., Yeh, W., Luka, B.J., Olseth, K.L., Mix, K.S., & Wu, L. (1993). Concepts and meaning. In K. Beals, G. Cooke, D. Kathman, K.E. McCullough, S. Kita, & D. Testen (Eds.), Chicago Linguistics Society 29: Papers from the parasession on conceptual representations (pp. 23-61). University of Chicago: Chicago Linguistics Society.

Barsalou, L.W. (1993). Flexibility, structure, and linguistic vagary in concepts: Manifestations of a compositional system of perceptual symbols. In A.C. Collins, S.E. Gathercole, & M.A. Conway (Eds.), Theories of memory (pp. 29-101). London: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Reviews of Empirical Literature

Barsalou, L.W. (2008). Grounded cognition. Annual Review of Psychology, 59, 617-645.

Barsalou, L.W. (2003). Situated simulation in the human conceptual system. Language and Cognitive Processes, 18, 513-562.[Reprinted in H. Moss & J. Hampton, Conceptual representation (pp. 513-566). East Sussex, UK: Psychology Press.]

Barsalou, L.W., Simmons, W.K., Barbey, A., & Wilson, C.D. (2003). Grounding conceptual knowledge in modality-specific systems. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 7, 84-91.

Goldstone, R., & Barsalou, L.W. (1998). Reuniting perception and conception. Cognition, 65, 231-262.

Barsalou, L.W., Pecher, D., Zeelenberg, R., Simmons, W.K., & Hamann, S.B. (2005). Multi-modal simulation in conceptual processing. In W. Ahn, R. Goldstone, B. Love, A. Markman, & P. Wolff (Eds.), Categorization inside and outside the lab: Essays in honor of Douglas L. Medin (pp. 249-270) . Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.

Barsalou, L.W., Solomon, K.O., & Wu, L.L. (1999). Perceptual simulation in conceptual tasks. In M.K. Hiraga, C. Sinha, & S. Wilcox (Eds.), Cultural, typological, and psychological perspectives in cognitive linguistics: The proceedings of the 4th conference of the International Cognitive Linguistics Association, Vol. 3 (209-228). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Empirical Reports

Simmons, W.K., Hamann, S.B., Harenski, C.N., Hu, X.P., & Barsalou, L.W. (in press). fMRI evidence for word association and situated simulation in conceptual processing. Journal of Physiology – Paris.

van Dantzig, S., Pecher, D., Zeelenberg, R., & Barsalou, L.W. (in press). Perceptual processing affects conceptual processing. Cognitive Science.

Estes, Z., Verges, M., & Barsalou, L.W. (2008). Head up, foot down: Object words orient attention to the object’s typical location. Psychological Science, 19, 93-97.

Simmons, W.K., Ramjee, V., Beauchamp, M.S., McRae, K., Martin, A., & Barsalou, L.W. (2007). A common neural substrate for perceiving and knowing about color. Neuropsychologia 45, 2802-2810.

Simmons, W.K., Martin, A., & Barsalou, L.W. (2005). Pictures of appetizing foods activate gustatory cortices for taste and reward. Cerebral Cortex, 15, 1602-1608.

Barsalou, L.W., & Wiemer-Hastings, K. (2005). Situating abstract concepts. In D. Pecher and R. Zwaan (Eds.), Grounding cognition: The role of perception and action in memory, language, and thought (pp. 129-163) . New York: Cambridge University Press.

Solomon, K.O., & Barsalou, L.W. (2004). Perceptual simulation in property verification. Memory & Cognition, 32, 244-259.

Kan, I.P., Barsalou, L.W., Solomon, K.O., Minor, J.K., & Thompson-Schill, S.L. (2003). Role of mental imagery in a property verification task: fMRI evidence for perceptual representations of conceptual knowledge. Cognitive Neuropsychology, 20, 525-540. [Reprinted in A. Martin & A. Caramazza (Eds.), The organisation of conceptual knowledge in the brain: Neuropsychological and neuroimaging perspectives (pp. 525-540). East Sussex, UK: Psychology Press.]

Pecher, D., Zeelenberg, R., & Barsalou, L.W. (2003). Verifying properties from different modalities for concepts produces switching costs. Psychological Science, 14, 119-124.

Pecher, D., Zeelenberg, R., & Barsalou, L.W. (2004). Sensorimotor simulations underlie conceptual representations: Modality-specific effects of prior activation. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 11, 164-167.

Richardson, D.C., Spivey, M.J., Barsalou, L.W., & McRae, K. (2003). Spatial representations activated during real-time comprehension of verbs. Cognitive Science, 27, 767-780.

Simmons, W.K., Pecher, D., Hamann, S.B., Zeelenberg, R., & Barsalou, L.W. fMRI evidence for modality-specific processing of conceptual knowledge on six modalities. Meeting of the Society for Cognitive Neuroscience, New York, March 2003.

Solomon, K.O., & Barsalou, L.W. (2001). Representing properties locally. Cognitive Psychology, 43, 129-169.

Language and Simulation

Barsalou, L.W., Santos, A., Simmons, W.K., & Wilson, C.D. (in press). Language and simulation in conceptual processing. In M. De Vega, A.M. Glenberg, & A.C. Graesser, A. (Eds.). Symbols, embodiment, and meaning . Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Solomon, K.O., & Barsalou, L.W. (2004). Perceptual simulation in property verification. Memory & Cognition, 32, 244-259.

The Situated Nature of the Conceptual System

Theory and Review of Empirical Literature

Barsalou, L.W., Breazeal, C., & Smith, L.B. (2007). Cognition as coordinated non-cognition. Cognitive Processing, 8, 79-91.

Barsalou, L.W. (2008). Grounded cognition. Annual Review of Psychology, 59, 617-645.

Barsalou, L.W. (2005). Situated conceptualization. In H. Cohen & C. Lefebvre (Eds.), Handbook of categorization in cognitive science (pp. 619-650). St. Louis: Elsevier.

Yeh, W., & Barsalou, L.W. (2006). The situated nature of concepts. American Journal of Psychology, 119, 349-384 .

Barsalou, L.W. (2002). Being there conceptually: Simulating categories in preparation for situated action. In N.L. Stein, P.J. Bauer, & M. Rabinowitz (Eds.), Representation, memory, and development: Essays in honor of Jean Mandler (pp. 1-19). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.

Barsalou, L.W. (1999). Language comprehension: Archival memory or preparation for situated action? Discourse Processes, 28, 61-80.

Empirical Reports

Simmons, W.K., Hamann, S.B., Nolan, C.L, Hu, X., & Barsalou, L.W. fMRI evidence for the role of word association and situation simulation in conceptual processing. Meeting of the Society for Cognitive Neuroscience, San Francisco, April 2004.

Function

Theory

Barsalou, L.W., Sloman, S.A, & Chaigneau, S.E. (2005). The HIPE theory of function. In L. Carlson & E. van der Zee (Eds.), Representing functional features for language and space: Insights from perception, categorization and development ( pp. 131-147). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Review of Empirical Literature

Chaigneau, S.E., Barsalou, L.W. (in press). The role of function in categorization. Theoria et Historia Scientiarum. [Reprinted in the Polish journal, Kognitywistyka i media w edukacji / Cognitive Science and Media in Education]

Empirical Reports

Chaigneau, S.E., Barsalou, L.W., & Sloman, S. (2004). Assessing the causal structure of function. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 133, 601-625.

Social and Cultural Processes

Theory and Review of Empirical Literature

Barsalou, L.W., Niedenthal, P.M., Barbey, A., & Ruppert, J. (2003). Social embodiment. In B. Ross (Ed.), The Psychology of Learning and Motivation, Vol. 43 (pp. 43-92). San Diego: Academic Press.

Niedenthal, P.M., Barsalou, L.W., Winkielman, P., Krauth-Gruber, S., & Ric, F. (2005). Embodiment in attitudes, social perception, and emotion. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 9, 184-211 .

Niedenthal, P.M., Barsalou, L.W., Ric, F., & Krauth-Gruber, S. (2005). Embodiment in the acquisition and use of emotion knowledge. In L. Feldman Barrett, P.M. Niedenthal, & P. Winkielman (Eds.), Emotion and consciousness (pp. 21-50). New York: Guilford.

Barsalou, L.W., Barbey, A.K., Simmons, W.K., & Santos, A. (2005). Embodiment in religious knowledge. Journal of Cognition and Culture, 5, 14-57.

Parker, E.A., & Barsalou, L.W. (2007). Perspectiveless certainty in socio-cultural-political beliefs. In Òscar Vilarroya & Francesc Forn (Eds.), Social brain matters. Stances on the neurobiology of social cognition (pp. 59-67) . Amsterdam/New York: Editions Rodopi.

Ad Hoc and Goal-Derived Categories

Theory and Review of Empirical Literature

Barsalou, LW. Ad hoc categories. (in press). In P.C. Hogan (Ed.), The Cambridge encyclopedia of the language sciences. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Barsalou, L.W. (1991). Deriving categories to achieve goals. In G.H. Bower (Ed.), The psychology of learning and motivation: Advances in research and theory (Vol. 27, pp. 1-64). San Diego, CA: Academic Press. [Reprinted in A. Ram & D. Leake (Eds.), Goal-driven learning (1995, pp. 121-176). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press/Bradford Books]

Empirical Reports

Barsalou, L.W. (1983). Ad hoc categories. Memory & Cognition, 11, 211-227.

Barsalou, L.W. (1985). Ideals, central tendency, and frequency of instantiation as determinants of graded structure in categories. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 11, 629-654.

Ratneshwar, S., Barsalou, L.W., Pechmann, C., & Moore, M. (2001). Goal derived categories: The role of personal and situational goals in category representation. Journal of Consumer Psychology, 10, 147-157.

The Dynamic Nature of Concepts

Theory and Review of Empirical Literature

Barsalou, L.W. (1987). The instability of graded structure: Implications for the nature of concepts. In U. Neisser (Ed.), Concepts and conceptual development: Ecological and intellectual factors in categorization (pp. 101-140). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Barsalou, L.W. (1989). Intraconcept similarity and its implications for interconcept similarity. In S. Vosniadou & A. Ortony (Eds.), Similarity and analogical reasoning (pp. 76-121). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Empirical Reports

Barsalou, L.W. (1982). Context-independent and context-dependent information in concepts. Memory & Cognition, 10, 82-93.

Barsalou, L.W., & Sewell, D.R. (1984). Constructing representations of categories from different points of view. Emory Cognition Project Technical Report #2, Emory University.

Frames and the Structure of Knowledge

Barsalou, L.W., & Hale, C.R. (1993). Components of conceptual representation: From feature lists to recursive frames. In I. Van Mechelen, J. Hampton, R. Michalski, & P. Theuns (Eds.), Categories and concepts: Theoretical views and inductive data analysis (97-144). San Diego, CA: Academic Press.

Barsalou, L.W. (1992). Frames, concepts, and conceptual fields. In E. Kittay & A. Lehrer (Eds.), Frames, fields, and contrasts: New essays in semantic and lexical organization (pp. 21-74). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Category Learning

Theory

Barsalou, L.W. (1990). On the indistinguishability of exemplar memory and abstraction in category representation. In T.K. Srull & R.S. Wyer (Eds.), Advances in social cognition, Volume III: Content and process specificity in the effects of prior experiences (pp. 61-88) Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Barsalou, L.W. (1995). Storage side effects: Studying processing to understand learning. In A. Ram & D. Leake (Eds.), Goal-driven learning (407-419). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press/Bradford Books.

Empirical Reports

Luka, B.J., & Barsalou, L.W. (2005). Structural facilitation: Mere exposure effects for grammatical acceptability as evidence for syntactic priming in comprehension. Journal of Memory and Language. 52, 436-459.

Barsalou, L.W., Huttenlocher, J., & Lamberts, K. (1998). Basing categorization on individuals and events. Cognitive Psychology, 36, 203-272.

Heit, E., & Barsalou, L.W. (1996). The instantiation principle in natural categories. Memory, 4, 413-451.

Barsalou, L.W., & Ross, B.H. (1986). The roles of automatic and strategic processing in sensitivity to superordinate and property frequency. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 12, 116-134.

Event Knowledge

Lancaster, J.S., & Barsalou, L.W. (1997). Multiple organisations of events in memory. Memory, 5, 569-599.

Hale, C.R., & Barsalou, L.W. (1995). Explanation content and construction during system learning and troubleshooting. Journal of the Learning Sciences, 4, 385-436.

Barsalou, L.W. (1988). The content and organization of autobiographical memories. In U. Neisser & E. Winograd (Eds.), Remembering reconsidered: Ecological and traditional approaches to the study of memory (pp. 193-243). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Barsalou, L.W., & Sewell, D.R. (1985). Contrasting the representation of scripts and categories. Journal of Memory and Language, 24, 646-665.

Other

Barsalou, L.W. (2008). Cognitive and neural contributions to understanding the conceptual system. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 17, 91-95.

Glushko, R.J., Maglio, P.P., Matlock, T., & Barsalou, L.W. (2008). Categorization in the wild. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 12, 129-135.

Loken, B., Barsalou, L.W., & Joiner, C. (2008). Categorization theory and research in consumer psychology: Category representation and category-based inference. In C.P. Haugtvedt, F. Kardes, & P. Herr (Eds.). Handbook of consumer psychology (pp. 133-163). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Barsalou, L.W. (2007). Continuing themes in the study of human knowledge: Associations, imagery, propositions, and situations. In M.A. Gluck, J.R. Anderson,, & S.M. Kosslyn (Eds.). Memory and mind: A Festschrift for Gordon H. Bower (pp. 209-227). New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Barsalou, L.W., & Smith, E.E. (1990). One pillar in the making of cognitive science. Review of W. Hirst (Ed.), The making of cognitive science, New York: Cambridge University Press, 1988. Contemporary Psychology, 35, 574-575.