The mass/count distinction: evidence from on-line psycholinguistic performance

Concepts of objects and substances in language

People distinguish objects from the substances that constitute them. Many languages also distinguish count nouns and mass nouns. What is the relation between these two distinctions? The connection between them is complicated by the facts that (a) some mass nouns (e.g., toast) seem to name countable objects; (b) some count and mass nouns (e.g., pots and pottery) seem to name the same objects; (c) nouns for seemingly the same things can be count in one language (English: dishes) but mass in another (French: la vaisselle); (d) count nouns can be used to name substances (There is carrot in the soup) and mass nouns to name portions (She drank three whiskeys); and (e) some languages (e.g., Mandarin) appear to have no count nouns, whereas others (e.g., Yudja) appear to have no mass nouns. All these cases counter a simple object-to-count-noun and substance-to-mass-noun relation, but they provide opportunities to see whether the grammatical distinction affects the referential one. We examine evidence from such cases and find continuity through development: Infants appear to have the conceptual OBJECT/SUBSTANCE distinction very early on. Although this distinction may change with development, the acquisition of count/mass syntax does not appear to be an effective factor for change.

Mass is more: The conceiving of (un)countability and its encoding into language in 5-year-old-children

Is the mass-count distinction merely a linguistic issue, or is it coded in representations other than language? We hypothesized that a difference between mass and count properties should be observed even in absence of linguistic distinctions driven by the morphosyntactic context. We tested 5-6-year-old children's ability to judge sentences with mass nouns (sand), count nouns (ring), and neutral nouns (i.e., those that appear in mass and count contexts with similar frequency; cake). Children refused neutral nouns embedded in uncountable morphosyntactic contexts, showing a preference for a count interpretation. This suggests that linguistic features alone are not sufficient to define the mass-count distinction. Additional analyses showed that children's performance with mass-but not count-morphosyntax correlated with their performance in tasks concerning logical and conservation operations. Altogether, these results suggest that the processing of mass features is not more demanding than count features from a linguistic point of view; rather, mass features entail additional abstraction abilities.

Garlic and ginger are not like apples and oranges: Effects of mass/count information on the production of noun phrases in English

In this study a picture-word interference paradigm was used to investigate how grammatical mass/count information is processed during noun phrase production in English. Theories of lexical processing distinguish between two different types of lexical-syntactic information: variable extrinsic lexical-syntactic features, such as number (singular, plural), and fixed intrinsic lexical-syntactic properties, such as grammatical gender (e.g., masculine, feminine). Previous research using the picture-word interference paradigm has found effects of distractor lexical-syntactic congruency for grammatical gender but no congruency effects for number. We used this phenomenon to investigate whether mass/count information is processed similarly to grammatical gender. In two experiments, participants named pictures of mass or count objects using determiner noun phrases (e.g., Experiment 1 with mass and plural count nouns: "not much_mass rice_mass", "not many_count pegs_count"; Experiment 2 with mass and singular count nouns: "some rice_mass", "a peg_count"), while ignoring distractors that were countability congruent or incongruent nouns. The results revealed a countability congruency effect for mass and plural count nouns in Experiment 1 and for singular count nouns, but not mass nouns in Experiment 2. This is similar to grammatical gender suggesting that countability processing is predominantly driven by a noun's lexical-syntactic information.

Semantic and syntactic processing of mass and count nouns: data from dementia

In the present research, we investigated the processing of Italian mass and count nouns and of their semantic and morphosyntactic attributes in people with neurodegenerative disease. The performance of a group of 26 Italian participants with Alzheimer's disease was studied in a semantic judgment task and a syntactic judgment task. Results were analyzed by means of mixed-effect models, revealing an interaction between task and stimulus category: The probability for correct responses to mass stimuli was significantly lower than that for count stimuli, but only in the semantic task. These findings confirm the major semantic impairment in dementia and suggest that mass nouns have particular features that make them more prone to impairment than count nouns for a progressively degenerating brain.

Representation and processing of mass and count nouns: a review

Comprehension and/or production of noun phrases and sentences requires the selection of lexical-syntactic attributes of nouns. These lexical-syntactic attributes include grammatical gender (masculine/feminine/neuter), number (singular/plural) and countability (mass/count). While there has been considerable discussion regarding gender and number, relatively little attention has focused on countability. Therefore, this article reviews empirical evidence for lexical-syntactic specification of nouns for countability. This includes evidence from studies of language production and comprehension with normal speakers and case studies which assess impairments of mass/count nouns in people with acquired brain damage. Current theories of language processing are reviewed and found to be lacking specification regarding countability. Subsequently, the theoretical implications of the empirical studies are discussed in the context of frameworks derived from these accounts of language production (Levelt, 1989; Levelt et al., 1999) and comprehension (Taler and Jarema, 2006). The review concludes that there is empirical support for specification of nouns for countability at a lexical-syntactic level.

From "some butter" to "a butter": an investigation of mass and count representation and processing

This paper investigates the representation of mass and count nouns at the lexical-syntactic level, an issue that has not been addressed to date in psycholinguistic theories. A single case study is reported of a man with aphasia, R.A.P., who showed a countability specific deficit that affected processing of mass noun grammar. R.A.P. frequently substituted mass noun determiners (e.g., some, much) with count noun determiners (e.g., a, many). Experimental investigations determined that R.A.P. had a modality-neutral lexical-syntactic impairment. Furthermore, a series of novel experiments revealed that R.A.P.'s processing of mass noun determiners varied depending on how mass nouns were depicted (single vs. multiple depictions) and how congruent these were with the conceptual-semantic information of target determiners (e.g., "some" corresponds to multiple but not single concepts). R.A.P.'s determiner difficulties emerged only when mass nouns and determiners were number incongruent. The results of this research clearly indicate that nouns are lexical-syntactically specified for countability, but that the derivation of countability can additionally be influenced by conceptual-semantics.

Determiner primes as facilitators of lexical retrieval in English

Gender priming studies have demonstrated facilitation of noun production following pre-activation of a target noun's grammatical gender. Findings provide support for models in which syntactic information relating to words is stored within the lexicon and activated during lexical retrieval. Priming effects are observed in the context of determiner plus noun phrase production. Few studies demonstrate gender priming effects in bare noun production (i.e., nouns in isolation). We investigated the effects of English determiner primes on bare mass and count noun production. In two experiments, participants named pictures after exposure to primes involving congruent, incongruent and neutral determiners. Facilitation of noun production by congruent and neutral determiner primes was found in both experiments. The results suggest that noun phrase syntax is activated in lexical retrieval, even when not explicitly required for production. Post hoc analysis of the relative frequency of congruent and incongruent prime-target pairs provides support for a frequency-based interpretation of the data.

Where the Mass Counts: Common Cortical Activation for Different Kinds of Nonsingularity

Typically, plural nouns are morphosyntactically marked for the number feature, whereas mass nouns are morphosyntactically singular. However, both plural count nouns and mass nouns can be semantically interpreted as nonsingular. In this study, we investigated the hypothesis that their commonality in semantic interpretation may lead to common cortical activation for these different kinds of nonsingularity. To this end, we examined brain activation patterns related to three types of nouns while participants were listening to a narrative. Processing of plural compared with singular nouns was related to increased activation in the left angular gyrus. Processing of mass nouns compared with singular count nouns was related to increased activity bilaterally in the superior temporal cortex and also in the left angular gyrus. No significant activation was observed in the direct comparison between plural and mass nouns. We conclude that the left angular gyrus, also known to be relevant for numerical cognition, is involved in the semantic interpretation of different kinds of nonsingularity.

Pairing words with syntactic frames: syntax, semantics, and count-mass usage

Two experiments examined English speakers' choices of count or mass compatible frames for nouns varying in imageability (concrete, abstract) and noun class (count, mass). Pairing preferences with equative (much/many) and non-equative (less/fewer) constructions were compared for groups of teenagers, young adults, and older adults. Deviations from normative usage were, for all ages, larger for count than for mass nouns, for the non-equative than for the equative construction, and for abstract count than for concrete count nouns. These results indicate that mass syntax is not a developmental default, support proposals that mass syntax is more flexible than count syntax, verify the non-prescriptive use of less with count nouns, and extend the interaction of syntax and semantics in noun classification to older ages, with older adults showing a reduced reliance on semantics. Knowledge of frame compatibility and knowledge of noun class are also shown to be largely independent.

The syntactic and semantic processing of mass and count nouns: an ERP study

The present study addressed the question of whether count and mass nouns are differentially processed in the brain. In two different ERP (Event-Related Potentials) tasks we explored the semantic and syntactic levels of such distinction. Mass and count nouns typically differ in concreteness, hence the effect of this important variable was factorially examined in each task. Thus the stimuli presented were: count concrete, count abstract, mass concrete or mass abstract. The first experiment (concrete/abstract semantic judgment task) involved the interaction between the N400 concreteness effect and the Mass/Count condition, revealing a substantial effect between mass and count nouns at the semantic level. The second experiment (sentence syntactic violation task) showed a Mass/Count distinction on left anterior negativity (LAN) and on P600 components, confirming the difference at the syntactic level. This study suggests that the brain differentiates between count and mass nouns not only at the syntactic level but also at the semantic level. Implications for our understanding of the brain mechanisms underlying the Mass/Count distinction are discussed.

The count-mass distinction in typically developing and grammatically specifically language impaired children: new evidence on the role of syntax and semantics

By the age of three, typically developing children can draw conceptual distinctions between "kinds of individual" and "kinds of stuff" on the basis of syntactic structures. They differ from adults only in the extent to which syntactic knowledge can be over-ridden by semantic properties of the referent. However, the relative roles of syntax and semantics in determining the nature of the count-mass distinction in language acquisition are still not well-understood. This paper contributes to this debate by studying novel noun acquisition in a subgroup of children, aged 8-15 years, with specific language impairment, whose core deficits are limited to within the grammatical system (G-SLI), We conducted two experiments: a production task and a word extension task. Such children might be expected to rely to a greater extent than their age-matched peers on semantic properties of referents in order to assign noun interpretations, since by hypothesis they have greater difficulty in accessing and utilizing syntactic category distinctions than typically developing children. In the production task, the Children with G-SLI demonstrated rigid over-application of a pluralization rule which masked even basic knowledge of semantic information about individuated objects versus non-individuated substances. Age-matched control children only performed in this way when all syntactic and conceptual/perceptual cues were neutralized. In the word extension task, which required a non-verbal response, the Children with G-SLI showed evidence of only very limited abilities to use syntactic or semantic information for word-learning. Thus, developmental deficits in the grammatical system can be seen to impact on lexical acquisition as well as syntactic development.

LEARNING OUTCOMES

As a result of this activity, the reader will be able to: (1) describe how syntactic (grammatical) impairment affects the ability to use syntactic cues for lexical acquisition, resulting in difficulties representing the structure of even simple phrases; (2) discuss the interaction between language components throughout development, and the cumulative impact of impairment in one or more aspect of language, which results in secondary impairments in other parts of the system; (3) consider the effects of an impairment in the ability to use syntactic cues for narrowing down word meanings, and how this can result in a much bigger problem affecting the subtle semantics of words and word classes.

Semantic and syntactic aspects of the mass/count distinction: a case study of semantic dementia

Semantic and syntactic contributions to processing of mass and count nouns were assessed by examining the performance of a patient suffering from a pure semantic deficit. Semantic and syntactic processing was evaluated on grammaticality judgement and sentence-picture matching tasks, respectively, where each task involved mass and count readings of metonymic nouns. While the patient did not show impaired performance on the grammaticality judgment task, he manifested difficulties in making mass/count distinctions in the sentence-picture matching task. It is thus argued that while distributionally the mass/count distinction may be established on a purely syntactic basis, cognitive processing of mass/count information requires both intact syntactic and semantic knowledge.

Processing of mass/count information in Alzheimer's disease and mild cognitive impairment

This study examines the processing of a specific linguistic distinction, the mass/count distinction, in patients suffering from Alzheimer's disease (AD) and mild cognitive impairment (MCI). Fourteen AD and 10 MCI subjects were tested using a sentence grammaticality judgement task where grammaticality violations were caused by determiner-noun mismatches, as well as a sentence-picture matching task to assess their ability to access mass and count readings of dual nouns. Considerable heterogeneity was observed within each subject group, and performance across groups was almost identical. It is concluded that a combination of linguistic and attentional and/or learning factors are responsible for the range of impairments; specifically, a subset of subjects exhibit no linguistic nor attentional/learning impairment, another subset exhibit only an attentional and/or learning impairment but no linguistic impairment, and a third subset (comprising more than half of the subjects included in this study) exhibit a linguistic impairment. It is postulated that the latter group have difficulty processing sense extensions in metonymous nouns. It is further claimed that, at least within the limits of the study, language impairments can be of the same severity and nature across AD and MCI subjects.

Interaction between phonological and grammatical processing in single word production in Kiswahili

Grammatical priming of picture naming was investigated in Kiswahili, which has a complex grammatical noun class system (a system like grammatical gender), with up to 15 noun classes that have obligatory agreements on adjectives, verbs, pronouns and other parts of speech. Participants heard a grammatically agreeing (concordant), nonagreeing (discordant) or neutral prime before seeing a picture of a common object and being asked to name the object. Priming was found, with naming following concordant primes being faster than naming following the neutral prime ('say'). However, more interestingly, effects were found such that where two noun classes share a prefix, the grammatical prime from each of these two noun classes also primed words that have the same prefix but are not in the same noun class, and hence for which the prime was not grammatical. It is concluded that the prime appears to be facilitating the phonological form of the prefix rather than the syntacto-semantic group of words that are known as a noun class, and that the phonological form associated with a grammatical entity may be more significant in its processing than has previously been supposed.

How the mass counts: an electrophysiological approach to the processing of lexical features

Nouns may refer to countable objects such as tables, or to mass entities such as rice. The mass/count distinction has been discussed in terms of both semantic and syntactic features encoded in the mental lexicon. Here we show that event-related potentials (ERPs) can reflect the processing of such lexical features, even in the absence of any feature-related violations. We demonstrate that count (vs mass) nouns elicit a frontal negativity which is independent of the N400 marker for conceptual-semantic processing, but resembles anterior negativities related to grammatical processing. This finding suggests that the brain differentiates between count and mass nouns primarily on a syntactic basis.