Language and Thought - Experiments

LATTE (Language Aspect Tense Test)

Subjects are shown three pictures, each depicting a succession of action.

Afterwards, subjects are presented with random pictures, where they are asked to write a sentence describing the picture. The target of this experiment is to investigate the use of tense in Indonesian language, which correlates to Indonesians' conception of time.

TripleLATTE

The target of this experiment is to investigate the conception of time in early childhood development.

LIME

Does the way we talk about time influence the way we think about it? Some languages express time in terms of distance, while others in terms of quantity. Previous study in the cognition lab showed that English speakers tend to look at time as if time moves in a horizontal line, while Mandarin speakers look at time as if it moves vertically. Whereas English speakers say June is the next month, Mandarin speakers say June is the down month (xia ge yue).
This experiment intends to investigate Indonesians' spatial language and temporal thinking.

a. Growing lines
Subjects are presented with lines ‘growing' horizontally across monitor one pixel at a time. They are then asked to estimate either the duration or the length (displacement) of each line by clicking the mouse to indicate the beginning and end of the estimated temporal or spatial interval. In addition to horizontal lines, subjects are also presented with vertical lines.

b. Filling tanks
Subjects view schematically drawn containers on the monitor being filled vertically, one row of pixels at a time. Subjects are to imagine the container as a tank being filled with water. They are then asked to estimate either the amount of time it took to fill the tank or the amount of water in the tank at the end of the trial, using mouse clicks.

(courtesy of Boroditsky, L. and Casasanto, D., 2001)

SOSIS

Subjects are shown three pictures of one event. They are asked to describe in one short sentence each picture. The sentences are then analysed for segmental features.

TEA

Subjects are shown a number of objects, such as ball, book, blouse, pen, etc. Then the objects reappear beside a stick figure, either male or female.

After each picture is shown, subjects are asked whether the object appeared with a girl or a boy, and whether the object was on the left or the right side of the screen (the center being the stick figure). The objective of this experiment is to investigate the gender assignment in Indonesian speakers as well as horizontal orientation (right/left).

BlameGame

BlameGame is our most recent project. This project is designed by Caitlin Fausey, Lera Boroditsky's student. This experiment proposes that the degree of ‘blame' factor in the language defines the thought process of the people who speak the language. In this experiment, subjects are shown random short videos of mishaps as well as intended actions. Then they are asked to provide a short explanation on the short videos they have just seen. The short description reflects Indonesians' perspective on subject-object correlation.