Journal

Volume 21, Issue 4 (December 31, 2020)

6 articles

• Celebrating the 20th Anniversary of the Journal of Cognitive Science
  by Chungmin Lee
  J. CS. 2020, 21(4), 0-;
  Abstract Ever since the Cognitive Revolution of the 1950s, the interdisciplinary field of cognitive science has developed greatly. Alongside the journals of Cognitive Science and Trends in Cognitive Sciences, the Journal of Cognitive Science was established as a conduit for the ever-increasing research lines... [Read more].
  Abstract Ever since the Cognitive Revolution of the 1950s, the interdisciplinary field of cognitive science has developed greatly. Alongside the journals of Cognitive Science and Trends in Cognitive Sciences, the Journal of Cognitive Science was established as a conduit for the ever-increasing research lines in cognitive science. As a SCOPUS indexed journal, it has attracted papers from eminent scholars such as Smolensky, Gentner and Chalmers, has held special issues on consciousness (Chalmers declaring it a hard problem) and a very recent series of special issues on biological mentality and (forthcoming) semantic space.It is open to all scholars who are concerned with the basic science of the structure of mind, as applied to AI (e.g., 'Deep Mind' and speech understanding in relation to the speaker such as ‘Alexa’ and the bot ‘GPT3’), quantum sciences delving into how the mind works in the brain, human and artificial neural net research (such as ‘AlphaFold’). Moreover, the Journal of Cognitive Science has gained the reputation of featuring language-related and philosophy-related cognitive science research (reflecting typological characteristics of Asian minds as well).In this defining COVID-19 era, let us celebrate the journal’s 20th anniversary with a glass of wine on-line and in print!Finally, on this occasion, I, as the editor-in-chief for these 20 years, would like to express my deep gratitude to all paper contributors, peer reviewers, editorial assistants, advisory editorial board, editorial board, special issue editors, and editors. My thanks also extends to the directors of the Institute for Cognitive Science, SNU, the International Association for Cognitive Science (IACS, which sponsors the biannual International Conference on Cognitive Science) and the Korean Society for Cognitive Science for administrative and financial support. Additionally, I appreciate Stanford University Library, Japanese university libraries (including Chukyo University), and other libraries and OSPs for subscribing to the journal. Finally, I cannot forget to mention our printing places such as Seoul National University Press and Hyoil.Chungmin LeeEditor-in-Chief [Collapse]
• Facial Attractiveness: The Role of Iris Ratio
  by Negar Sammaknejad, Darren Peshek, Donald Hoffman, Pete Foley
  J. CS. 2020, 21(4), 507-532;
  Abstract The ratio of iris width to eye width in the human eye is roughly 0.6 during infancy, falls to about 0.42 in young adulthood and middle age, and then increases again after age 50. Thus the iris-to-eye ratio (IER) is a nonlinear, probabilistic signal of age. Has natural selection shaped our judgments ... [Read more].
  Abstract The ratio of iris width to eye width in the human eye is roughly 0.6 during infancy, falls to about 0.42 in young adulthood and middle age, and then increases again after age 50. Thus the iris-to-eye ratio (IER) is a nonlinear, probabilistic signal of age. Has natural selection shaped our judgments of facial attractiveness to be sensitive to the IER? Here we present an experiment suggesting that, for male observers, the answer is yes. On each trial, an observer viewed two young adult faces that were identical except for IER (0.48 versus 0.42), and indicated which face was more attractive. Male observers preferred the larger IER (which signals youth) in both male and female faces, suggesting that males have indeed been shaped by natural selection to be sensitive to the IER in their judgments of facial attractiveness, and to prefer IERs indicative of youth. Viewing faces upside-down did not affect this preference, indicating that IER is processed primarily as a local feature in the analysis of facial attractiveness. Females showed no preference for larger or smaller IERs, a result that invites further exploration. [Collapse]
• The Information Diversity Effect on Investor Relations: An Experimental Study on Investors’ Evaluation of a Firm
  by Anna Mun
  J. CS. 2020, 21(4), 533-568;
  Abstract This study investigated how an investor's evaluation of a firm varies depending on the type of corporate information presented on the firm’s website. Based on previous studies, three factors were assumed to influence this evaluation: (a) the information itself, (b) the information source, and (c) th... [Read more].
  Abstract This study investigated how an investor's evaluation of a firm varies depending on the type of corporate information presented on the firm’s website. Based on previous studies, three factors were assumed to influence this evaluation: (a) the information itself, (b) the information source, and (c) the investor’s involvement. Using an experiment involving 232 participants, the effect of corporate information quality on an investor’s evaluation was assessed. The results revealed that high information diversity significantly improved the investor’s positive evaluation of a firm. In addition, high investor involvement was more likely to induce positive investment belief in the presence of high information diversity. Perceived information credibility was a mediator in the cognitive path between information diversity and investment belief. On the other hand, a low level of investor involvement was more likely to induce positive investment belief in the presence of a high level of heuristic cues for the information source. [Collapse]
• Masked phonological priming in languages with different scripts: Evidence from Korean-English bilinguals
  by Ji Hyon Kim, Nayeon Kim, Jae-hee Yang
  J. CS. 2020, 21(4), 569-594;
  Abstract The present study investigated the issue of nonselective phonological access in different-script bilinguals. Korean-English bilinguals participated in two masked phonological priming experiments with Korean primes and English targets. A significant cross-linguistic phonological priming effect was fo... [Read more].
  Abstract The present study investigated the issue of nonselective phonological access in different-script bilinguals. Korean-English bilinguals participated in two masked phonological priming experiments with Korean primes and English targets. A significant cross-linguistic phonological priming effect was found when the prime was phonologically similar to the target. This priming effect was not modulated by the degree of phonological overlap (one-syllable prime vs. twosyllable prime) between the prime and target. These results provide evidence in support of the Bilingual Interactive Activation Plus (BIA+) model’s claims of nonselective access in bilinguals. The absence of an interaction between degree of overlap and priming is discussed in terms of excitatory and inhibitory connections in models of bilingual word recognition. [Collapse]
• Syntactic Categories in Early Child English: A Corpus Study of Article Production
  by Kum-Jeong Joo, Isaiah WonHo Yoo, Kitaek Kim
  J. CS. 2020, 21(4), 595-618;
  Abstract A topic of ongoing debate in regard to the acquisition of English articles is whether the articles very young children produce are abstract categories or limited scope formulae. This study investigates the issue by analyzing five English-speaking children’s corpus data, classified into four phases a... [Read more].
  Abstract A topic of ongoing debate in regard to the acquisition of English articles is whether the articles very young children produce are abstract categories or limited scope formulae. This study investigates the issue by analyzing five English-speaking children’s corpus data, classified into four phases according to the number of article+noun combinations. The study has two main findings. First, the analysis found no sign of a U-shaped curve in the development of overt articles in obligatory contexts, a finding which indicates that the children did not pass through an initial stage of producing articles only as part of rote-learned formulae. Second, it was found that children produced predicate adjectives but no postverbal articles lacking nouns, a finding which constitutes evidence for the acquisition of articles. Taken together, the results provide positive evidence that English-speaking children’s early articles are an overt instantiation of an adultlike syntactic category [Collapse]
• Investigating the production of Greek compounds by bidialectal and bilingual children
  by Maria Tenizi, Georgios P. Georgiou
  J. CS. 2020, 21(4), 619-648;
  Abstract Compound production by bidialectal and bilingual children has received scarce attention in terms of research since most of the studies in the literature focus on monolingual populations. Such investigations can offer an understanding of morphological acquisition in bidialectal and bilingual speakers... [Read more].
  Abstract Compound production by bidialectal and bilingual children has received scarce attention in terms of research since most of the studies in the literature focus on monolingual populations. Such investigations can offer an understanding of morphological acquisition in bidialectal and bilingual speakers. Also, it has been proposed that formal schooling enhances metalinguistic awareness and contributes to better control of the native language. The present study aims to investigate the Greek noun (noun + noun) and verbal (verb + verb) compound production patterns of Cypriot Greek – Standard Modern Greek bidialectal children and bidialectal plus bilingual children (English) (henceforth bilingual), and the effect of formal education on these productions. To this purpose, 35 preschool and first-grade bidialectal and bilingual children who permanently live in Cyprus participated in an experimental study in which they were instructed to produce Greek compound words after watching pictures and clips in a controlled environment. The results showed that bidialectal preschoolers outperformed bilingual preschoolers in the formation of correct compounds and they had relatively fewer errors than bilinguals, while there was a prevalent interference of the local dialect in their productions. Also, first-grade bidialectals demonstrated better performance than preschool bidialectals in the formation of correct compounds and had fewer errors in compound formation, but bilingual firstgraders had worse overall performance than bilingual preschoolers. It is assumed that these differences are affected by the children’s linguistic repertoire and their attunement to the speech input of their environment. The study offers useful insights into how bidialectal and bilingual children construct compounds in an underresearched linguistic context and demonstrates the effect of sociolinguistic factors on compound production. [Collapse]