Metaphor congruent image schemas shape evaluative judgment: a cross-linguistic study of metaphors for economic change

Metaphor pervades discussions of important socio-political topics. Recent research indicates that metaphorical language can influence how people reason about such topics, potentially affecting real-world decision-making. In this study, we report on research into the effects of metaphor on evaluative judgment, another aspect of decision-making that has been less well studied than reasoning. We use a cross-linguistic difference in the metaphors used by English and Spanish speakers to discuss economic change to investigate how metaphorical language affects evaluative judgment. We show that the image schematic information inherent in the semantics of the different metaphors performs a central role in shaping this process.