This paper surveys some of the important trends of the research on metaphor comprehension in the cognitive science area. We examine the semantic theories of the metaphor, some pros and (mostly) cons of the very challenged error-recovery model of metaphor comprehension. We present Lakoo's view that metaphors are conceptual rather than linguistic phenomena; we discuss how theories of other tropes...

The comprehension of metaphors involves the ability to activate a broader, more flexible set of semantic associations in order to integrate the meanings of the weakly related parts of the metaphor into a meaningful linguistic expression. Previous findings point to a relation between levels of creativity and efficiency in processing metaphoric expressions, as measured by reaction times (RTs) and...

English uses the horizontal spatial metaphors to express time (e.g., the good days ahead of us). Chinese also uses the vertical metaphors (e.g., 'the month above' to mean last month). Do Chinese speakers, then, think about time in a different way than English speakers? Boroditsky [Boroditsky, L. (2001). Does language shape thought? Mandarin and English speakers' conceptions of time. Cognitive P...

Since the 1980s metaphors have been used to design computer interfaces in order to facilitate user learning. As computer systems become more complex, the issue of using a large number of metaphors of narrow scope to design interfaces has arisen. Several researchers have proposed the use of multiple metaphors in the design of computer systems. This study set out to compare the effects of structu...

Metaphors have a tremendous power to guide our actions. In Information Systems Development (ISD) certain metaphors like Software Engineering has guided our thinking concerning how we practice ISD and also how we teach ISD. The argument of this paper is that if we, as ISD teachers, expand our metaphors of ISD we will be able to think more creatively about how we can teach ISD.

The affections of a person can be expressed by non-verbal methods such as facial expressions, gestures, postures and expressions from eyes. While implicit language like emotional metaphor is also an important way to express one’s affections. Different kinds of emotional metaphors in Chinese and their characteristics are proposed, including happiness, sadness, anger, fear and surprise. Experimen...

Unlike Lexical Projections, Functional Projections (Extended Projections) are more of an ‘abstract’ in nature. Therefore, Functional Projections seem to be acquired later than Lexical Projections by the L2 learners. The present study investigates Iranian L2 learners’ acquisition of English Extended Projections taking into account their level of grammatical proficiency. Specifically, the aim is ...

Systemic functional grammar constructs a grammar for the purpose of text analysis to investigate how grammar is used as a means of making meaning. Grammatical metaphor is one of the language phenomena introduced by Halliday (2004) in the framework of functional grammar. The present work focuses on the application of Halliday’s metafunctional framework in health texts of English newspapers. The ...