Semantics Research Group (Tokyo/Hybrid) 2026/2/27

[jrta...@gmail.com]

意味論研究会のお知らせ

意味論研究会の会合をお知らせします。対面の場所・ズームのアクセス情報は下記の通りです。どなたでも参加できますので，多くの方の参加をお待ちしています。また、会合終了後に食事会を予定しております。ご参加希望の方はご指名と所属をご記入の上、その旨を2月11日（水）までにChris Tancrediにご連絡くださいますようお願い致します。(Chris Tancredi, cdtan...@gmail.com )

The Semantics Research Group will be having a talk as detailed below. There will also be a dinner after the talk. If you would like to participate in the dinner, please RSVP with Chris Tancredi by Wednesday, Feb. 11th. Make sure to include your name and affiliation. (Chris Tancredi,  cdtan...@gmail.com )

Date: February 27th (Friday)

Time: 5:00 pm

Place: Keio University, Mita campus, South Annex building, 7th floor conference room https://www.keio.ac.jp/en/maps/mita.html

Online option: https://keio-univ.zoom.us/j/82972175560?pwd=YlRuaGt0NUFWWmI1ajhrNm1vQ3ZVZz09

Speaker: Wataru Uegaki

Title: An efficiency-based effect of frequency on lexicalization: a dyadic experiment (joint work with Anne Mucha and Ciyang Qing)

Abstract: 

Zipf’s Law of Abbreviation states that the more frequent a word is, the shorter it tends to be. Zipf’s own explanation of the law in terms of the trade-off between cognitive effort and communicative accuracy, i.e., Principle of Least Effort, predicts that a similar pattern holds not only for word length but also for the lexical/compositional distinction. That is, lexical forms tend to express more frequent meanings compared to compositional forms. In this paper, we report on a dyadic communication experiment that supports this prediction