Study of Changes in Language Ability Based on Data from a Word Association Test

Changes in the language ability of native speakers under the influence of the rapid development of technology and the transformation of the surrounding world is one of the urgent problems of modern psycholinguistics. The re-search material was the data of the Russian associative dictionary (late 80s - early 90s of the twentieth century) and the results of a free associative experiment presented in the multilingual associative thesaurus of politeness (2020). Within the framework of the theory of speech activity, the cue−target pair is considered as a speech action. According to the model of speech action developed by us, its essential components are methods and means of predication. The paper shows that significant changes have occurred in the structure of the associative fields "dog" of different fixation times, emphasizing the dynamics of the language ability of native speakers. The number of speech actions of the full syntactic cycle decreased by 26%, and the number of syntactic primitives and topic-comment structures increased by 10% and 16%, respectively, which indicates a decrease in the level of potential readiness to produce and perceive speech actions of the full syntactic cycle. Different hierarchy of structural components of the analyzed associative field demonstrate changes in the means of predication. The experimentally revealed reduction in the proportion of operational associates (-14%) and emotional-evaluative reactions (-26%) indicates a decrease in the importance of emotive and linguistic orienting points in the formation of associative links, and also diagnoses a decrease in the level of language competence. The increase in the share of conceptual reactions (+12%) and reactions-images (+28%) emphasizes the dominance of cognitive orienting points in the production of speech actions.

1. Pishchalnikova V. A. [Integration of linguistic disciplines as an objective necessity for the development of modern linguistics]. Yazykovoe bytie cheloveka i etnosa: psiholingvistich-eskii i kognitivnyi aspekty [Linguistic being of a person and ethnos: psycholinguistic and cogni-tive aspects]. Moscow, Barnaul, AlSU Publ., 2003, vol. 6. 272 p. (In Russ.).

2. Butakova L. O. Yazykovaya sposobnost', rechevaya kompetenciya, rechevaya deyatel'nost' predstavitelej pokoleniya Z [Language ability, speech competence, speech activity of representatives of generation Z]. Russkij yazyk v shkole = Russian Language at School, 2021, vol. 82(4), pp. 61–74. https://doi.org/10.30515/0131-6141-2021-82-4-61-74

3. Rossijskaya psiholingvistika: itogi i perspektivy (1966-2021) [Russian psycholinguistics: results and prospects (1966 – 2021)]; ed. by Sternin I. A., Ufimtseva N. V., Myagkova E. Yu. Moscow: Institute of Linguistics, MMA Publ., 2021. 626 p. http://dx.doi.org/10.30982/978-5-6045633-7-3.

4. Associativnyj eksperiment: teoreticheskie i prikladnye perspektivy psiholingvistiki [Asso-ciative experiment: theoretical and applied perspectives of psycholinguistics]; ed. by Pishchal-nikova V.A. Moscow, R. Valent Publ., 2019. 200 p.

5. Zalevskaya A. A. Znachenie slova cherez prizmu eksperimenta [The meaning of the word through the prism of the experiment]. Tver, Tverskoy gos. Universitet Publ., 2011. 240 p.

6. De Deyne S., Storms G. Word associations: Network and semantic properties. Behavior Research Methods, 2008, vol. 40, pp. 213–231. http://dx.doi.org/10.3758/BRM.40.1.198

7. Fitzpatrick T. Word association patterns: unpacking the assumptions. International Jour-nal of Applied Linguistics, 2007, vol. 17 (3), pp. 319–331. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1473-4192.2007.00172.x

8. Guts E.N. Psiholingvisticheskoe issledovanie yazykovogo soznaniya podrostka [Psycho-linguistic study of the language consciousness of a teenager]. Omsk, Variant-Omsk Publ., 2005. 260 p.

9. Nelson D. L., McEvoy C. L., Schreiber T. A. The University of South Florida free asso-ciation, rhyme, and word fragment norms. Behavior Research Methods, Instruments, & Comput-ers, 2004, vol. 36, pp. 02–407. http://dx.doi.org/10.3758/BF03195588

10. Karaulov Yu. N. Russkij associativnyj slovar' kak novyj lingvisticheskij istochnik i in-strument analiza yazykovoj sposobnosti [Russian associative dictionary as a new linguistic source and tool for the analysis of language ability]. Russkij associativnyj slovar' [Russian asso-ciative dictionary]. Moscow, Astrel: AST Publ., 2002. 992 p. (In Russ.).

11. Leont'ev A. A. Osnovy teorii rechevoj deyatel'nosti [Fundamentals of the theory of speech activity]. Moscow, Nauka Publ., 1974. 368 p.

12. Pishchalnikova V. A. Interpretaciya associativnyh dannyh kak problema metodologii psiholingvistiki [Interpretation of Associative Data as a Methodogical Issue of Psycholinguis-tics]. Russian Journal of Linguistics, 2019, vol. 23 (3), pp. 749–761. http://dx.doi.org/10.22363/ 23129182-2019-23-3-749-761.

13. Karaulov Yu.N, Cherkasova G.A., Ufimtseva N.V., Sorokin Yu.A., Tarasov E.F. Russ-kiy assotsiativnyy slovar' [Russian associative dictionary]. Available at: http://tesaurus.ru/dict/

14. Stepykin N. I., Mironova D. M. Proekt mul'tilingval'nogo associativnogo tezaurusa vezhlivosti [Project of multilingual associative thesaurus of politeness], Kursk, 2020. 205 p.

15. Stepykin N. I. Rechevoe dejstvie kak psiholingvisticheskij mekhanizm porozhdeniya i aktualizacii smysla. Diss. d-ra filol. nauk [Speech action as a psycholinguistic mechanism of generation and actualization of sense. Dr. of sci. philo. diss.]. Moscow, Moscow State Linguistic University Publ., 2021. 457 p.

16. Stepykin N.I. Potencial primeneniya formalizovannyh parametrov dlya modelirovaniya rechevogo dejstviya [Potential of Using Formalized Parameters for Modeling Speech Action].Nauchnyj dialog = Nauchnyi Dialog, 2021, vol. (8), pp. 112–127. https://doi.org/10.24224/2227-1295-2021-8-112-127

17. Stepykin N. I. Dinamika mekhanizmov rechevogo dejstviya (na materiale associa-tivnogo polya "zlo") [Dynamics of speech action mechanisms (an analysis of the associative field “evil”)]. Vestnik of Moscow State Linguistic University. Gumanitarnye nauki = = Vestnik Moskovskogo gosudarstvennogo lingvisticheskogo universiteta. Humanities, 2019, vol. 4 (820), pp. 69 – 80.

18. Pishchalnikova V. A. Istoriya i teoriya psiholingvistiki [History and theory of psycho-linguistics]. Moscow, R. Valent Publ., 2021. 488 p.