How the Brain makes Sense of Metaphor: Inference, Imagery, and Processing Dynamics
GB 5/150–152 „Ruhrpott“
Guest lecture by Valentina Bambini (Professor of Linguistics at the University School for Advanced Studies IUSS in Pavia, Italy).
How does the brain construct metaphorical meaning, and what role do sensory-motor processes play? In this talk, I will bring together a series of studies on metaphor comprehension to explore its temporal dynamics and underlying mechanisms. Drawing on evidence from neuropragmatics, I will argue that understanding metaphor involves inferential and predictive processes that fine-tune lexical-semantic representations and support the construction of implicatures. I will examine how these processes unfold over time and how their trajectories vary with individual characteristics and properties of the metaphors themselves. Extending this account beyond propositional meaning, I will discuss evidence for the contribution of mental imagery. Particular attention will be given to clinical populations, in which intrusive visual imagery may interfere with predictive mechanisms and contribute to atypical metaphor processing. Together, these findings inform a neurochronometric model of metaphor comprehension that integrates inferential, sensory-motor, and neurocognitive dimensions.
